Author: David

MEDIA ADVISORY: UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH ADMITS HEARTS BEATING WHILE HARVESTING ABORTED INFANTS’ KIDNEYS

In a statement to news media today, the University of Pittsburgh admitted that “ischemia time” in its NIH grant application for the GUDMAP aborted fetal kidney harvesting program “refers to the time after the tissue collection procedure”. From this afternoon’s Fox News article, “Millions in federal money flowed to fetal tissue bank that collected fetal ‘heart, gonads, legs, brain’: report”:

“Ischemia time, he said “refers to the time after the tissue collection procedure”

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pittsburgh-fetal-tissue-project

Ischemia starts when the organ (the kidneys primarily in Pitt’s GUDMAP project) is cut off from blood circulation. The NIH defines ischemia as “lack of blood supply to a part of the body.” The University states the fetal organs do not undergo ischemia—lose their blood supply—until “after the tissue collection procedure”. This means the organs are still receiving blood supply from the fetal heartbeat during the “tissue collection”.

David Daleiden, founder and president of The Center for Medical Progress, notes: “Pitt is now admitting to news media that the aborted babies are still alive at the time their kidneys are cut out for NIH grant money. Pitt’s grant application for GUDMAP advertised this to the federal government and that labor induction abortions, where the baby is pushed out of the mother whole, would be ‘used to obtain the tissue.’ The plain meaning of the GUDMAP grant application, and the University of Pittsburgh’s statement today explaining it, is that Pitt and the Planned Parenthood abortion providers responsible for its ‘research’ abortions are allowing babies, some of the age of viability, to be delivered alive, and then killing them by cutting their kidneys out.”

Daleiden continues: “If Bill Barr knew about this as Attorney General and did nothing, he should be impeached and hauled before Congress to explain himself. Merrick Garland even promised the Senate Judiciary Committee he would make decisions about fetal trafficking prosecutions based on the facts and the law. The fact pattern here in Pittsburgh and elsewhere demands that this Kermit Gosnell-like activity be brought to justice under the law. Dr. Anthony Fauci, whose NIAID office funds nearly 60% of NIH-sponsored fetal experimentation, was recently grilled by Senator Rand Paul about unethical government-sponsored gain-of-function experiments. The Senate Judiciary Committee should call Barr, Garland, FBI Director Wray, NIH Director Collins, Fauci, and representatives of Pitt and Planned Parenthood to face the same imperative scrutiny for the enabling of partial-birth abortions and infanticide in the government-sponsored human trafficking of aborted infants.”

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ABORTED INFANTS’ CONTINUED BLOOD FLOW ADVERTISED IN RACIST UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH GRANT APPLICATION TO NIH
Newly-Released Public FOIA Records Obtained by The Center for Medical Progress Indicate Organ Harvesting from Aborted Infants Delivered Alive, Targeted by Race

Contact: David Daleiden, media@centerformedicalprogress.org, 949.734.0859

PITTSBURGH, Aug. 3—Judicial Watch and The Center for Medical Progress announced today that they have received disturbing public records from the NIH about government-sponsored fetal experimentation at the University of Pittsburgh, which describe “minimiz[ing]” the “warm ischemic time,” or time without blood flow, of aborted fetal organs and targeting pregnant women and fetuses based on race.

David Daleiden, founder and president of The Center for Medical Progress, states, “The NIH grant application for just one of Pitt’s numerous experiments with aborted infants reads like an episode of American Horror Story. Infants in the womb, some old enough to be viable, are being aborted alive and killed for organ harvesting, in order to bring in millions of dollars in taxpayer funding for Pitt and the Planned Parenthood abortion business it supports. People are outraged by such disregard for the lives of the vulnerable. Law enforcement and public officials should act immediately to bring the next Kermit Gosnell to justice under the law.”

The records were produced by NIH in response to a FOIA request submitted by CMP over a year ago and a federal lawsuit brought by Judicial Watch on behalf of CMP after NIH’s inexplicable delays. The documents include the University of Pittsburgh’s original NIH grant application in 2015 to be the fetal tissue distribution hub for the GenitoUrinary Developmental Molecular Anatomy Project, or GUDMAP, program.

