By Jim Sedlak
On Friday, May 28, 2021, Joe Biden released a budget request for FY2022 (budget request, appendix, and fact sheet). As was expected, Biden’s proposed budget is filled with pro-abortion details and will, if passed, provide millions more federal dollars to Planned Parenthood.
The reaction of Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s president, Alexis McGill Johnson, reveals how excited Planned Parenthood is about this budget proposal. She said: “President Biden’s budget, which proposes to end Hyde, is a historic step in the fight for repro freedom. Momentum is on our side, and we look forward to working with the administration & Congress to end the racist, discriminatory Hyde amendment once and for all.”
Once again, Planned Parenthood, which has openly admitted it is a racist, white supremacist organization today, tries to deflect criticism by calling everything it doesn’t like “racist” and “discriminatory.”
Johnson chose to highlight the Hyde Amendment because its existence in the law for over 45 years has prevented Planned Parenthood from claiming even more taxpayer money than it already receives. The Hyde Amendment prohibits federal funding within the Health and Human Services Appropriations bill from being used to pay for elective abortions. The amendment was first added to Congressional appropriations bills in 1976—three years after the Roe decision. It has been renewed every year since 1976 on a bipartisan basis.
The Hyde Amendment is not perfect. While originally having just an exception to save the life of the mother, today that exception has been expanded to include abortions in cases of rape or incest. Yet, the withholding of federal monies has undeniably reduced the total number of abortions.
Even with the Hyde Amendment in force, Planned Parenthood reports that it received $618.1 million dollars in taxpayer money in its latest fiscal year; that is 38 percent of Planned Parenthood’s total budget. Can you imagine how much taxpayer money is going to flow to Planned Parenthood from the Department of Health and Human Services (currently run by PP supporter Xavier Becerra) if the Hyde Amendment is removed?
Recent polls claim that 53 percent of Americans consider themselves to be pro-choice. Yet, those same polls show that 58 percent are opposed to taxpayer funding of abortion. A whopping 77 percent are opposed to paying for abortions in foreign countries. In the past, the International Planned Parenthood Federation has reported receiving millions of dollars from the United States. If the proposed Biden budget is passed without including the Hyde Amendment, the number of abortions in the United States will greatly expand, and more and more of our tax dollars will wind up in the bank accounts of Planned Parenthood affiliates in the United States and around the world.
Planned Parenthood claimed that it spent over $45 million to get Biden elected. It also succeeded in getting a major ideological supporter of Planned Parenthood—Kamala Harris—elected to the office of vice president of the United States. Biden and Harris then managed to get another major supporter of Planned Parenthood—Xavier Becerra—appointed as head of the Department of Health and Human Services. As such, he will control where all that extra money for abortions will go.
It is no wonder that Alexis McGill Johnson chose to highlight the attack on Hyde and use it to illustrate that “momentum” is on the side of Planned Parenthood. Yet, in using that analogy, Johnson has told us how we can stop what is happening. As I learned decades ago in my physics classes, we can stop the momentum by applying a larger force in the opposite direction.
We have been comfortable with Hyde because it has been routinely renewed. But now that there is momentum to get rid of it, we must not only save Hyde, but we must strengthen it. Now is the time for all Americans to insist that, not only must Hyde be maintained, but it should be strengthened by having all its exceptions removed.
If the six out of 10 Americans who oppose taxpayer funding of abortion get behind a campaign to “Strengthen Hyde,” we can hand Planned Parenthood a major defeat and save even more babies every year!
Jim Sedlak is executive director of American Life League, founder of STOPP International, and host of a weekly talk show on the Radio Maria Network. He has been successfully fighting Planned Parenthood since 1985.