Despite a “clear margin” of House Republicans opposing such a measure, Fox News reports that a stopgap spending bill was approved by Congress just hours before the midnight deadline to avoid a government shutdown. The bill, which still includes funding for the as-yet-unaccountable abortion giant, Planned Parenthood, will fund the government until December 11th.
But according to Fox News, there is “no assurance there won’t be yet another shutdown showdown” at that time…
Democrats helped beleaguered House Republican leaders pass the measure by 277-151 — a lopsided vote shrouding deep disagreements within the GOP — after the Senate approved it by a 78-20 tally earlier in the day. The votes sent the bill to President Obama for his signature.
Approval of such stopgap measures used to be routine, but debate this year exposed acrimonious divisions between pragmatic Republicans such as House Speaker John Boehner and more junior lawmakers in the party’s tea party wing who are less inclined to compromise….
Boehner, who plans to resign from Congress at the end of October, reportedly “inform[ed] Republicans he would not risk a government shutdown over Planned Parenthood.” The pressure from his own party over defunding Planned Parenthood is said to have played a role in Boehner’s decision to resign.
Congress’s decision comes on the heels of Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards’ testimony before the House Oversight Committee just yesterday, defending the abortion giant’s half a billion dollars in annual funding against allegations that have arisen from a series of undercover videos released by the Center for Medical Progress. The videos have exposed Planned Parenthood’s officials, at the highest levels, showing a willingness to profit from the sale of aborted baby body parts and to illegally alter abortion procedures to more successfully obtain those parts.
Live Action’s Lila Rose reacted to Congress’s decision:
President Obama and some in Congress have opted to keep taxpayer funds flowing to Planned Parenthood, even though the nation’s largest abortion chain is under four congressional investigations, and several state investigations, looking into at least three criminal acts it has committed.
Yesterday, to get that money, Cecile Richards continued to mislead the American people by claiming that the horrific videos showing her employees talking about illegally harvesting and selling baby body parts were deceptively edited, even though a forensic analysis released just yesterday determined that there was no evidence of manipulation.
It’s stunning when you have high-ranking Planned Parenthood officials caught in hours upon hours of undercover video admitting to committing crimes, and President Obama was threatening to veto any bill that redirected taxpayer funding to thousands of other eligible clinics that weren’t involved in this scandal. It’s also deeply troubling to many taxpayers when they discover their hard-earned money is going to the nation’s largest abortion chain–with Planned Parenthood committing over 327,000 abortions per year.
We are grateful for those members of Congress who tried to redirect that money to clinics that actually provide more health services to women, despite the fact that they didn’t have the votes to overcome President Obama’s threatened veto or the Democrats’ filibuster in the Senate.
Planned Parenthood has spent millions of dollars on political campaign contributions – and approximately $15 million to re-elect President Obama in 2012 alone – to secure over half a billion dollars per year in taxpayer funding. Today, President Obama and some in Congress decided to turn a blind eye to the overwhelming video evidence of criminal activity and showed us that Planned Parenthood’s investment has paid off.
As mentioned, to date, two forensic analyses (including Planned Parenthood’s own commissioned analysis) have found no evidence of audio or video manipulation in the Center for Medical Progress’s full footage videos. Despite this, Richards and her cronies on Capitol Hill, in order to justify continued taxpayer funding for the abortion giant, continue to claim that the videos were “doctored” and “deceptively edited.”
While more than 13,000 Federally Qualified Health Centers offer more comprehensive care (minus abortion) for women and families in need, Congress unfortunately appears quite willing to continue funneling taxpayer dollars to an organization that sells aborted baby body parts and has been shown to willingly protect sex traffickers and statutory rapists, among other corrupt acts.
