Cecile Richards has proven she can’t answer questions well after she gave a disastrous ABC News interview near the beginning of the fetal parts scandal. So recently, we’ve been hearing more from her Executive Vice President, Dawn Laguens.
Laguens is more personable than Richards; she smiles, looks less tense with difficult questions, and puts a happy face on Planned Parenthood by looking like someone’s aunt instead of like the second-in-command at a killing factory. Ultimately, though, she comes off like a talking, yellow smiley face that’s been programmed to spew rhetoric rather than reality.
On CNN’s New Day, Laguens faced off with host Alisyn Camerota, and probably regrets she did. CNN may not be the place most conservatives would expect to find the tough questions, but Camerota delivered them.
In the video, she begins by asking Laguens if she feels the tide on Capitol Hill is turning against Planned Parenthood. With a big smile, Laguens says:
Oh, absolutely not, Alisyn! And today I’m just thrilled that two and a half million Americans can continue to get their important, preventative, excellent health care at Planned Parenthood.
Adjectives aside, she then insists, “What we’re seeing has very little to do with health care or even fetal tissue research and has everything to do with Republican primary politics.”
Camerota doesn’t buy that. She says Laguens is right that it isn’t about women’s health care, but most would say it’s about abortion. (Click below to view video.)
Camerota points out what few have been saying: That the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) has placed all the unedited videos and accompanying full transcripts on its website. Laguens then expands on the “highly-edited” answer we’ve been hearing for weeks. She smiles more and denies these are really the full, unedited videos:
That is actually not a fact, and since we have known for years that this has been a strategy to deceptively edit in inflammatory ways these kinds of videos, put them out, claim that they put out the full tape. We can tell that these are still edited tapes.
Laguens doesn’t explain how she knows it’s a “fact” that CMP edited its unedited videos to make them look unedited when they edited them; Laguens reasoning is about as clear as that line of thought.
Her comment that “we can tell,” is not a fact – it is accusation, which seems to be all Planned Parenthood has left. Clearly, the abortion giant is realizing the “highly-edited” line isn’t working, since the full versions are available to people, so they have found a new line. Truly, they are grasping at anything they can.
Laguens tries to volley Camerota’s questions back to the Senate vote, which she seems to see as a victory, despite the fact that for the first time a majority voted to defund Planned Parenthood. Laguens insists that the Senate vote actually “has nothing to do with abortion,” she insists, since federal money can’t be used for abortion.
Nope. Camerota is not falling for that one either. She explains how people will say money is fungible; that having $500 million in free money frees them up to do more abortion work. Camerota moves on quickly and shows Laguens a clip of Dr. Deborah Nucatola from the first video and comments that it seems “something unscrupulous is happening.” Suddenly it’s all just the editing again. Laguens, still smiling, says:
We don’t know what she was responding to… they move around tape, one in front of the other so that you’re not clear if shes even talking about fetal tissue.
Camerota never relents, but never badgers either. She actually presents legitimate questions and stays on topic, which is more than Laguens can do.
Laguens says it’s all a political game:
What we’re seeing here are attacks on people’s ability to get health care. We’re seeing attacks that are intended, in their end analysis, to get rid of safe, legal abortion in this country and destroy Planned Parenthood, who stands up for the reproductive health rights and freedom of women and all people in this country.
Pro-abortion Media Matters reported on the interview and said:
CNN’s Alisyn Camerota pointed to deceptively edited videos and transcripts from the anti-choice group The Center for Medical Progress (CMP) to question whether “something unscrupulous” may be happening at Planned Parenthood, despite the fact that fact-checkers, media outlets, and state investigations have all concluded the videos mislead about Planned Parenthood’s legal donation of fetal tissue.
Media Matters doesn’t present the facts any better than Laguens, however, since none of that is true. Some media outlets that are abortion supporters have tried to discredit the videos, but that doesn’t prove anything except media bias. And the state investigations are not complete. Indiana found no wrongdoing in a brief investigation, but neither does it participate in the fetal tissue donation program, so that’s hardly evidence.
And in Texas, which was implicated in the fifth video, Governor Greg Abbott issued a statement that said:
The latest video showing Planned Parenthood’s treatment of unborn children in a Houston clinic is repulsive and unconscionable. Selling baby body parts is the furthest thing imaginable from providing women’s healthcare, and this organization’s repeated and systematic disrespect for human life is appalling.
The State of Texas is aggressively investigating this matter and must use all available legal remedies to address this depraved conduct.
Media Matters may want to believe there is no merit to the video evidence, but repeating what Planned Parenthood says doesn’t make it the truth.
Laguens adds an ironic statement at the end the interview. “Outside of the Beltway,” she says, referring to political matters in Washington, D.C., “they know what Planned Parenthood is.”
She tries to add the compassion line, but the fact is, everyone who has paid attention and bothered to examine the evidence in front of them does know what Planned Parenthood is, and a compassionate provider of medical care is nowhere near the top of the list.
A twin in Houston could tell you that–if the dismembered baby had ever been allowed to speak.
