WASHINGTON - Following revelations that Planned Parenthood is harvesting and selling body parts of aborted babies, House Speaker John Boehner is calling for hearings. And at least one House committee has said it will investigate.
The news came just hours after a pro-life protest against the abortion provider was staged outside Speaker Boehner's office.
The news came just hours after a pro-life protest against the abortion provider was staged outside Speaker Boehner's office.
The protesters said Boehner should lead the charge to make sure Planned Parenthood no longer gets half-a-billion taxpayer dollars a year.
Mark Harrington heads up the group Created Equal, which displays huge posters of dismembered unborn babies on campuses and elsewhere to spark the consciences of pro-abortion Americans.
His group is in Washington D.C. displaying the banners outside places like the White House and Holocaust Museum.
"We have young people from all across America who have been gathered here in front of Speaker Boehner's office for one reason, and that is to call for the defunding of Planned Parenthood," Harrington said at the protest. "He's the only man who can do that, and that's why we're here."
U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., echoed that sentiment in a press release Wednesday.
"Current law that proscribes altering abortion procedures in order to procure baby organs and body parts, as well as the law that says it is 'unlawful for any person to knowingly acquire, receive or otherwise transfer any human fetal tissue for valuable consideration,' need to be enforced and if need be, strengthened," he said.
"Congress must and will investigate and put an end to these barbaric practices," he added.
The protest came after the release of an undercover video showing Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Planned Parenthood's senior director of medical services, describing "disposal practices" to actors posing as employees of a biotech firm.
"We've been very good at getting heart, lung, liver. Because we know that so I'm not gonna crush that part. I'm gonna basically crush below; I'm gonna crush above and I'm gonna see if I can get it all intact," Nucatola says while enjoying lunch at a Los Angeles restaurant.
In reaction, lead protester Rev. Pat Mahoney, with the Christian Defense Coalition, said, "America should not be giving one penny to an organization that traffics in baby parts."
James Conrad, with Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust, also weighed in on the matter.
"Planned Parenthood's practice of brutally dismembering young and defenseless human beings is outrageous and atrocious enough," Conrad said. "And these new revelations seal the deal."
Planned Parenthood responded, saying it's only been donating the body parts at the wish of the mother and any money received is to reimburse the organization for transporting those body parts.
But obstetrician Christina Francis told CBN News even if that were true, Planned Parenthood uses partial birth abortions as the best method to harvest the parts.
"That has been illegal in this country since 2003," Francis stated. "So I'd want to hear their defense of why they think it's okay to perform an illegal procedure in this country solely for the purpose of obtaining tissue that they are potentially profiting from."
The protesters asked for hearings into this, and within hours, Speaker Boehner called for congressional investigations.
"When an organization monetizes an unborn child - and with the cavalier attitude portrayed in this horrific video - we must all act," Boehner said.
CBN News
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