A group of Republican senators has sent a letter to Small Business Administrator (SBA) Isabella Guzman, demanding answers as to why the agency gave Planned Parenthood money from Paycheck Protection loans, despite the abortion giant’s ineligibility.
The letter, sent by Senator Rand Paul and signed by Senators Rick Scott, Ron Johnson, James Lankford, Josh Hawley, and Mitt Romney, states:
On May 19, 2020, SBA notified a number of Planned Parenthood affiliates that they had wrongfully applied for 38 PPP loans totaling more than $80 million dollars. SBA determined that these local affiliates of Planned Parenthood Federation of America were ineligible for PPP loans under the applicable affiliation rules and size standards, and that the loans they received should be returned.
Despite this determination, the SBA approved 17 new PPP loans to Planned Parenthood affiliates totaling nearly $40 million in 2021. Moreover, under your leadership, the SBA has forgiven at least 34 Planned Parenthood PPP loans to date. This raises serious questions about the SBA’s management of the PPP program which was intended to provide relief to small businesses.
READ: HHS floods Planned Parenthood with hundreds of millions more in taxpayer dollars
As Live Action News previously reported, the Paycheck Protection Program was designed to help small businesses with fewer than 500 employees. While most Planned Parenthood affiliates meet that criteria, they are part of the larger conglomerate, which has thousands of employees, and therefore none of the affiliates qualified. Despite this, they were not asked to return any of the funds they received.
As Fox News reports, this is not the first time that Paul has questioned Guzman about the illegal distribution of funds. During a hearing last year, he questioned Guzman in person as to why she was allowing “small business loans to go to Planned Parenthoods and fund abortions across America.”
At the time, Guzman promised to look into the issue but has not since provided any more information.”I have repeatedly asked for more information that she has not yet provided. Today she again refused to give us that information, even though she clearly knows the answers,” Paul said at the time.
The senators have demanded that the SBA provide information about the distribution by no later than 5:00 PM on May 10.
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