In the $3 million grant application, Pitt proposes that its existing fetal tissue collections “can be significantly ramped up” (pg. 7 of grant application) to supply GUDMAP program researchers across the country with aborted fetal kidneys, bladders, and other organs and body parts from healthy fetuses aborted up to 6 months old.

Pitt advertises several points to NIH for why Pitt will be the best location for a “distribution hub” for supplying large numbers of aborted fetal body parts to NIH researchers, focusing on Pitt’s “over 18 years of experience” collecting body parts from aborted babies. Chillingly, Pitt announces under point number 5, “Ischemia time is minimized”: “We record the warm ischemic time on our samples and take steps to keep it at a minimum to ensure the highest quality biological specimens. We get feedback from our users and utilize this feedback to tailor our collection processes on a case-by-case basis to maximize the needs of investigators.” (pg. 62). Later in the application, Pitt describes “labor induction” as a “procedure that will be used to obtain the tissue” (pg. 73).

According to the NIH, warm ischemia time is “the time a tissue, organ, or body part remains at body temperature after its blood supply has been reduced or cut off but before it is cooled or reconnected to a blood supply.” If the fetus’ heartbeat and blood circulation continue in a labor induction abortion for harvesting organs, it means the fetus is being delivered while still alive and the cause of death is the removal of the organs.

Furthermore, Pitt also states in the application that its GUDMAP fetal harvesting program will feature “Inclusion (or exclusion) of individuals on the basis of sex/gender, race, and ethnicity” and sets quotas of 50% white patients and aborted fetuses, and 50% minority patients and fetuses, with a full 25% of the fetuses harvested to come from Black women (pgs. 74-76). Allegheny County, the major metropolitan area from which Pitt-based abortion practices draw patients, is 80% white and only 13% Black.

CMP and Daleiden cited this part of the GUDMAP NIH application in their amicus curiae brief to the Supreme Court in the Dobbs v. Jackson 15-week abortion limit case.

CMP is responsible for the 2015 undercover video series that exposed top-level Planned Parenthood leadership resorting to partial-birth abortions to sell fetal body parts, resulting in the closure of three Planned Parenthood-partnered biotech companies and the termination of Planned Parenthood from multiple State funding programs. Earlier this year, CMP released a video documenting the disturbing government-sponsored fetal trafficking and experimentation at the University of Pittsburgh and Planned Parenthood’s integral role in Pitt’s programs.

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The press release from Judicial Watch is available here: https://www.judicialwatch.org/press-releases/hhs-documents-organ-harvesting/

Learn more about CMP’s work here: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org

On Wednesday, The Center for Medical Progress and its founder David Daleiden filed an amicus curiae brief with the United States Supreme Court in Dobbs v. Jackson (No. 19-1392), the case on Mississippi’s 15-week abortion limit. To view the brief, click here.

At the center of uncovering and reporting on the sale and trafficking of aborted fetal body parts in America, The Center for Medical Progress and David Daleiden are in a unique position to inform the Court of the facts on the ground about late term abortions and fetal organ harvesting, laying out a concise argument to uphold Mississippi’s Gestational Age Act of 2018 and protect “pre-viability” infants under the law.  The Center and Daleiden conclude the following:

If a four-month old child vulnerable to abortion is old enough to be sold for organ harvesting experiments, he or she is old enough to be protected from elective abortion. This Court must uphold Mississippi’s law. (page 22)

Other quotes from the brief include:

Ironically, it is precisely from this point when the fetus becomes most recognizably a fellow human being, that the fetuses vulnerable to abortion become most useful as an experimental biologic “resource.” Even though four-month-old infants in the womb move, kick, suck their thumbs, hiccup, and demonstrate a readily discernible heartbeat and brainwaves, and even though the Constitution guarantees that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude” shall exist in America nor that any person be deprived of life without due process of law, U.S. Const., amends. XIII § 1, XIV § 1, these same children can be routinely killed through live dismemberment abortions or trafficked and sold for experimental use. (page 3)

