'Sheer Cruelty': Outrage as GOP Moves Ahead With Measure to Defund Planned Parenthood

As the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesday voted along party lines to advance legislation that includes a measure which seeks to cut Medicaid funding for the abortion and healthcare provider Planned Parenthood, reproductive rights defenders are sounding the alarm on the impacts that such a move would have.

"This provision is about punishing Planned Parenthood health centers for providing abortion care, and threatening access to affordable birth control, wellness checkups, and cancer screenings for millions of people across the country in the process," said Alexis McGill Johnson, the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood, in a statement on Wednesday.

"It is indefensible how far abortion opponents, who claim to care about women and families, are willing to go to shut down health centers and line the pockets of billionaires and big corporations," McGill added.

The measure is part of a sweeping GOP spending and tax cuts bill currently making its way through Congress. The House Energy and Commerce Committee's portion of the legislation also includes cuts to Medicaid and takes back unspent funds from Inflation Reduction Act grant programs.

The outlet NOTUSreported Wednesday that the measure pertaining to Planned Parenthood would bar the organization from receiving federal funds, even via Medicaid payments. According to the 19th, the language of the measure does not specifically call out Planned Parenthood, but is crafted to apply to the organization.

The proposed cuts would impact Planned Parenthood's ability to offer services like birth control, cancer screenings, and pap smears. Medicaid is already barred from providing funds for abortion care, which only account for a small percentage of the services that Planned Parenthood's affiliates provide.

"It's no surprise that a goal of this reconciliation bill is to force Planned Parenthood health centers to shut down. Republicans have been trying—unsuccessfully—to shut down Planned Parenthood for decades," said Mini Timmaraju, president and CEO of Reproductive Freedom for All, an abortion rights and reproductive freedom group. "Plain and simple, this legislation will mean millions of people will have nowhere to go for basic health care."

"The sheer cruelty and enormity of their actions, and the harm they will inflict on the very people they were elected to represent, is unconscionable," Timmaraju continued.

Rachana Desai Martin, chief U.S. program officer at the Center for Reproductive Rights, on Tuesday denounced the fact that Trump has already frozen millions in funding for Planned Parenthood through the Title X program.

Planned Parenthood has said freezing that funding "effectively blocks people from getting birth control, STI testing and treatment, and lifesaving cancer screenings."

Speaking Tuesday, before the committee advanced its portion of the bill, Martin said that the Center for Reproductive Rights stands with Planned Parenthood and all reproductive healthcare providers and that "these baseless, politically motivated attacks against reproductive health care providers must stop."

A leaked preliminary estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported on by Mother Jones this week estimates that the measure aimed at Planned Parenthood would cost taxpayers $300 million over the next ten years. According to the outlet, spokespeople at CBO did not offer comment on how they came to that $300 million figure.