Lawmakers: Stop investigating Planned Parenthood

SONY DSC

Five members of Congress, including Denver Democratic Rep. Diana DeGette, are calling on their Republican colleagues to end the investigations into Planned Parenthood.

The request comes in the wake of a grand jury indictment in Texas against David Daleiden and Sandra S. Merritt of the Center for Medical Progress, the producers of heavily-edited and widely-discredited videos that purported to show Planned Parenthood officials engaging in the illegal sale of fetal tissue.

Daleiden and Merritt were indicted last week by a grand jury in Houston, which had been asked by the Texas Lieutenant Governor to investigate the Center for Medical Progress videos. The grand jury found no wrongdoing by Planned Parenthood, but did indict Daleiden and Merritt for presenting fake driver’s licenses, a felony in Texas, and attempting to purchase human organs, a misdemeanor.

Twelve states have now investigated the Center for Medical Progress videos and found the allegations that Planned Parenthood engaged in fetal tissue trafficking unsubstantiated.

Earlier this year, Rep. Mike Coffman said the videos “shock the conscience.” He has voted multiple times to defund Planned Parenthood since he saw them. Coffman’s office did not reply to The Colorado Independent’s messages about the videos and whether the indictment would change his mind about their conclusions.

 

Photo credit: Center for American Progress, Creative Commons, Flickr

has been a political journalist since 1998. She covered the state capitol for the Silver & Gold Record from 1998 to 2009 and for The Colorado Statesman in 2010-11 and 2013-14. Since 2010 she also has covered the General Assembly for newspapers in northeastern Colorado. She was recognized with awards from the Colorado Press Association for feature writing and informational graphics for her work with the Statesman in 2012.

1 COMMENT

  1. Do you REALLY think Coffman is going to even TRY to do a sensible thing? It’s not in his psychological makeup. He’s going to do what the rest of them will do, he will continue to scream and whine about how PPFA is SO terrible and HAS to be defunded. They IGNORE everything that doesn’t fall into line with their goal of leaving women with NO health care at all if possible, and the fact that these videos were doctored and edited mean NOTHING to them. And the more they scream and yell and lie, the more they think you’ll fall right into line with what they say.

    Don’t expect this to make ANY difference to the party at all. They aren’t about truth, they are about themselves and their ability to take away as many rights and freedoms as possible from as many of us as they can.

Comments are closed.