Congresswoman Vicki Hartzler (R-MO)
Congresswoman Vicky Hartzler (MO-04) and fifty-five other members of Congress called on the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) on June 7 to investigate Planned Parenthood after a report came out last week chronicling a longstanding pattern of the organization’s failure to report the sexual abuse of minors.
“It is unthinkable that Planned Parenthood would perform an abortion on a young girl with no questions asked,” Congresswoman Hartzler said. “The thought makes me shudder. It is alarming that an organization with a signature pattern of failure to report child sexual abuse continues to receive taxpayer money. We need to investigate how widespread Planned Parenthood’s complicity truly is; this abuse needs to stop.”
Live Action released a report and documentary series last week that included accounts from victims who had been to Planned Parenthood, former Planned Parenthood employee testimonies, state health department reports and undercover footage. The report details the long history the organization has of looking the other way when girls who are likely victims of sex abuse, as young as 12 and 13, are brought in for an abortion.
Live Action President and Founder Lila Rose stated, “When a child is the victim of sexual abuse by a family member or the victim of a pimp who has forced her into a life of sex-slavery, she deserves to be protected, not to be victimized again by an abortion facility that willingly turns a blind eye to her torture. We are grateful that so many members of Congress are pushing to initiate an investigation into Planned Parenthood and help put an end to this horrific cycle of abuse.
“The fact that Planned Parenthood has for decades participated in the ongoing abuse of children proves that its priority is selling abortions, not caring for the most vulnerable of girls. Planned Parenthood’s culture of cover-up must end, the cycle of abuse of innocent children must end, and Planned Parenthood’s half a billion dollars in annual federal funding must end. Taxpayers cannot be forced to subsidize these abuses of children.”
See the full letter here) that Congresswoman Hartzler and her colleagues sent to HHS on June 7, 2018.