The Tar Heel State follows Indiana, whose legislature passed a bill last month bringing an end to taxpayer funding of abortion providers, and Kansas, whose 2012 budget eliminates funding to Planned Parenthood. In addition, last year New Jersey Governor Chris Christie vetoed a measure that would have provided $7.5 million to “family planning” groups, which resulted in the closing of at least one Planned Parenthood clinic in the state.
In her earlier veto, N.C. Governor Perdue had insisted that the Republican-passed budget was “ideologically driven,” declaring, “I cannot support a budget that sends the message that North Carolina is moving backwards, when we have always been a state that led the nation.”
The budget strips approximately $500,000 in grants for Planned Parenthood contraception and teenage-pregnancy-prevention programs, according to the Carolina Journal. In addition, it saves some $50,000 by dropping the State Abortion Fund, which financed abortions for pregnancies resulting from rape, incest, or when the life of the mother is in danger, according to the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services.
“We think we’ve done something historic on several different levels,” said House Speaker Thom Tillis after the vote to override the veto.
In applauding the legislature’s actions, Bill Brooks of the North Carolina Family Policy Council noted, “When you give money to someone who’s providing abortion, a lot of their funding goes in the schools and into various activities in which we think that they are encouraging sex rather than promoting abstinence.”
LifeSite News reported that Planned Parenthood condemned the override as opposing “lifesaving cancer screenings and birth control,” with Paige Johnson, a spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood of Central North Carolina, saying that the “continued misleading attacks on Planned Parenthood expose a cynical and coldhearted willingness to further a divisive political agenda even if it will deny women access to lifesaving preventive healthcare.”
And Melissa Reed, vice president of public policy with Planned Parenthood Health Systems, said that her organization was considering a lawsuit to force the state to honor Perdue’s veto. “Planned Parenthood in North Carolina is considering all options,” she said, “including litigation, to protect the health care needs of our patients, particularly low-income women and families.”
Johnson concurred, saying that her group was not “preparing to limit the scope of our services or to turn patents away. We are preparing to fight this in court and we think we’ll prevail — that we’ll get an injunction immediately.”
Planned Parenthood of Indiana has already filed suit against that state’s law de-funding the abortion provider, asking a federal judge to rule the law unconstitutional. According to the Associated Press, the Justice Department has come to the aid of the state’s Planned Parenthood franchise, asking a U.S. District judge to grant the abortion provider an injunction to stop implementation of the law “because it blocks Medicaid recipients’ freedom to choose the provider of their choice.” The AP report explained that the state is fighting the injunction “because even though Medicaid doesn’t pay for abortions in most cases, the program may provide indirect funding by subsidizing some of Planned Parenthood’s overhead costs.”
The Indiana law strips Planned Parenthood of about $1.4 million in Medicaid funding, which the organization insists would go to provide cancer screens and other general health services to around 9,300 Medicaid clients at its 28 health clinics across Indiana. But pro-life groups have argued that some of that money could be funneled into abortion services, and the rest would indirectly aid the abortion provider.
According to LifeNews.com, a survey conducted by The Polling Company/WomanTrend “reveals that a majority of Americans, 54 percent, oppose giving tax dollars for family planning services to organizations that perform abortions. The poll also shows the intensity of this position, with 43 percent ‘strongly’ opposing any federal funds going to abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood, while just 20 percent ‘strongly’ support federal funds going to abortion businesses.”
The pro-life news site quoted WomenTrend president Kellyanne Conway as saying that support for stripping Planned Parenthood of its tax funding even crosses into the pro-abortion camp. “Even 26 percent of pro-choice adherents rejected diverting taxpayer dollars for family planning organizations that provide abortions,” Conway said. “Some Americans may have positive attitudes toward Planned Parenthood, but may also reject the underlying premise that federal funding for family planning organizations should be fungible for abortions.”
The same survey found that 82 percent of those who identified themselves as pro-life said they opposed “tax dollars for family planning services going to organizations that perform abortions.”
Lila Rose, whose organization Live Action provided undercover video exposing the involvement of some Planned Parenthood clinics in criminal child sexual abuse, applauded North Carolina’s efforts to stop Planned Parenthood, noting that the abortion provider “is responsible for killing over 332,000 defenseless unborn children each year.”
Challenged the pro-life activist, “Planned Parenthood manipulates women to choose abortion and routinely aids and abets the sexual exploitation and trafficking of young girls. Governors of other states should take note of how Gov. Perdue’s legislature has decisively rejected her veto and realize that the American people do not want to subsidize abortionists.”
Photo: North Carolina State Capitol
