Diocese of Arlington announces review of all clergy files

Washington D.C., Jun 1, 2017 / 06:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The controversial abortion provider Planned Parenthood has lost over half a million unique patients in five years, but its abortion figures remain the same – a consistency its critics have blasted.

“While non-abortion services are declining, Planned Parenthood continues to perform a record number of abortions – over 300,000 per year,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, Susan B. Anthony List president.

“They’ve performed more than 1.6 million abortions in the last five years alone.”

The pro-life group, citing the abortion provider’s own annual reports, said that in the period from 2011-2016 Planned Parenthood’s number of unique patients have dropped by 600,000, a 20 percent decline. Cancer screenings have halved, while contraceptive services are down 18 percent. STD screenings have dropped five percent.

At the same time, its abortion numbers are stable. In the last five years, Planned Parenthood performed about 11,290 adoption referrals total. That makes a ratio of 145 abortions for each adoption referral.

“Women are turning away from abortion giant Planned Parenthood,” Dannenfelser said. “It’s time to re-direct Planned Parenthood’s funding to community health centers.”

“Taxpayers would be disentangled from the grisly abortion industry and get a better return on their investment in women’s health,” she said.

While the abortion provider enjoyed protection and influence under the Obama administration, the U.S. House of Representatives has now passed a bill that would defund Planned Parenthood for one year. The proposal would shift $422 million to community health care centers.

The Susan B. Anthony List backs the shift, saying that community health centers have strong bipartisan support and work in under-served communities. The centers provide mammograms, mental heath services, and other care for women that is not available at Planned Parenthood.

The abortion provider’s latest annual report said its website has received nearly 70 million visitors from 2015-2016. The report claims 75 percent of Americans support continued Medicaid reimbursement for preventive care at Planned Parenthood.

The report describes attacks on Planned Parenthood as having reached “fever pitch,” citing “a record number of state laws” regulating abortion. The organization claimed to have nearly 650 Planned Parenthood health centers in the year 2015.

The organization is struggling in some parts of the country. Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains recently announced the closure of six facilities in its region due to financial concerns, including its only Wyoming clinic. Four Iowa facilities will also close.

The abortion provider is under scrutiny after the release of investigative reports beginning in 2015 appearing to show Planned Parenthood leaders involved in the illegal sale of unborn baby parts and other fetal tissue for profit. The reports prompted a multi-million dollar damage control campaign from Planned Parenthood and its allies like the Open Society Foundations, the Hewlett Foundation and the Democracy Alliance, records from the Open Society Foundations indicate.

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Washington D.C., Jan 19, 2021 / 10:25 am (CNA).- President-elect Joe Biden will nominate a supporter of the contraceptive mandate to a top position at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), he announced on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, Biden announced that he would nominate Dr. Rachel Levine, a biological man identifying as a transgender woman who has served as Pennsylvania’s health secretary since 2017, to be HHS Assistant Secretary for Health. Before serving as Pennsylvania’s health secretary, Levine served as the state’s physician general.

Levine has been outspoken on social issues, supporting gender-transition surgery and the contraceptive mandate while opposing a proposed 20-week abortion ban.

Levine’s nomination to HHS, along with that of Health Secretary nominee Xavier Becerra, signals that social issues could be priorities at the agency for the next several years. These might include pro-LGBTQ policies, funding of abortion providers, and religious freedom conflicts with Catholic organizations.

Regarding the Obama-era HHS contraceptive mandate, Levine in 2017 called it “immoral and unethical” to allow for religious exemptions to the mandate. Hundreds of non-profits and businesses—including the Little Sisters of the Poor—had objected to the mandate and the Obama administration’s opt-out process for objecting non-profits.

After the Trump administration announced in 2017 that religious employers and other organizations morally opposed to the contraceptive mandate could receive exemptions from it, Levine issued a sharp statement in opposition.

“It is immoral and unethical to give any employer the ability to take away access to health care from an entire gender,” Levine said as Pennsylvania’s acting health secretary, in 2017. “We cannot allow women’s health to be reduced to one issue or be jeopardized in any way.”

Levine also wrote an op-ed against the Trump administration’s reversal of Obama-era rules on transgender accommodation.

In Feb., 2017, the Trump administration said it would stop defending the Obama administration’s transgender bathroom policy in court; the policy had directed schools to allow students to use gender-specific bathrooms according to their gender identity, and not their biological sex.

In an op-ed for the Patriot-News, Levine wrote that “[t]he decision by the Trump administration to roll back the most basic protections for transgender and gender expansive youth is heartbreaking.”

“To Pennsylvania’s transgender and gender expansive youth and their families who are worried or concerned, I want you to know that Governor Wolf’s administration has your back,” Pennsylvania’s then-physician general wrote.

In 2016, Levine spoke out against a 20-week abortion ban that criminalized abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy except in cases where the mother’s life was in danger. The bill also banned the “dilation and evacuation” abortion procedure.

Levine said at the time that the bill “punishes women whose pregnancies have complications.”

“Women and their families, when faced with a devastating diagnosis of a significant fetal anomaly, have the right to make the decision which is appropriate for them, in consultation with their doctors,” Levine said.

Levine’s family moved their mother out of a personal care home early in the COVID-19 pandemic, because of the high spread of the virus; the decision invited some media scrutiny.

Levine was also questioned for the state’s policy of requiring nursing homes to accept recovering COVID patients from hospitals, although the state health secretary responded that asymptomatic staff at the homes—not patients discharged from hospitals—were the primary spreaders of the virus there.

