Pennsylvania Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sean Parnell wants to see criminal charges pressed against anyone responsible for University of Pittsburgh’s (Pitt) alleged organ harvesting of unborn babies whose hearts were still beating, he told host Matthew Boyle on Breitbart News Saturday.
Parnell, a western Pennsylvania native, spoke about documents made public last week by Judicial Watch and the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) that revealed Pitt was granted $2.7 million in taxpayer funds to become a fetal “tissue hub,” which involved collecting “urinary and genital” organ samples of aborted babies between six and 42 weeks gestation.
“I saw some news that the University of Pittsburgh was conducting research on extracting kidneys from unborn babies … extracting their kidneys while their hearts were still beating, in the University of Pittsburgh, in my backyard,” Parnell said. “That’s horrific. That’s evil. There absolutely needs to be a full-scale investigation, and I think in the meantime funding needs to be revoked, and if there’s any truth at all to these allegations, that criminal charges need to be leveled.”
Listen:
The CMP noted in a press release that according to the findings in the new documents, which were obtained from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Pitt aimed to minimize “ischemia time [time organ remains at body temperature after blood supply is reduced or cut off].”
The CMP warned, therefore, that “if the fetus’ heartbeat and blood circulation continue in a labor induction abortion for harvesting organs, it means the fetus is being delivered while still alive and the cause of death is the removal of the organs.”
Parnell, a decorated Army veteran, observed, “This is some of the most horrific stuff I’ve ever seen, and I was in combat in Afghanistan for 16 months.”
“First of all, U.S. taxpayer dollars should not go to fund abortion in any way, shape, or form, but to me, this is even larger than the pro-life, pro-choice debate,” Parnell continued. “This is murder. If an infant’s heart is still beating and you are extracting organs from their body, I mean, come on. My God. This shouldn’t happen in the United States of America. One of the things that I saw in Afghanistan was how the children in that country were treated by our enemy. Our enemy targeted them to punish the Afghan people. We did everything we could to protect our children in Afghanistan. We should be doing the same darn thing here at home. This is wrong. There is a moral component. This is a good versus evil thing, and we’ve got to come down on the side of the good here.”
Parnell is running for U.S. Senate next year to fill the seat of retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA), and he pointed out that one of his opponents in the race, Rep. Conor Lamb (D-PA), has claimed he is “personally opposed to abortion” but voted twice against born-alive proposals.
The Pennsylvania Republican said, “If you look at some of the Democrats that are in the Senate race, right? And I’m not trying to make this political because I really do truly believe this is a good versus evil thing, but Conor Lamb just got in the Senate race here in Pennsylvania. Now Conor Lamb voted against the Born-Alive Act twice.”
The most recent born-alive proposal, the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, would require healthcare providers to deliver the “proper degree of care” to a baby born alive after a failed abortion attempt. Democrats have argued the legislation amounts to inappropriate “government interference in women’s health care.”
Parnell, like most Republicans, supports the legislation and tied it to the allegations against Pitt. He asserted, “The Born-Alive Act would stop horrific stuff like this.”
Write to Ashley Oliver at aoliver@breitbart.com.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.