FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 8, 2015
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Statement from Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America:
“Once again, we are being subjected to the consequences of anti-choice politicians’ obsession with Planned Parenthood. It’s little wonder Rep. McCarthy would drop out of the race for House speaker this morning, given the dysfunction and paralysis caused by the extreme anti-choice minority in the GOP. Today’s hearing—the 4th of its kind– follows on the heels of yesterday’s sixth vote in Congress’s futile witch hunt against Planned Parenthood. This is part of their shameful obsession to deprive low-income men and women access to the affordable health care that they need.
“The witness list is a terrifying parade of the kinds of anti-choice activists that extreme members of Congress decided are ‘experts’ in women’s bodies: a doctor who founded and operates an anti-choice pregnancy center; a clinic protester who engaged in the intimidation of abortion providers and patients; and an anti-choice activist who filed a lawsuit against Planned Parenthood, dismissed for ‘failing to provide a single example.’ All of them are blatantly partisan and single-mindedly anti-choice—none of them are qualified to decide healthcare policy for the women of this country.
“7 in 10 Americans believe women should be able to make their own health care decisions. Hateful, partisan rhetoric, may be on full display in Congress today but we will not allow them to restrict our freedoms.”
More about today’s witnesses:
- In his 2013 testimony before Congress, Dr. Anthony Levatino said that an abortion is “usually” not a “viable treatment option” for saving the life of “patients with life threatening conditions related to or caused by pregnancy.”
- In December 1999, Luana Stoltenberg joined a rally “in front of the newly opened Planned Parenthood clinic in Bettendorf, Iowa, singing carols and praying as they pushed baby strollers carrying dolls. ‘The reason it’s raining today is because God is crying,’ Luana told Jacqueline Adams of CBS’ Early Show.”
- Referencing her anti-choice activism, Sue Thayer described herself on Facebook in 2013 as a “messenger sent by GOD to speak the truth and to shed light in a very dark place.” In 2012, she posted on Facebook, “History shows that once a culture embraces homosexuality, it doesn’t last much longer. Pray that the court rules with the Bible.”
Today’s Congressional hearing on Planned Parenthood brings the total to four this session.
NARAL Pro-Choice America and its network of state affiliates are dedicated to protecting and expanding reproductive freedom for all Americans. NARAL works to guarantee that every woman has the right to make personal decisions regarding the full range of reproductive choices, including preventing unintended pregnancy, bearing healthy children, and choosing legal abortion. In recognition of its work defending our constitutional right to choose, Fortune Magazine described NARAL as “one of the top 10 advocacy groups in America.”
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