Late into Thursday night and early this morning, the Pence Amendment to the House Continuing Resolution to fund the federal government was debated. Emotions ran high. One Republican House member after another maligned Planned Parenthood and kept saying the amendment was to stop federal funding of abortions despite the fact that no federal funding of abortion has been permitted since the passage of the Hyde Amendment in 1976.
House Democrats defended Planned Parenthood and reminded everyone that millions of women depend on Planned Parenthood for basic health care, including family planning, cancer screenings, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, and many other health care services.
The Republican-controlled House is expected to not only pass the Pence Amendment but to pass a Continuing Resolution that will totally eliminate Title X funding of $317 million and will cut $125 million out of the teenage pregnancy prevention grants ($110 million cut). Since 1970, Title X, the national family planning program, has provided reproductive health services to millions of low income women yearly.
