At a press conference Thursday, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Republicans’ talk of defunding Planned Parenthood is a “distraction” that will hold little weight with Americans because the organization has a “solid grounding of support with the American people.”
Democrats have been coming to the defense of the nation’s largest abortion provider following the release of gruesome and graphic videos depicting the organization’s top medical professionals discussing the sale of the body parts of aborted babies.
“Planned Parenthood administers to the needs of … two and a half million women,” she said. “A very small percentage of that relates to women having the right to choose. But it relates to their health.”
Pelosi said young women in college go to Planned Parenthood for breast, cervical, and ovarian cancer.
In 2014, Pelosi was awarded Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Margaret Sanger award – the organization’s highest honor – named for its founder, a known racist and eugenicist.
Asked by a reporter about whether Republicans will shut down the government over Planned Parenthood funding when the House recess is over, Pelosi responded, “[Republicans] started their majority by saying they want to shut down government instead of funding Planned Parenthood, so this is nothing new in their regard.”
“We probably were going to have a CR anyway, the question is what does it look like?” she continued. “And if they don’t have the Republican votes to pass it, then hopefully we can have some influence over what is in that CR.”
In June of 2013, Pelosi criticized a bill prohibiting late-term abortions by referring to abortion as “sacred ground.”
“As a practicing and respectful Catholic, this is sacred ground to me when we talk about this,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi has also promoted Planned Parenthood’s relationship with the Girl Scouts USA.