There’s been a lot of coverage of Planned Parenthood recently. (And, once again, operatives on the Right have been caught editing video to skew what someone says. So much for any kind of values.) Below is an article by Janell Ross from the Washington Post published August 4, 2015, that talks about how federal funds are used by this organization:
The long-running calls for the federal government to cease all funding directed toward Planned Parenthood have once again come to the fore. This time, a congressional vote and debate took shape after an anti-abortion group secretly recorded a series of videos with the organization’s medical officers and staff speaking dispassionately — some would say dismissively — about the work of extracting fetal tissue from aborted fetuses and and transferring it to research facilities.
And even though the defund Planned Parenthood fight on the Senate floor didn’t move the needle — in terms of actual impacts on funding — it did bring to the fore some important facts about how much federal money goes to the group, and what it’s used for.
Those federal dollars were the single largest source of money coming into the organization and its local affiliates, by far. Another $305.3 million came from nongovernment sources, about $257.4 million reached the organization after private donors and foundations made contributions and bequests. The organization also raised another $54.7 million in fees charged for its services. So, government funding — with federal dollars comprising the biggest portion of this part of the organization’s budget — are absolutely critical to Planned Parenthood’s total operation.
But, it’s important to note that federal dollars are not used to provide the service at the center of the political debate around Planned Parenthood: abortions. That’s been banned by law in almost all cases since 1976. (The details of the ban have shifted over time.) Instead, the organization uses money from other sources — private donors and foundations as well as fees — to fund its abortion services. Continue reading “How Planned Parenthood actually uses its federal funding”