Due to this Court’s antiquated, 1900s-era abortion precedents, absent laws like Mississippi’s, unborn-victims-of-violence laws do not protect the very same unborn victims from the violence of predatory businesses that operate with the explicit purposes of killing them by abortion and selling them for experimentation. (page 4)

If a human infant in utero is old enough to be trafficked for his or her organs, he or she should be old enough to be protected by the State from elective abortion. (page 7)

The “pre-viability” infants Mississippi seeks to protect with the Gestational Age Act are the same group most vulnerable for organ trafficking and experimentation. (page 9)

It is impossible to look at the stacks and stacks of invoices for the body parts of premature or “pre-viable” infants that have been published through public records requests and not plainly recognize that in the trafficking of aborted fetuses for experimentation, human beings are being bought and sold for their usefulness to someone else’s labor. Few State interests could be more compelling than that of stamping out such vestigial barbarism completely. (pages 11-12)

To schedule an interview with David Daleiden, email media@centerformedicalprogress.org or call 949.734.0859.

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On the six-year anniversary of its undercover video series catching top Planned Parenthood leadership negotiating the harvesting and sale of aborted fetal body parts, The Center for Medical Progress released a new summary video of the results of its reporting, a re-release of the uncut footage of the undercover encounters that Planned Parenthood accuses of being “heavily edited” or “doctored”, and the following statement:

Six years ago, The Center for Medical Progress began releasing a series of undercover videos that caught top-level Planned Parenthood leadership trafficking and selling aborted baby body parts. The videos documented the horrifying facts about fetal trafficking and experimentation and pushed these barbaric practices out into the light in a public conversation that continues to the present day.

The videos shut down Planned Parenthood’s baby body parts companies in southern California: Novogenix Laboratories, LLC, DaVinci Biosciences, LLC, and DV Biologics, LLC. The DaVinci companies admitted illegally selling aborted fetal body parts from Planned Parenthood Orange & San Bernardino Counties and were shut down in a $7.8 million settlement with the local District Attorney, who credited CMP’s undercover reporting with prompting the successful prosecution.

The Texas Inspector General’s Office found violations of medical standards and ethics in illegal fetal tissue trafficking on the videos at Planned Parenthood, and Texas terminated Planned Parenthood from state Medicaid based on the wrongdoing documented in the recordings. Planned Parenthood sued Texas claiming the videos showed no wrongdoing, and twice the federal 5th Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed that the undercover videos were an accurate, authentic, and reliable basis to disqualify Planned Parenthood from taxpayer funding. On May 13, 2021, Planned Parenthood dropped their lawsuit and surrendered to the defending based on the videos.

CMP’s undercover videos also prompted an ongoing FBI and U.S. Department of Justice investigation of Planned Parenthood and others for illegal transfers of aborted fetal tissue.

The full truth about government-sponsored human trafficking of aborted infants has yet to be revealed. Planned Parenthood and their powerful political allies have retaliated viciously against the publication of the videos, in a telling admission of how badly they got caught and how damning and incriminating the full truth will be. Today, we demand that the human trafficking of aborted infants and their body parts stop and that public officials at all levels bring those responsible to justice under the law.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW VIDEO EXPOSES GOVERNMENT-SPONSORED TRAFFICKING OF ABORTED BABIES AT PITT WITH PLANNED PARENTHOOD
Tomorrow, David Daleiden of The Center for Medical Progress Will Testify About Fetal Experimentation Before Pennsylvania House Committee on Health

Contact: David Daleiden, media@centerformedicalprogress.org, 949.734.0859

PITTSBURGH, May 3–The Center for Medical Progress released a detailed new video today documenting shocking government-sponsored experiments on aborted human fetuses at the University of Pittsburgh, and the local Planned Parenthood’s participation in the fetus trafficking.

