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Center for Medical Progress

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Template:Distinguish2 The Center for Medical Progress (CMP) is a pro-life organization founded by David Daleiden in 2013.[1][2][3][4] Daleiden set up a fake biomedical research company, called Biomax Procurement Services, as a cover to pose as buyers of fetal tissues and secretly record Planned Parenthood officials during meetings.[5]

Organization

David Daleiden formed the Center for Medical Progress in 2013.

The CMP receives advice, consulting and funds from Operation Rescue.[3][6] Their website initially described the organization as "dedicated to informing and educating both the lay public and the scientific community about the latest advances in regenerative medicine, cell-based therapies, and related disciplines."[1] It was initially registered by Daleiden as a tax-exempt biomedicine charity,[7] but after questions about the group's tax exempt status the organization's stated mission was changed to "a group of citizen journalists dedicated to monitoring and reporting on medical ethics and advances."[1]

The CMP's board members include Daleiden, Troy Newman, and Albin Rhomberg.[4]

Undercover videos controversy

Main article: Planned Parenthood 2015 undercover videos controversy

Daleiden's organization posed as a fake biomedical research company, called Biomax Procurement Services. Under this guise, they posed as potential buyers of fetal tissues, and secretly recorded Planned Parenthood officials during meetings.[5] The edited videos are promoted as showing Planned Parenthood officials "price haggling over ‘baby parts'",[8] however, a Factcheck.org article notes that the full, unedited video "shows a Planned Parenthood executive repeatedly saying its clinics want to cover their costs, not make money, when donating fetal tissue from abortions for scientific research."[9] According to the lawyer for Planned Parenthood, Roger K. Evans, Biomax proposed “sham procurement contracts,” offering US$1,600 for liver and thymus fetal tissues.[10]

Video clips

On July 2015, the Center for Medical Progress released a number of highly edited videos that purportedly show executives at Planned Parenthood haggling over the price for fetal tissue donations.[11] In the first video clip, the senior director of medical services at Planned Parenthood is purportedly describing altering the abortion procedure to preserve fetal organs.[12] In the video clip, the Planned Parenthood representative is heard as saying, "We've been very good at getting heart, lung, liver because we know that, I'm not going to crush that part."[12] In a second video clip, a Planned Parenthood official is seen saying that if patients provide informed consent for fetal tissue donation then "If our usual technique is suction, at 10 to 12 weeks, and we switch to using an Ipas or something with less suction, and increase the odds that it will come out as an intact specimen, then we’re kind of violating the protocol that says to the patient, ‘We’re not doing anything different in our care of you.'"[13]

Court orders

In July, a Los Angeles judge placed an injunction on the release of further videos of employees of Stemexpress, one company with which Planned Parenthood does business, based on California's anti-wiretapping law.[14][15][16] David Daleiden stated in an interview with CNN that Stemexpress sought the restraining order because Stemexpress had admitted on film to a receiving fully intact fetuses from clinics and this was “prima facie evidence of born-alive infants.”[17]

A Superior Court judge in Los Angeles, and a federal judge in San Francisco ordered the group not to publish footage, and prohibits them from disclosing names or addresses of National Abortion Federation members, or dates and locations of future meetings.[18]

Political impact

The videos were shown to Republicans Trent Franks and Tim Murphy two weeks before being made publicly available,[19] leading commentators to note that the timing of the release appears to coincide with a bipartisan bill to raise money for Susan G. Komen for the Cure.[20] Rand Paul and Diane Black introduced pre-prepared legislation to strip Planned Parenthood of all federal funding.[21][22] On July 14, 2015, House Speaker John Boehner ordered congressional hearings into these practices of Planned Parenthood, and at least one committee committed to scheduling a hearing.[23]

As a direct consequence of the videos, Republicans sponsored a bill to defund Planned Parenthood. On August 3, 2015, that bill failed to pass in the Senate.[24][25][26] The White House said it would oppose Congress defunding the organization.[27]

Several Republican Presidential candidates have focused on comments made by Planned Parenthood officials, characterizing tissue donation as a way to profit from abortion: Rick Perry stated "The video showing a Planned Parenthood employee selling the body parts of aborted children is a disturbing reminder of the organization’s penchant for profiting off the tragedy of a destroyed human life."[9]

Carly Fiorina declared "This latest news is tragic and outrageous. This isn’t about "choice." It’s about profiting on the death of the unborn while telling women it’s about empowerment."[9] Rand Paul posted on Twitter "...a video showing [Planned Parenthood]’s top doctor describing how she performs late-term abortions to sell body parts for profit!" and vowed to campaign to defund Planned Parenthood.[22]

Reception

Sherilyn J. Sawyer, the director of Harvard University and Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s biorepository told FactCheck.org that "there’s no way there’s a profit at that price." She wrote that non-profit hospitals provide adult "tissue blocks from surgical procedures" at around $100–500 per block, and noted that "$30-100 is completely reasonable and normal fee."[9] Jim Vaught, president of the International Society for Biological and Environmental Repositories said that "$30 to $100 per sample is a reasonable charge for clinical operations to recover their costs for providing tissue."[9] Carolyn Compton, the chief medical and science officer of Arizona State University’s National Biomarkers Development Alliance said this was "a modest price tag for cost recovery."[9] Art Caplan, a professor of bioethics at New York University told CNN that "In abortion the primary goal is to give the safest abortion possible, your sole concern has to be the mother and her health."[12] He told The Washington Post that it is "ethically very dangerous" to "put the mom’s health secondary."[13]

