Planned Parnethood Slams GOP Leaders for Doubletalk

From an e-mail to the press from PPFA PR person:

Will the real Mike Pence please stand up? The Indiana Republican has lately been on a campaign against family planning and preventive health care, voting to eliminate the nation’s 40-year old family planning program (Title X) and trying to cut off Planned Parenthood health services to anyone who receives federal assistance. 

The same Mike Pence just told National Public Radio that he understands the value of Title X health centers and the importance of the preventive care they offer. But in a classic example of political doublespeak, Pence did not mention that Planned Parenthood health centers make up a full third of all Title X health centers, and they provide the very same preventive care he praises, using federal funds to deliver it. 

This from a recent report by National Public Radio:

“But even staunch anti-abortion legislators like Rep. Mike Pence, the Indiana Republican who has crusaded against federal funding for Planned Parenthood clinics, say that jettisoning the Title X program, may be going too far.

“‘I’ve never advocated reducing funding for Title X,’ Pence said during a recent radio interview with the chairman of a county Right to Life organization in his home state.

“‘Title X clinics do important work in our inner cities,’ Pence said. ‘They provide health services for women and children that might not otherwise have access to them.’”

This is the same Rep. Pence who just weeks ago voted for H.R. 1, which included the extreme provision of eliminating the Title X national family planning program (Roll Call Vote 147)

If Rep. Pence has changed his mind about Title X, he should also rethink his crusade to cut off Planned Parenthood services to Title X patients. Planned Parenthood is the single largest provider of preventive health care under the Title X program. 

In fact, Planned Parenthood health centers receive 25% of the funds under Title X but care for 33% of the patients who get care through Title X. The very success of Title X depends on the participation of Planned Parenthood.

If those patients lose access to Planned Parenthood health centers, many of them will have nowhere to turn for basic, preventive health care. As Pence’s own hometown newspaper, the Muncie Star Press, observed in a recent editorial, “by pulling the rug out on Title X funding, (Rep. Pence is) also denying many low-income women, and women without a regular health-care provider, access to preventive health services such as contraception, medical exams, breast cancer screening and counseling. Options for health care are limited for low-income families. Pence’s amendment narrows, if not outright eliminates, alternatives.[…]”

Planned Parenthood is taking this message directly to Rep. Pence’s district. This morning, the Planned Parenthood Pink Bus will stop in Muncie, Indiana (Rep. Pence’s district) to highlight the widespread support for Planned Parenthood and the preventive health care our doctors and nurses provide — and to underscore Rep. Pence’s doubletalk on Planned Parenthood and Title X.

Read about it here:
I Stand With Planned Parenthood

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