Publicly available information demonstrates that Pitt hosts some of the most barbaric experiments carried out on aborted human infants, including scalping 5-month-old aborted fetuses to stitch onto lab rats, exporting fetal kidneys across the country, and killing infants delivered alive for liver harvesting–funded by U.S. taxpayers via the National Institutes of Health, and in particular Dr. Anthony Fauci’s NIAID office.

Local Planned Parenthood of Western Pennsylvania abortion providers supply the aborted fetuses, while Pitt sponsors the local Planned Parenthood’s operations, in what looks like an illegal Quid Pro Quo for fetal body parts, forbidden by 42 U.S. Code 289g-2 and 18 Pennsylvania Statutes 3216. Pennsylvania law also makes it a felony to experiment on a living fetus or to fail to provide immediate medical care to an infant born alive.

Tomorrow, David Daleiden, founder and chief executive of the Center for Medical Progress, will testify at the Pennsylvania House of Representatives Health Committee hearing on “Fetal Experimentation”, where he will discuss the fetal trafficking at the University of Pittsburgh and Planned Parenthood Western Pennsylvania. The University of Pittsburgh’s Dean of the School of Medicine, Dr. Anantha Shekhar, is also expected to testify.

Who:
-The University of Pittsburgh, Planned Parenthood, CMP, and David Daleiden

What:
-CMP releases new video: “Government-Sponsored Fetal Experimentation at the University of Pittsburgh and Planned Parenthood”
-Daleiden testifies before Pennsylvania House Health Committee hearing: “Fetal Experimentation”

When:
-Video Release: Today, Monday May 3, 8:00 a.m. Eastern
-Testimony: Tuesday, May 4; 8:30 a.m. – 11 a.m. Eastern

Where:
-Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-JUzqswKZs
-Testimony: https://livestream.com/pahousegop

David Daleiden is available for further comment or interviews today and anytime after Tuesday’s testimony. Please email media@centerformedicalprogress.org or call 949.734.0859.

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Watch the new video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-JUzqswKZs

To learn more about CMP, visit www.centerformedicalprogress.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

UNDERCOVER INVESTIGATORS WITH PLANNED PARENTHOOD VIDEOS APPEAL $16 MILLION RETALIATION LAWSUIT
Planned Parenthood Sued The Center for Medical Progress, David Daleiden, Others for Releasing Videos of Aborted Baby Body Parts Sales, But Did Not Allege Defamation

Contact: David Daleiden, media@centerformedicalprogress.org, 949.734.0859

SAN FRANCISCO, Mar. 1—Over the weekend, The Center for Medical Progress, David Daleiden, and CMP’s undercover investigators filed their opening briefs on appeal at the federal Ninth Circuit, seeking reversal of Planned Parenthood’s $16 million retaliation lawsuit over CMP’s release of undercover videos, which show Planned Parenthood leadership callously negotiating the sale of aborted fetus body parts.

After the release of the videos in 2015, Planned Parenthood faced Congressional investigations and criminal and regulatory referrals to state, federal, and local officials over its participation in illegal transfers of human fetal tissue for valuable consideration (42 U.S.C. 289g-2). Business partners in Planned Parenthood’s fetal tissue program in southern California admitted illegally selling fetal tissue from Planned Parenthood and were shut down in a $7.8 million settlement with the Orange County District Attorney, who credited CMP’s undercover reporting with prompting the successful prosecution. But in January 2016, Planned Parenthood filed a lawsuit in San Francisco federal court in retaliation for the undercover videos, suing for fraud, trespass, unlawful recording, and breach of contract and seeking damages of over $20 million—but conspicuously refused to bring a claim for defamation.

The judge, William Orrick III, initially slashed that number down to barely $400,000 in consultant fees, but then allowed a San Francisco jury to triple it under the federal RICO statute and add nearly $1 million in punitive damages. Then Judge Orrick himself added $13 million in attorneys fees.

