Senate Planned Parenthood vote vowed

GOP leaders plan pre-recess defunding step; Democrats ready to fight it

GOP presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky said Tuesday that win or lose, a Senate vote on a bill to end funding for Planned Parenthood would be “a huge victory for conservatives.”
GOP presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky said Tuesday that win or lose, a Senate vote on a bill to end funding for Planned Parenthood would be “a huge victory for conservatives.”

WASHINGTON -- The Senate will vote before its August recess on a Republican effort to block federal aid to Planned Parenthood, GOP leaders said Tuesday.

Democrats said they will strongly oppose what they called the latest Republican effort to weaken women's health care programs, but stopped short of predicting its defeat.

The positioning came as an anti-abortion group released a third covertly recorded video of Planned Parenthood officials discussing procedures for obtaining tissue from aborted fetuses for research.

"Good luck," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said of the Republican effort to garner the 60 of 100 Senate votes they will need to cut off Planned Parenthood's money. "We're dealing with the health of American women, and they're dealing with some right-wing crazy."

There are 54 Republicans and just a handful of anti-abortion Democrats. One of them, Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., said in an interview that he would not support the effort to end government help for Planned Parenthood because "they provide all kinds of primary health care" for women and because of the prohibition against using federal funds for virtually any abortions.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said a group of senators led by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, were crafting a measure responding to "these horrendous videos."

The videos have been released by the Center for Medical Progress. Its founder, David Daleiden, previously worked with the anti-abortion group Live Action, which has released several undercover videos aimed at discrediting Planned Parenthood.

McConnell said the Senate would vote "on a measure that they support sometime before we break for the August recess," scheduled to begin after next week.

Other senators said the GOP bill might transfer Planned Parenthood's federal funds to other organizations, such as federally backed community health centers, which provide health care, but not abortions, to millions of lower-income Americans.

Planned Parenthood has said it has done nothing illegal or improper. It receives more than $500 million annually in government aid, including some state funds. Federal funds cannot be used for abortions except for pregnancies involving rape, incest or where the mother's life is in danger.

Asked by lawmakers Tuesday about Planned Parenthood, Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell said the dispute over how the group gets fetal organs for research involves "passion and emotion and belief on many sides of the issue, and I want to respect that."

Burwell also told the House Education and the Workforce Committee, "There are statutes that guide the use of fetal tissue that are in place and should be enforced."

It is illegal to sell fetal tissue for profit; however, it is legal for a group providing it to recover the costs of the procedure. Planned Parenthood has said it only takes fetal organs if the mother agrees to let that occur, and only after she has planned to have an abortion.

Earlier Tuesday, presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said in an interview that thanks to his "persistence," Senate GOP leaders had committed to a pre-recess vote on blocking Planned Parenthood's federal money.

He has introduced a bill that would end all of the organization's federal aid and is part of the group producing a GOP bill. Paul said that win or lose, simply having the vote will be "a huge victory for conservatives" opposed to abortion.

House Republicans say there are no plans for a vote in that chamber before it begins its recess, probably today.

A Section on 07/29/2015

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