Even though it swore up and down for weeks that it did nothing wrong, Planned Parenthood claimed today it will stop accepting payment in exchange for aborted baby parts harvested by its abortionists:
In order to completely debunk the disingenuous argument that our opponents have been using – and to reveal the true political purpose of these attacks – our Federation has decided, going forward, that any Planned Parenthood health center that is involved in donating tissue after an abortion for medical research will follow the model already in place at one of our two affiliates currently facilitating donations for fetal tissue research. That affiliate accepts no reimbursement for its reasonable expenses – even though reimbursement is fully permitted under the 1993 law. Going forward, all of our health centers will follow the same policy, even if it means they will not recover reimbursements permitted by the 1993 law.
Despite its previous claims of innocence, Planned Parenthood’s announcement today suggests that the organization knew its activities were almost certainly illegal.
When the shocking videos of Planned Parenthood were first released, the taxpayer-funded abortion mill said it only accepted reimbursement for the cost of harvesting and shipping aborted baby body parts. According to the group, accepting mere reimbursement, rather than profiting from the practice, is allowed by law. The undercover videos, however, showed multiple senior Planned Parenthood staff haggling over the prices they would accept in exchange for aborted baby body parts. In one video, one Planned Parenthood executive said she needed a good price for baby body parts because, “I need a Lamborghini.”
Planned Parenthood’s decision to stop taking cash for organs was spurred entirely by a series of undercover videos by The Center for Medical Progress which were decried by Planned Parenthood supporters as “deceptively edited.” In fact, the videos were released in full, and a forensic audit showed that there was no deceptive editing whatsoever.
Abortion activists masquerading as journalists tried their best to cover up the footage. For the most part, they followed Planned Parenthood’s request to not cover the videos, which resulted in a virtual blackout of coverage from certain outlets for quite some time. When they did finally decide to write about it, these activists with bylines would parrot Planned Parenthood’s false talking points or repeat falsehoods about the abortion provider’s website being attacked by extremists.
Despite the best efforts of Planned Parenthood’s allies to discredit these videos and prop up Planned Parenthoods organ-trafficking scheme as something charitable and good-natured, the announced change in policy seems to indicate that those “deceptively edited videos” actually highlighted a widespread practice that Planned Parenthood was desperate to keep in the dark.
In several of those undercover videos, Planned Parenthood officials are seen haggling over the price of organs in an attempt to get as much money out of them as possible. If they really were just getting reimbursed for reasonable expenses, wouldn’t it make sense to itemize the precise costs associated with baby organ harvesting — like transportation and freezer space — to recoup the exact dollar amount spent? Instead, Planned Parenthood employees were caught trying to upcharge investigators posing as organ buyers in what was clearly an effort to make money from aborted baby parts. One Planned Parenthood executive said it would be a good thing if some clinics “do a little better than break even.” Others emphasized the need to be discreet about all financial negotiations.
David Daleiden, the founder of the Center for Medical Progress (CMP), stated that the nation’s largest abortion provider’s policy change is an admission of guilt.
“If the money Planned Parenthood has been receiving for baby body parts were truly legitimate ‘reimbursement,’ why cancel it?” Daleiden asked. “This proves what CMP has been saying all along—Planned Parenthood incurs no actual costs, and the payments for harvested fetal parts have always been an extra profit margin.”
Daleiden also noted that there’s no way to monitor how, or even if, Planned Parenthood plans to enforce its new policy.
“Without releasing the text of the alleged new ‘policy’ and the exact model from the their Washington affiliate, Planned Parenthood’s stunt today tells us nothing,” Daleiden said.
Cecile Richards, the wealthy head of Planned Parenthood, said the group will now refuse to accept reimbursement, but how can you end a policy that you never even had in the first place? It’s clear from the videos that Planned Parenthood and its partners had little interest in merely getting reimbursed for the cost of harvesting and trafficking aborted baby parts. Anyone can see that Planned Parenthood staff were eager to negotiate the best price possible for these baby parts.
Until Planned Parenthood specifically details its new policy and how it plans to enforce it in every single Planned Parenthood facility in the country, and given Planned Parenthood’s documented record of dishonesty over the last several months, a little skepticism about the group’s latest claim seems to be be the best policy going forward.
