Free Republic

The administration of former Republican presidential candidate Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) has given Planned Parenthood a waiver allowing it to continue performing abortions — even though it goes against state law. The waiver has many pro-life advocates up in arms because Planned Parenthood failed to comply with Ohio state law —a law that makes it mandatory for surgical facilities to have an emergency patient-transfer agreement in place with a local hospital. Ohio Department of Health Director Richard Hodges issued Planned Parenthood permission by issuing it a variance last week so that the abortion giant’s clinic in Cincinnati’s suburb of Mount...

A new batch of evidence from the Congressional panel investigating Planned Parenthood reveals some disturbing exchanges between the buyers and sellers of aborted baby body parts. Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn, who chairs the Select Panel on Infant Lives, sent the evidence to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services this week along with a letter asking HHS to investigate possible violations by Planned Parenthood and the organ harvesting company StemExpress. The newly uncovered evidence points to multiple potential violations of federal laws based on emails between the companies, invoices, contracts for the aborted babies’ body parts and other documents. Some...

Chilling email exchanges and documents shared between Planned Parenthood and StemExpress employees indicate their organ harvesting scheme violated federal law. The House Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives sent evidence to the Obama administration on Wednesday revealing that the nation’s largest abortion provider conspired with the organ procurement company to break the law and fraudulently cover it up. (snip) Documents show that the abortion clinics would regularly share patients’ personal health information with StemExpress. Based on this information, StemExpress technicians would decide what organs they wanted to harvest and then would seek out patients by name to obtain consent forms....

(snip) StemExpress chief executive Cate Dyer says profit is not a factor. “We lose money doing this,” Dyer said about working with fetal tissue. “We don’t have to do this, and we won’t stop doing this.” (snip) Dyer once worked as an emergency medical technician at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital’s trauma center. Watching people die every day at the Southern California facility, she said, inspired her to search for ways to prevent death. She started the company in 2010 with $9,000 in savings. In 2015, StemExpress said it posted roughly $5 million in revenue. (snip) Before the videos came out,...

When she discovered she was pregnant, the 22-year-old aspiring veterinarian started calling abortion clinics in her home state of Oklahoma. It was a short list – there are only two, and neither could get her an appointment quickly. Unemployed, no car, and still living with her parents, Pearl thought about trying Texas, but knew the state had also recently tightened restrictions on clinics. ...

Washington, DC – Select Investigative Panel Chairman Marsha Blackburn is calling on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to investigate potential violations of federal law by StemExpress and a number of abortion clinics. In a letter to the Office of Centralized Case Management Operations at HHS, Chairman Blackburn asks Director Jocelyn Samuels to examine evidence uncovered by the Select Panel’s investigation that shows StemExpress and the abortion clinics violated the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). The HIPAA privacy rule is a patients’ rights law, designed to empower the patient to determine when and...

In the wake of an undercover investigation into Planned Parenthood’s alleged fetal trafficking operation, the California state legislature is considering a bill that would criminalize publishing secretly recorded video footage of “health care providers.” AB 1671, which has been backed by Planned Parenthood, would criminalize the publication of confidential interactions with state-licensed medical personnel, including abortionists and clinician staff, punishable by up to one year in prison and a $10,000 fine per violation. Introduced by Los Angeles Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez, the bill has received criticism from both pro-life activists and those who worry about its potential to chill free speech...

If at first you don't impede, try, try again. Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick signed a new law today restricting the free speech rights of pro-life sidewalk counselors. Patrick, a Democrat, said he was “still stunned” by the Supreme Court's unanimous ruling in McCullen v. Coakley, striking down the state's previous 35-foot “bubble zone” at today's signing ceremony. The original law, drafted by current Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts President Marty Walz when she was a state legislator, required all “protesters” to stand dozens of feet away from the entrance of any such facilities. The justices did not rule that all such zoning...

An attorney representing Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, Josh Schaffer, has admitted that he pressured the Harris County District Attorney’s office to refocus a grand jury investigation away from his client and onto pro-life journalists David Daleiden and his associate, Sandra Merritt, of the Center for Medical Progress. Schaeffer also confessed that Assistant District Attorney Sunni Mitchell did an “end around” the State Attorney General Ken Paxton in order to share sealed video evidence with Planned Parenthood. The grand jury later returned indictments against Daleiden and Merritt. Shaffer stated publicly that he was informed by the District Attorney’s office that no...

The head of a conservative student organization at DePaul University has been sanctioned by the university and could be expelled after he released the names of vandals who destroyed a pro-life flag display. Kristopher Del Campo, the chairman of the Young Americans for Freedom chapter, was found guilty by the university on two counts – “Disorderly, Violent, Intimidating or Dangerous Behavior to Self or Others” and “Judicial Process Compliance.” DePaul University did not return calls seeking comment. Last January Del Campo and other pro-life students received permission from the university to erect a pro-life display featuring 500 flags. Vandals later...

