"When I saw what Rep. Henry Waxman said about federal funding for crisis pregnancy centers, the first thing that came to mind was Planned Parenthood," said American Life League president Judie Brown. "He offered a definitive reason for withdrawing all federal, state and taxpayer money from the group that operates America's largest chain of abortion clinics."
"It's wrong to pour millions of federal dollars into organizations that are providing false health information to vulnerable teenagers," the California Democrat told the Associated Press.
"That is exactly what Planned Parenthood does," said Mrs. Brown, "and this controversial organization has been doing so with impunity for generations." In addition, she noted that Waxman has a 100 percent approval rating from Planned Parenthood and that, while he is complaining about the estimated $30 million in taxpayer money received by pregnancy care centers since 2001, Planned Parenthood has received 40 times as much – more than $1.2 billion during the same period.
American Life League has repeatedly cautioned parents to keep their children away from Teenwire, Planned Parenthood's youth-oriented web site that encourages all varieties of sexual activity and leads young people to believe that a condom can offer foolproof protection against pregnancy and any number of sexually transmitted diseases. "I challenge Planned Parenthood to prove to me that premarital sexual activity is 'healthy' for any child," said Mrs. Brown, adding that Planned Parenthood tells teens such things as pornography is not harmful and emergency contraception can not cause abortion.
She renewed her call for Congress to stop giving money to Planned Parenthood. "This organization has engorged itself with almost $4 billion tax dollars over the past 20 years. It has aborted more than 3 million babies and it has contributed to a mindset that is focused almost exclusively on sex. It will take years to undo the damage; we can start today by closing the spigot, cutting off the flow of our hard-earned tax money into Planned Parenthood's coffers."
American Life League is leading a petition drive that seeks to do just that. The petition is online at www.StopPlannedParenthoodTaxFunding.com.
Release issued: 18 Jul 06