| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE July 31, 2018 |
CONTACT: Mallory Quigley [email protected] | 202-223-8073 |
Restored Reagan-era rule disentangles taxpayers from abortion businesses without reducing family planning funding
Washington, D.C. – Today the national pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List) and its partner organizations the Charlotte Lozier Institute, and Life Issues Institute submitted a joint comment to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in support of the Trump administration’s Protect Life Rule. The deadline for public comment on the rule, which would disentangle abortion centers from the Title X Family Planning Program, is today. The groups also released the following statement:
“We wholly support the Protect Life Rule, which draws a bright line between abortion and family planning in the Title X program. Abortion is not health care and it is not ‘family planning.’ The American people have repeatedly and clearly voiced their opposition to taxpayer funding of abortion, but for years, their will – expressed in the statute itself – has been ignored. The abortion industry has used Title X as a slush fund. We thank President Trump and HHS Secretary Alex Azar for hearing American taxpayers, putting a stop to this abuse, and restoring integrity to Title X. The Protect Life Rule does not reduce Title X family planning funding by a dime. Rather, it makes room for women and families to receive the life-affirming health care they deserve from thousands of willing providers.”
Key points in the comment include:
- The Protect Life Rule is consistent with the original intent of Title X, to clearly separate Title X funds from abortion, which is not health care or family planning.
- The Protect Life Rule supports the majority pro-life view of Americans.
- There is well-established legal precedent supporting the Protect Life Rule.
- Taxpayer funding of abortion centers enables a massive and unsafe abortion industry.
- If Planned Parenthood and other abortion centers choose not to comply with the Protect Life Rule, ample qualified health facilities remain to serve patients.
- The Protect Life Rule gives states flexibility to better meet the needs of their citizens.
Forty-seven (47) state legislators representing 26 states, led by members of SBA List’s National Pro-Life Women’s Caucus, separately submitted a comment in support of the Protect Life Rule. The comment reads in part:
“As elected leaders we have been frustrated with the federal government telling us how to implement family planning programs in older, tired approaches that don’t respect our values…the proposed Protect Life Rule will open a new vista of women’s care services that include new approaches, new providers and a new sense of empowerment for women. It empowers us as state policy leaders, as well.”
Previously 85 national and state pro-life groups, 41 U.S. Senators and 153 U.S. Representatives called on President Trump and HHS Secretary Alex Azar to issue new Title X regulations. A Marist poll earlier this year found that six in 10 Americans oppose the use of taxpayer funding for abortion.
Susan B. Anthony List and its partner super PAC, Women Speak Out spent more than $18 million in the 2016 election cycle, visiting more than 1.1 million homes in battleground states to defeat Hillary Clinton and maintain a pro-life Senate. SBA List is dedicated to pursuing policies and electing candidates who will reduce and ultimately end abortion. To that end, SBA List emphasizes the education, promotion, mobilization, and election of pro-life women. SBA List is a network of more than 630,000 pro-life Americans nationwide.
The SBA List family of organizations includes Susan B. Anthony List, Charlotte Lozier Institute, Women Speak Out PAC, SBA List Candidate Fund, the National Pro-life Women’s Caucus, and Life Issues Institute.
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