Op-Ed: Planned Parenthood boss’s DNC speech fails a basic fact-check

Pro-Lifers are activists, but we’re also factivists.  And when someone lies about the goals of the Pro-Life movement, or tramples the preborn as collateral damage of their skewed worldview, we will not be silent.  On Tuesday night, Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards spoke at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.  But her words were dishonest, misleading, and at times downright false.

Lie #1: Women need abortion and Planned Parenthood to succeed

Let’s start with Richards’ claim that Planned Parenthood gives women “the care they need to live their lives and chase their dreams – no limits, no ceilings.”  In fact, Planned Parenthood has been ravaging the freedoms of women for decades by killing them (sometimes just because they are girls), lying to them, and using and abusing them for profitCecile: those actions are the antithesis of “giving women what they need.” 

Lie #2: Hillary’s VP pick has been “a champion for women and families his entire life”

We know that in Planned Parenthood’s language-subverting dictionary, “pro-family” means “anti-Life.”  And while Hillary’s anti-Life VP pick Tim Kaine shares Hillary’s radical abortion views today, he was singing a different tune during his Virginia gubernatorial bid a decade ago.  At that time, Kaine claimed to be in favor of abstinence education, opposed to partial-birth abortion, and opposed to abortion in general because of his faith.  Cecile Richards either did not do her homework on the evolution of Tim Kaine’s abortion positions, or willfully mischaracterized his stance to fit her own agenda.

Lie #3: Planned Parenthood saves women from cancer

“When Donald Trump and Mike Pence say they’ll defund Planned Parenthood,” Richards gushed to the cheering audience, “they’re talking about cutting women… off of life-saving care.”

For years, Cecile Richards has shamelessly lied about Planned Parenthood’s role in cancer diagnosis and treatment at every opportunity.  Fact: Planned Parenthood has NO ability to diagnose or treat breast cancer.  Not a single Planned Parenthood facility in the world has a mammogram machine (although Richards has repeatedly lied about this fact), and the abortion giant has zero resources for treating cancer once a diagnosis is made elsewhere.  So what Cecile Richards was talking about when she told the emotional story of a Dallas breast cancer patient who “received care” at Planned Parenthood two years ago is a total mystery.

Lie #4: Richards claims SCOTUS called House Bill 2 “dangerous”

“You may have heard that just last month the Supreme Court ruled that the Texas laws that forced abortion providers to close their doors are dangerous…”

In fact, nowhere in the 40-page majority opinion or in Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s concurring opinion is House Bill 2, the Pro-Life Omnibus Bill of the 2013 Texas Legislative Session, called “dangerous.”  The law was ruled unconstitutional because anti-Life justices on the bench believed Pro-Life protections for women undergoing abortion serve as an “undue burden” to abortion access.

Richards did tell the truth about one thing: that Hillary would “always stand up for Roe v. Wade” and legalized abortion (through all nine months of pregnancy).  A few months ago, in fact, Hillary Clinton stated: “The unborn person doesn’t have constitutional rights.”  Unborn person – this is a woman and a movement that acknowledges the personhood of preborn humans (including preborn females!) but still obstinately withholds basic human rights from them while claiming out of the other side of their mouth to stand for the rights of all women and children.

The bottom line: Planned Parenthood and Cecile Richards rely on legislation that refuses to acknowledge the Right to Life as outlined in the Declaration of Independence in order to make beaucoup bucks committing abortions.  Make no mistake: therein lies the root of the abortion behemoth’s lavish love affair with Hillary Clinton.