Over 4 different opening briefs filed at the Ninth Circuit on Friday, CMP, Daleiden, the undercover investigators, and other co-defendants argue and alert the federal appeals court:

• Judge Orrick allowed Planned Parenthood to make an end run around the First Amendment, where Planned Parenthood sued for research and management costs stemming from the release of the undercover videos, but did not prove in court the videos were false or defamatory—in fact, Planned Parenthood admitted in court the videos were authentic. Judge Orrick’s $16 million fine for the videos and injunction against further investigation awarded to Planned Parenthood, without any defamation claim, are a threat to all undercover reporting.

• In allowing Planned Parenthood’s case to go forward without proving the video reporting was false, Judge Orrick denied CMP’s First Amendment rights and protections for speech, blocked significant discovery on Planned Parenthood’s fetal research practices, and forbade any Defense based on the truth of the video reporting.

• Judge Orrick excluded the expert testimony of Dr. Forrest O. Smith, the longest continuously practicing abortion provider in the United States, who testified the videos are evidence infants are being delivered alive and killed through organ harvesting in Planned Parenthood’s fetal research programs.

• Judge Orrick allowed Planned Parenthood to sue CMP for “fraud” and “breach of contract” for operating a “fake” fetal tissue company, when the “real” fetal tissue companies Planned Parenthood was contracting with like DaVinci Biosciences were admittedly criminal.

• Planned Parenthood’s fraud, trespass, and RICO claims presented no evidence to distinguish CMP investigators’ undercover networking with the abortion industry from pure speech protected by the First Amendment, and 9th Circuit and Supreme Court precedent. The “fake IDs” shown by some investigators were creative props never used for government ID purposes and cannot be the basis for a tripled RICO fine.

• Planned Parenthood’s “breach of contract” claims are based on standardized tradeshow agreements for exhibit booth space, which concluded with the end of each tradeshow and where undercover investigators ran exhibit booths without incident or injury.

• The undercover video recordings at issue in the case were all made of professional conversations in public areas where third parties easily overheard—yet Judge Orrick would not allow the Defense to play the full videos of the conversations to the jury.

• David Daleiden led and managed the entire undercover project and video release, with investigative contractors playing limited roles and former CMP board directors minimally involved. But Planned Parenthood picked and chose without evidence who to sue for money based on Planned Parenthood’s own conspiracy theories.

• One undercover investigator did not identify as pro-life and used his own name and ID to attend Planned Parenthood tradeshows—yet Orrick still allowed Planned Parenthood to sue him for “fraud” and “trespass” because he assisted a pro-life publication. Judge Orrick then punished the other Defendants further for actually subscribing to pro-life advocacy. The real “crime” in Orrick’s courtroom was pro-life speech, and guilt by association with it.

• Judge Orrick helped open and operate a Planned Parenthood abortion referral clininc in San Francisco that brought in $100,000/year to a non-profit center that Orrick directed. Orrick’s Planned Parenthood clinic referred pregnant patients to the same Planned Parenthood fetal tissue program with StemExpress that CMP’s reporting exposed. During the lawsuits in his courtroom, Judge Orrick’s wife’s Facebook account used a photo of him to “Like” posts calling CMP and Daleiden’s reporting “domestic terrorism” and calling for Daleiden’s criminal prosecution. CMP and Daleiden sought to have Judge Orrick disqualified from the case, but Orrick refused to step down, refused to disclose his relationship with Planned Parenthood, and attempted to influence another judge to keep him on the case.

Daleiden notes, “Planned Parenthood got caught selling aborted baby body parts in the undercover videos, and their fetal trafficking programs have started to be held accountable. Yet because of a biased federal judge, who previously helped run a Planned Parenthood clinic in the fetal trafficking network, Planned Parenthood has been allowed to sue me and CMP for successfully reporting the facts while blocking us from defending ourselves.”

Daleiden continues, “The animus against free speech about abortion and fetal trafficking was palapable in Judge Orrick’s courtroom, where no evidence against Planned Parenthood would be admitted and the real ‘crime’ is being pro-life. This judgment does not reflect equality or fairness and puts freedom of the press and the rule of law at risk for all Americans. This judgment must be reversed.”

