For years, Republicans in Congress have made defunding Planned Parenthood a legislative priority, but Democrat opposition and President Obama have prevented that goal from being a reality.
Well, with a Republican-controlled Congress and a friendly incoming president, legislators may finally be able to make good on their promise to defund the nation’s largest abortion provider.
After undercover videos in recent years revealed that Planned Parenthood was involved in the harvesting and selling of baby parts, calls for the abortion giant to lose federal funding grew even louder.
Well on Thursday, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan announced that the GOP will “defund” Planned Parenthood in its repeal of the controversial Obamacare law.
From The Chicago Tribune:
“The Planned Parenthood legislation would be in our (repeal) bill,” Ryan said.
Last year’s Obamacare repeal measure also contained the effort to defund the group, which receives government reimbursements from the Medicaid program for non-abortion health services to low-income women. It also receives reimbursements for contraception services from a different government account.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, defuding Planned Parenthood would remove approximately $400 million in Medicaid funds from the abortion provider in the year after enactment.
President-elect Donald Trump has promised to support legislation cutting federal funding to Planned Parenthood “as long as they continue to perform abortions, and re-allocating their funding to community health centers that provide comprehensive health care for women.”
While the bill does have broad support, two liberal Republicans, Senator Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins, both who are pro-choice, have refused to commit to supporting an Obamacare repeal bill if it contains a measure defunding Planned Parenthood.
From CNN:
“I’m going to wait and see what happens,” Collins told reporters, indicating she thinks it’s too early to decide how she will vote on the bill. “Obviously, I’m not happy to hear the speaker wants to include defunding of Planned Parenthood, an extremely controversial issue in the package.”
Murkowski’s told reporters Tuesday she was still weighing the issue. In 2015, she joined Collins in voting for an amendment to strip Planned Parenthood funding out of a budget bill that would have also repealed much of Obamacare. But Murkowski ultimately backed the repeal measure even though it had the anti-Planned Parenthood provision, which Obama ultimately vetoed.
“At this point and time, I have not been involved in a sit down with colleagues about specifics of reconciliation. So it’s tough for me to speculate or engage in any conjecture,” Murkowski said earlier this week. “We’re going to be having a lot of discussions about that probably as soon as this week.”
If Murkowski and Collins, along with Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, who has announced he will vote against the Obamacare repeal legislation because the underlying budget measure adds to the deficit, then the entire bill, including defunding of Obamacare will fail.
It is unclear what pressure President-elect Trump will put on senators who are refusing to commit to vote for legislation that will fully defund Planned Parenthood. If his past comments are any indication, then Trump will likely insist that the Obamacare repeal bill contain language that cuts the abortion giant’s federal funding.
Are you glad to see Republicans holding firm on their commitment to defund Planned Parenthood or are you concerned that Senators Murkowski, Collins, and Paul will derail this important piece of legislation? Share your thoughts below!