A New York Times editorial wrote that the "video campaign is a dishonest attempt to make legal, voluntary and potentially lifesaving tissue donations appear nefarious and illegal."[28] Supporters of Planned Parenthood have complained that the videos were edited, although the Center for Medical Progress has released unedited videos along with the much shorter edited versions.[12][13][28][29]

In response to the videos, Planned Parenthood said that they may donate fetal tissue at the request of a patient, but that such tissue is never sold.[30][31] In response to Planned Parenthood, CMP issued a statement saying: "The Center for Medical Progress follows all applicable laws in the course of our investigative journalism work, and we look forward to showing the public more clear evidence that Planned Parenthood routinely profits from the sale of baby parts and changes the abortion procedures it uses on pregnant women in order to do so. Congress and state authorities are right to continue to hold Planned Parenthood accountable for these atrocities against humanity."[31]

On July 30, 2015, Indiana Republican Governor Mike Pence announced that the state's investigation did not find any evidence of wrongdoing in Planned Parenthood's handling of fetal tissue.[32]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c "With Planned Parenthood Videos, Activist Ignites Abortion Issue". New York Times. 23 Jul 2015.
  2. ^ "Who Is the 26-Year-Old Man Behind the Planned Parenthood 'Sting' Videos?". Yahoo Health. 22 July 2015.
  3. ^ a b "Hoaxers Fail to Nail Planned Parenthood in New Video". The Daily Beast. Operation Rescue provides "advice, consulting, funds" to the CMP
  4. ^ a b "Who's Behind the Planned Parenthood Sting Video? Troy Newman—and Other Rabid Anti-Choicers". The Nation.
  5. ^ a b "Sting Videos Part Of Longtime Campaign Against Planned Parenthood". NPR.
  6. ^ "Hoaxers Fail to Nail Planned Parenthood in New Video". The Daily Beast.
  7. ^ "Group Behind Planned Parenthood Sting Video May Have Tricked IRS, Donors". The Huffington Post. 17 July 2015.
  8. ^ Sherfinski, David (July 21, 2015). "Second Planned Parenthood video shows price haggling over 'baby parts'". The Washington Times. Retrieved July 27, 2015.
  9. ^ a b c d e f "Unspinning the Planned Parenthood Video". factcheck.org.
  10. ^ "Planned Parenthood Tells Congress More Videos of Clinics Might Surface". New York Times. Retrieved 2 August 2015.
  11. ^ "State Probes Find Zero Planned Parenthood Violations As Antiabortion Group Is Sued Over Undercover Videos". Yahoo News. Retrieved 4 August 2015.
  12. ^ a b c d Almasy, Steve; McLaughlin, Eliott C. (July 15, 2015). "Planned Parenthood exec, fetal body parts subject of controversial video". CNN. Retrieved July 27, 2015.
  13. ^ a b c Somashekhar, Sandhya; Ohlheiser, Abby (July 21, 2015). "Antiabortion group releases second Planned Parenthood video". The Washington Post. Retrieved July 27, 2015.
  14. ^ Armario, Christine (July 29, 2015). "Court bars anti-abortion group from releasing new videos". Associated Press. Archived from the original on July 30, 2015.
  15. ^ "StemExpress wins court order in video flap with anti-abortion group". Sacramento Business Journal. 30 July 2015.
  16. ^ "Restraining order issued against anti-abortion group's video". The Exponent Telegram.
  17. ^ "Blocked Planned Parenthood Video May Show 'Prima Facie Evidence Of Born Alive Infants'". The Federalist. 31 July 2015.
  18. ^ "U.S. judge halts release of secretly recorded videos of abortion providers". Los Angeles Times.
  19. ^ "Lawmakers Knew About Planned Parenthood Video Weeks Ago (Video)". Rollcall.com. 16 July 2015.
  20. ^ "Coincidence ... or Is It? Planned Parenthood 'Sting' Video Isn't First to Derail Legislation". Yahoo Health. 17 July 2015.
  21. ^ Brianna Ehley (22 July 2015). "Republicans offer legislation defunding Planned Parenthood". POLITICO.
  22. ^ a b Selyukh, Alina (July 26, 2015). "Rand Paul plans to keep pushing to defund U.S. Planned Parenthood". Reuters.
  23. ^ Fram, Alan. "John Boehner calls for investigation into whether Planned Parenthood is selling organs". Business Insider UK. Associated Press. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
  24. ^ Roberts, Dan (August 3, 2015), Republicans' Planned Parenthood defunding push fails in the Senate, The Guardian, retrieved August 3, 2015 {{citation}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  25. ^ Walsh, Deirdre (August 3, 2015), Senate vote to defund Planned Parenthood fails, CNN, retrieved August 3, 2015 {{citation}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  26. ^ "Senate blocks Planned Parenthood defunding measure". Reuters. 3 Aug 2015.
  27. ^ "White House says would oppose Congress defunding Planned Parenthood". Reuters. 30 Jul 2015.
  28. ^ a b "The Campaign of Deception Against Planned Parenthood". New York Times editorial. 22 Jul 2015.
  29. ^ Douthat, Ross (July 25, 2015). "Looking Away From Abortion". New York Times. Retrieved July 27, 2015.
  30. ^ "Planned Parenthood says video part of decadelong harassment". 20 Jul 2015.
  31. ^ a b Bassett, Laura (July 20, 2015). "Planned Parenthood: More Sting Videos Are Coming". Huffington Post.
  32. ^ "Indiana finds no Planned Parenthood abortion violations after undercover videos prompt probe", Fox News, Associated Press, July 30, 2015, retrieved August 2, 2015
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