Charles LiMandri of LiMandri & Jonna, special counsel to the Thomas More Society and lead trial counsel in the case, states, “Following the mockery of a trial in this case, I wrote an article in November 2019 to explain why the defense had such a strong record for appeal. The appellate briefs filed for David Daleiden and the other defendants on Friday, February 26, 2021, reflect the full strength of that appellate record. The issues in this case are vitally important for our constitutional freedoms of speech and the press, as well as the future of undercover journalism in our nation. David Daleiden and his co-defendants deserve to be rewarded for their courageous efforts to expose the atrocities of Planned Parenthood’s illegal trafficking in aborted baby body parts. Instead, a biased trial court hamstrung their defense with extremely one-sided rulings resulting in a monstrously unjust verdict in favor of Planned Parenthood. We are looking forward to finally obtaining justice for our heroic clients through the appellate process. Ultimately, it is Planned Parenthood that must answer for its heinous crimes against humanity.”

Harmeet Dhillon of the Dhillon Law Group, representing Daleiden and CMP, states, “This appeal implicates fundamental First Amendment values and further important legal issues of broad relevance beyond this case. This unprecedented, draconian treatment of undercover journalists amounts to selective censorship and punishment of pro-life views. Planned Parenthood refused to try the veracity of the undercover videos before the jury, yet this favored litigant was allowed to reap a windfall in defamation-style damages while our clients were blocked from mounting a full defense. The future of investigative journalism in the Ninth Circuit may well turn on the outcome of this case.”

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To learn more about CMP’s undercover reporting visit: centerformedicalprogress.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

UNSEALED SWORN TESTIMONY SHOWS PLANNED PARENTHOOD LIED TO CONGRESS ABOUT FETAL TISSUE SALES
VP of Research Testifies that Houston Branch Sold the Entire Fetus to Local University, Not “Only” the Placenta as PPFA Claimed

Contact: David Daleiden, media@centerformedicalprogress.org, 949.734.0859

IRVINE, Oct. 29–The Center for Medical Progress released a fourth video today featuring unsealed video clips from Planned Parenthood leaders’ sworn deposition testimony about the abortion provider’s fetal tissue research programs–including details about the programs that directly contradict what Planned Parenthood told multiple Congressional investigations in 2015 and 2016.

While under investigation by the Senate Judiciary Committee and House Select Investigative Panel, Planned Parenthood told Congress that its Houston, TX affiliate, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, never had a “fetal” tissue research program–only a “placental” tissue program–with researchers at University of Texas Medical Branch. Based on this representation, Planned Parenthood produced less documentation of PPGC’s practices than other regional offices in California.

But when questioned under oath about the transactions with UTMB, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast’s Vice President for Research, Melissa Farrell, testifies that her Planned Parenthood office in fact transferred the entire aborted fetus to UTMB, not just the placenta. Farrell testifies that in previous fetal tissue transactions, PPGC transferred the “products of conception” from the abortion–the fetus, placenta, and everything removed in the abortion–“in its entirety.” When asked, “What specimens are then conveyed to UTMB under the contract?” Farrell replies, “Products of conception,” and when asked, “Was it the entire products of conception from the abortion procedure?” she answers, “That is my understanding, yes.”

Contracts between PPGC and UTMB show the abortion provider charging $150 per successful fetal tissue specimen transfer to the university. The State of Texas disqualified the Planned Parenthood network from the state Medicaid program based on CMP’s undercover footage showing PPGC willing to change abortion procedures to get more intact fetal specimens to transfer for valuable consideration, and the federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the termination, finding that CMP’s undercover footage is authentic and accurate evidence that Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast committed partial-birth abortions to sell fetal tissue.

The video also includes testimony from Dr. Katharine Sheehan, the longtime Medical Director of Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest in San Diego and Riverside in southern California. Dr. Sheehan testifies that PPPSW has an ongoing relationship to provide fetal organs and tissues to middleman wholesaler Advanced Bioscience Resources, but she also reveals that PPPSW simultaneously has direct fetal tissue supply relationships with a local research institution and the researchers working there. Published experimental studies from UC San Diego thank Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest for providing aborted fetal tissue. In 2018, the Health and Human Services Department terminated an FDA contract with ABR for fetal tissue because it was “not sufficiently assured” that ABR complied with the federal law against selling fetal tissue (42 U.S.C. 289g-2).