If Levine is confirmed to HHS, along with Becerra, they together could craft policy to influence a number of issues including abortion, gender-transition surgery, and the contraceptive mandate.  

While California’s attorney general, Becerra fought aggressively in favor of an abortion coverage mandate that religious employers were not exempt from, and continued the prosecution of pro-life activist David Daleiden.

If confirmed as Health Secretary, Becerra—a Catholic—could reignite a number of Obama-era policies that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and other Catholic groups were opposed to.

These might include resurrecting court battles with the Little Sisters of the Poor and other Catholic groups that opposed the Obama administration’s procedure by which to “opt out” of the contraceptive mandate. The groups said that the policy still required them to provide coverage for contraceptives through their employee health plans, which they morally objected to.

Other HHS policies could include re-imposing the full transgender mandate—a requirement that doctors perform gender-transition surgery upon the referral of a mental health professional—and various requirements of religious groups that receive HHS grants, such as adoption agencies having to match children with same-sex couples.

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Washington D.C., Mar 18, 2021 / 12:30 pm (CNA).- Xavier Becerra, California’s attorney general and former congressman, was confirmed Thursday by the Senate as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. 

The narrow confirmation vote of 50-49 took place mostly along party lines, with Democrats in support and Sen. Susan Collins of Maine being the only Republican to cross the aisle and support Becerra’s confirmation. Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) did not vote. 

Becerra wrote on Twitter that he is “honored and humbled” by his confirmation, and he is “ready to get to work.” 

Becerra was one of Biden’s most controversial nominations due to his previous positions on abortion and conscience protections. The Senate Finance Committee was ultimately deadlocked on a favorable recommendation for his confirmation, forcing Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to file a discharge petition for the whole chamber to vote to advance the confirmation.

He will take the helm of the health agency amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic with legal experience – but critics have pointed to his lack of public health experience. 

Pro-life advocates from both parties expressed alarm at Becerra’s confirmation, pointing to his previous defense of coercive state abortion coverage and abortion advertising mandates. 

In a statement, Democrats for Life of America said Becerra’s record on abortion “should shock and horrify every American.”  

Becerra as health secretary will be “a clear and present danger for Catholics and all people of faith,” said CatholicVote.org president Brian Burch.

Jeanne Mancini, president of March for Life, said in a statement that Becerra’s confirmation “is alarming given the fact that he has spent his career expanding pro-abortion policies and persecuting pro-life groups and individuals.” 

Thomas Glessner, president of the National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA), said in a statement that the institute was “disheartened by the confirmation of anti-life extremist Xavier Becerra” during March, Women’s Health Month.

NIFLA sued the state of California over its Reproductive FACT Act, which required pro-life pregnancy centers to post signs advertising where free or low-cost abortion procedures could be obtained. Becerra defended that law in court, and lost at the Supreme Court in 2018 in the case of NIFLA v. Becerra.

Mancini added that Becerra “utilized his power as Attorney General of California to punish groups like the Little Sisters of the Poor for their faith as well as the journalists who exposed Planned Parenthood’s trafficking in baby body parts.” 

Becerra continued the state’s prosecution of pro-life activist David Daleiden for his undercover videos claiming that Planned Parenthood illegally profited from the sale of fetal tissue of aborted babies. He also sued the Trump administration in order to take away broad religious and moral exemptions to the HHS contraceptive mandate – exemptions which included the Little Sisters of the Poor. 

Lawsuits by Becerra and Pennsylvania’s attorney general Josh Shapiro forced the sisters to go back to court to defend their religious exemptions, and the Supreme Court sided with the Little Sisters in July.

Mancini said that “If his record is any indication, Becerra will weaponize the more than trillion-dollar budget of the Department of Health and Human Services to attack or disadvantage those with whom he disagrees, and advance unpopular pro-abortion policies.”

“From his new role, we expect Mr. Becerra will continue his attack on the civil liberties of those with whom he disagrees,” said Kristin Waggoner, general counsel with the group Alliance Defending Freedom.

Pro-life groups on Thursday also stated their disappointment that no Democrats opposed Becerra’s nomination – including Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) who was endorsed by Democrats for Life. 

“We are deeply disappointed in @Sen_JoeManchin and @SenBobCasey for their votes today,” Democrats for Life tweeted.

“Becerra is infamous in the pro-life movement, well known for his record of attacking pro-life policies protecting unborn life, as well as assaulting the conscience rights of pro-life Americans,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List, in a statement. “President Biden could not have picked a more eager and enthusiastic partner to destroy pro-life policy and expand abortion on demand.”

Meanwhile, Alexis McGill Johnson, President and CEO of both Planned Parenthood and its lobbying arm, tweeted she “[c]ouldn’t be more excited” to have Becerra lead HHS. 

During his Senate confirmation hearings, Becerra wouldn’t name a single abortion restriction he supported and claimed “I have never sued any nuns,” despite his lawsuit that ultimately drove the Little Sisters of the Poor to return to court. 

He also defended his push for the abortion pill regimen to be prescribed and dispensed remotely, saying remote health care practice is “something that we should really build on” in response to a question about federal restrictions on the abortion pill regimen.

Supporters of Becerra’s nomination pointed to his advocacy for the Affordable Care Act. He also received unlikely support from Republican attorneys general Jeff Landry of Louisiana and Herbert Slatery of Tennessee. Both officials hailed Becerra’s work on combatting the opioid crisis.

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