There are groups in this country so steadfast in their opposition to choice that they conduct years-long investigations in order to bring shame and embarrassment to family planning organizations that save lives and protect women's health. Today, that phenomenon manifested itself in a video released by by the Center for Medical Progress, an anti-abortion group that has been trying to bring down Planned Parenthood for years. The culmination of their three year investigation was a hidden camera interview with a Planned Parenthood Executive, where she discusses using the tissue from aborted fetuses for medical research. The Center, and its right-wing media allies, have pushed the story under the false and misleading notion that Planned Parenthood is somehow purposely aborting babies to harvest their organs to turn a profit. It is our duty as Progressives to fight back and portray this hit job for what it is: a brazen attempt to undermine Planned Parenthood, encourage Congress to cut its medical funding, and deprive millions of women access to critical reproductive health services.
I'll be the first to admit that the initial video the Center released was disturbing. In this spliced 8 minute clip, Deborah Nucatola, the Director of Medical Research at Planned Parenthood of America, talks rather nonchalantly about how to conduct abortions in order to preserve the most tissue. Her descriptions are quite graphic to someone like me, who is not used to hearing ANY procedure described in such detail. She is also heard telling undercover reporters (posing as representatives of a company trying to procure fetal tissue) that the cost for such tissue runs from $30-100, which seems to imply that Planned Parenthood is trying to turn a profit on aborted fetus parts. I'll also admit that the imagery in the video left a bad taste in my mouth. Here, a woman drinking red wine and eating a salad at a fancy restaurant is being very colloquial about a serious subject. The video feeds into right-wing narrative that Planned Parenthood is nothing more than an abortion factory. They teach kids how to have sex, they push them into getting abortions, and they harvest the organs to enrich their liberal friends and donate to Democrats.
Then something interesting happened. The Center, wary that the media might accuse them of splicing the video and taking Nucatola's remarks out of context, released the video in its entirety, which is almost three hours long. They also released a full transcript of the entire encounter. They clearly were counting on people giving them credit for releasing the full video and transcript while not actually reviewing them. I watched the first hour or so of the video this afternoon, and read the entire transcript this evening and my impression completely changed. In full context, you understand what's actually happening. Nucatola is very explicit about how tissue transactions work. First, the discussion about donating tissue is made only after a woman has decided to exercise her right to terminate her pregnancy. Then, some Planned Parenthood clinics ask women if they would like the terminated fetus tissue to be donated to medical research. Women are often pleased to have this option, Nucatola notes, because some good can come out of a difficult experience (donated tissue, you know, helps medical researchers save lives). The costs involved, as Nucatola spells out very clearly in the video, are the extra staff time devoted to extracting the tissue, and storing it so that it can be transported to a research facility. Nucatola's narrative in the full video comport closely to Planned Parenthood's prepared statement about the video: that patients, with their full informed consent, can offer tissue for medical research. The patient nor Planned Parenthood get any sort of "payoff" besides reimbursement from the research company. I think Nucatola would admit that she can come off as insensitive and callous in this interview, especially when the footage is spliced into small segments. But who among us hasn't talked callously (or nonchalantly) about important things when we think we're having a private conversation? I sure have! And I wouldn't want my carelessness to reflect on my character, nor on the work of my employer.
I think it's important to take a step back and account for what is REALLY happening here. Planned Parenthood, instead of discarding fetal tissue, is giving women the opportunity, if they so choose, to donate the tissue to medical research. They get paid a minimal amount for the costs involved in extracting, preserving and importing the tissue. A right-wing organization whose mission is to bring down Planned Parenthood, sets up a sting operation to try to get a Planned Parenthood Executive to say really incriminating things, so they ask very leading questions to produce answers that sound really bad. The Executive, thinking that she is engaged in an informal conversation with people well versed in the world of medical research, uses somewhat graphic language to talk about techniques used to preserve valuable tissue (valuable again, for LIFESAVING MEDICAL RESEARCH). The right-wing organization gets what they want: a massive right-wing freakout, and some attention from the mainstream media. They even get some raised eyebrows from people like me, who almost certainly would not take the time to view the video in its full context. They will use this outrage as justification to stop federal funding for Planned Parenthood (which, due to the Hyde Amendment, does NOT go to abortion services anyway!). As a result, poor women across the country won't have access to affordable family planning services and medical care. We can't let this happen. Please, watch the full video, and help fight back against this smear on social media, because as far as I can see, Planned Parenthood isn't getting much backup from the progressive community at a time when it needs it the most.
This issue is personal for me, because my spouse works for Planned Parenthood as a clinician. She is the most caring and compassionate person I know, and the work she does is critical to the lives of so many people. I can't let her important work, or any other dedicated Planned Parenthood employee's, be dragged into the mud by right-wing smear merchants.