The video also shows further testimony from Dr. Mary Gatter, for many years the Medical Director of Planned Parenthood Los Angeles responsible for the fetal tissue program with the wholesaler business Novogenix Laboratories, LLC, which closed down during the scrutiny of the Congressional investigations. When Dr. Gatter is asked a similar question as Dr. Sheehan as to whether PPLA also had researchers other than the Novogenix company come “to collect” fetal specimens, Dr. Gatter at first testifies, “Not as far I am aware.” Then, Dr. Gatter testifies, “Can I just–let me, I’d like to amend that, to say, there is a difference between tissue collection for a big organization, that they collect the tissue–a tissue procurement organization–and a specific research project. Now, we may in fact have been involved in specific research projects, but that’s a whole different category from fetal tissue donation.” Dr. Gatter testifies that she was responsible for “research projects” at PPLA and securing approval from the national Planned Parenthood Federation of America Research Department for these studies. But when asked to clarify, “Those research projects may have included projects that involved fetal tissue?” Dr. Gatter testifies, “I cannot remember.”

Last month, 49 Congressional representatives wrote to the Department of Justice demanding an investigation of Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast based on revelations in the sworn deposition testimony. Over the summer, 28 U.S. Senators wrote to Attorney General Bill Barr demanding an update on action the Department of Justice has taken to enforce the laws against trafficking in human fetuses and other violations. In May, the Small Business Administration demanded 37 Planned Parenthood affiliates return $80 million in federal relief loans they fraudulently certified they were eligible for. In late 2017, the DOJ announced it had opened a federal investigation following criminal referrals by Congress of Planned Parenthood and their business partners. The same week, two southern California companies admitted guilt for illegally selling body parts from Planned Parenthood Orange & San Bernardino Counties in a $7.8 million settlement with the Orange County District Attorney.

CMP founder and project lead David Daleiden notes, “When the undercover videos were first released, Planned Parenthood delivered a carefully-constructed script to the public and to the press minimizing their involvement in fetal experimentation–but under oath, their story changes. Now we know that Planned Parenthood flagrantly lied to the United States Congress about the extent of its abortion clinics’ criminal trafficking in fetal body parts for experimentation. How long will public officials continue to allow them to get away with it?”

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Watch the new video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsxgNV_RlnA

View more documents and testimony here: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/fetal-trafficking-under-oath/

To learn more about CMP, visit: www.CMP.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

UNDERCOVER FILMMAKER SUES PLANNED PARENTHOOD FOR CALLING FETAL BODY PARTS VIDEOS “FAKE”
Planned Parenthood Federation of America, in Press Statements and on Twitter, Claimed Undercover Videos “Manufacture a Fake” and “Created a False Smear Campaign”

Contact: David Daleiden, media@centerformedicalprogress.org, 949.734.0859

NEW YORK, September 17–The Center for Medical Progress and its founder David Daleiden, responsible for the 2015 undercover video series exposing top Planned Parenthood leadership negotiating the harvesting and sale of aborted fetal body parts, are suing Planned Parenthood Federation of America for defamation in New York federal court after PPFA falsely and repeatedly accused the filmmakers of “manufacture[d]”, “fake”, and “false” undercover video reporting.

In sworn deposition testimony in 2019, top Planned Parenthood officials admitted that their own actual statements were captured by the undercover video recordings. PPFA itself stipulated during a federal court trial that the words used by Planned Parenthood officials in the undercover videos “were spoken by those persons”.

Yet on September 18, 2019, PPFA issued a press statement claiming Daleiden and CMP filmed and published undercover video “to manufacture a fake smear campaign against Planned Parenthood”. On November 15, 2019, PPFA tweeted that Daleiden and CMP “created a false smear campaign against Planned Parenthood”.