The head of a conservative student organization at DePaul University has been sanctioned by the university and could be expelled after he released the names of vandals who destroyed a pro-life flag display. Kristopher Del Campo, the chairman of the Young Americans for Freedom chapter, was found guilty by the university on two counts – “Disorderly, Violent, Intimidating or Dangerous Behavior to Self or Others” and “Judicial Process Compliance.” The charges were a result of posting a copy of the university’s incident report on the YAF’s website.

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Stephen Breyer is more than vaguely "pro-choice."  He penned the majority opinion in the Stenberg v Carhart decision in 2000, striking down state laws banning partial-birth abortion.  In fact, the abortion procedure he supported is so barbaric that the United States Congress called for its outright prohibition in 2003: "A moral, medical, and ethical consensus exists that the practice of performing a partial-birth abortion.... (usually the puncturing of the back of the child’s skull and removing the baby’s brains) is a gruesome and inhumane procedure that is never medically necessary and should be prohibited.” As...

HOUSTON, Texas — The lawyer for Planned Parenthood who has been accused of colluding with the Harris County DA against the Planned Parenthood undercover videographer, filed an affidavit to deny this charge, but admits that a prosecutor gave him a copy of the undercover video. As reported on April 14, Jared Woodfill, a lawyer for undercover videographer David Daleiden told Breitbart Texas, “We have clear evidence that the DA is colluding with Planned Parenthood.” The District Attorney in Harris County, Texas, is Devon Anderson. David Daleiden, is the president and founder of the Center for Medical Progress (CMP). Daleiden’s undercover...

Why do liberals hate science? The left has long claimed that it has something of a monopoly on scientific expertise. For instance, long before Al Gore started making millions by claiming that anyone who disagreed with his apocalyptic prophecies was "anti-science," there were the "scientific socialists." "Social engineer" is now rightly seen as a term of scorn and derision, but it was once a label that progressive eggheads eagerly accepted. Masking opinions in a white smock is a brilliant, albeit infuriating and shabby, rhetorical tactic. As the late Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously said, "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion,...

Every day, it seems, the United States is becoming a more hostile environment for people with pro-life and conservative positions. Abortion activists constantly challenge pro-life laws, stall abortion industry investigations, force religious objectors to pay for abortions and attack life-affirming resource organizations. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT A recent article by Harvard law professor Mark Tushnet on the blog Balkinization calls for liberals to pursue even more aggressive measures against conservatives and pro-lifers, according to a new column by The Heritage Foundation’s Ryan T. Anderson.Anderson wrote at The Daily Signal: Now that President Barack Obama has reshaped the federal judiciary, liberal causes can...

A House panel issued subpoenas to two organizations in an effort to access information related to the purchase and sale of aborted baby body parts. The House of Representatives Select Investigative Panel issued subpoenas on April 29 to Scinto Group, LLP and Five Star Bancorp to get accounting and bank records of StemExpress, a biomedical tissue procurement company that used to work with Planned Parenthood. StemExpress has reportedly failed to turn over all documents to Congress after the Select Investigative Panel subpoenaed the company.

The state of Oklahoma is taking steps to divorce itself from the Planned Paethood abortion business after the company was caught selling the body parts of aborted babies. A Medicaid agency is canceling the contracts it has with the abortion company. Last year, Oklahoma pro-life Gov. Mary Fallin called for defunding Planned Parenthood after a state review discovered that the abortion giant’s state affiliates may be overbilling Medicaid. Fallin that the Oklahoma Health Care Authority end its contracts with the abortion business’s affiliates that operate in the state. Her call came after a state review of Planned Parenthood found a...

The bio-tech firm that purchases aborted baby parts and fully intact aborted babies from the Planned Parenthood abortion business is stonewalling Congress in its attempt to research and investigate the sales. It is failing to provide financial records so the panel can determine if federal law has been broken which prohibits profiting from the sale of aborted baby parts. To gain access to the records, the Select Investigative Panel has issued subpoenas to two financial entities — Scinto Group, LLP and Five Star Bancorp — in an effort to obtain StemExpress accounting and banking records, which the fetal tissue procurement...

A black doctor who was fired for supposedly inflammatory sermons unrelated to his medical work filed a lawsuit against the state of Georgia on Wednesday, claiming religious discrimination. This is particularly ironic, considering the governor of that state recently vetoed a religious liberty bill.Dr. Eric Walsh previously served on President Obama's Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS, was a board member of the Latino Health Collaborative, and started California's first city-run dental clinic for low-income families dealing with AIDS. Nevertheless, Walsh was fired only one week after being hired by Georgia's Department of Public Health. Right before Walsh was terminated, the...

A bill headed to Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin’s desk this week would strip abortionists of their medical licenses and basically outlaw abortions in the state. The bill describes an abortion as “unprofessional conduct” and prohibits Oklahoma medical licensure officials from renewing or granting licenses to doctors who do abortions, except to save the mother’s life, according to the Washington Post. The state House passed the bill on Thursday in a strong, bipartisan vote; and the Oklahoma Senate passed it in March, LifeNews reported. Oklahoma state Sen. Nathan Dahm, who sponsored the measure, said the purpose is to protect unborn babies’...