After 30 months of undercover work, CMP began releasing its undercover video footage of documenting Planned Parenthood and its business partners’ participation in the harvesting and sale of human fetuses and their body parts from abortions. With each video release, CMP posted the full footage of the conversation with the Planned Parenthood representative, alongside a shorter summary version presenting the most significant parts of the conversation.

In the first video release, PPFA’s then Senior Director of Medical Services, Dr. Deborah Nucatola, suggested prices “per-specimen” of fetal tissue, and advised that in her Planned Parenthood clinics, “We’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver, because we know, so I’m not gonna crush that part, I’m gonna basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above, and I’m gonna see if I can get it all intact.” Dr. Nucatola also described using ultrasound guidance to flip the position of a living fetus to feet-first in order to extract the fetus whole, remarking, “So if you do it starting from the breech presentation, there’s dilation that happens as the case goes on, and often, the last step, you can evacuate an intact calvarium [head] at the end,” and concluding, “We’ve been pretty successful with that, I’d say.”

The U.S. Department of Justice announced three years ago it had opened a federal investigation of Planned Parenthood and its business partners for selling fetal tissue based on criminal referrals from Congress, prompted by CMP’s undercover videos. Two of Planned Parenthood’s business partners in Orange County, CA then admitted guilt for illegally selling aborted tissue from Planned Parenthood in a $7.8 million settlement, and the Orange County District Attorney credited CMP’s undercover reporting with prompting the successful case. In September 2018, the Department of Health and Human Services terminated its contracts with Planned Parenthood partner Advanced Bioscience Resources because it could not be “sufficiently assured” that ABR’s supply complied with the federal law against selling fetal tissue (42 U.S.C. 289g-2). In January 2019, the federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled based on forensic analysis that CMP’s undercover footage was accurate, authentic, reliable evidence that Planned Parenthood committed partial-birth abortions and changed abortions in order to sell fetal tissue.

CMP president David Daleiden states, “Planned Parenthood admits my videos are true when under oath in federal court, but when speaking to the public, Planned Parenthood lies and calls the videos fake. I have put my life on hold for five years to report, with video evidence, the trafficking of aborted infants that I and others witnessed at the highest levels of Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry. It is time for Planned Parenthood to face the truth.”

Harmeet Dhillon, counsel for Daleiden and CMP, notes, “Planned Parenthood has tremendous power and influence in our society. But even it must adhere to legal norms. We filed this lawsuit to hold PPFA accountable for damaging falsehoods it uttered concerning our clients’ groundbreaking journalism that exposed shocking practices it would rather keep hidden — for good reason. Planned Parenthood is not above the law. We look forward to the merits litigation of this lawsuit.”

“Instead of coming clean about its ruthless pursuit of profit from selling the remains of aborted children, Planned Parenthood tried to smear David Daleiden, the man who blew the whistle on its dirty secret,” says Peter Breen, Vice President and Senior Counsel for the Thomas More Society, representing Daleiden. “In its earlier lawsuit against David and the Center for Medical Progress, Planned Parenthood fought to avoid scrutiny of its illegal fetal tissue trafficking. This new lawsuit puts Planned Parenthood’s grisly business practices front and center, to prove the truth of the conclusions of David’s investigation, which were also confirmed and echoed by the United States Congress and other government officials.”

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To watch CMP’s undercover video series, visit: centerformedicalprogress.org/cmp/investigative-footage

Learn more about Planned Parenthood’s admissions under oath here: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/fetal-trafficking-under-oath/ 

To learn more about CMP, visit: CenterforMedicalProgress.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

PLANNED PARENTHOOD SWORN VIDEO TESTIMONY ADMITS USING PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTIONS TO SELL BABY PARTS
Senior Executive Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Featured in First Undercover Video, Admits PPLA Clinics Were “Pretty Successful” With Feet-First, Intact Extraction of Living Fetuses

Contact: David Daleiden, media@centerformedicalprogress.org, 949.734.0859

IRVINE, Aug. 24–The Center for Medical Progress released a third video today featuring unsealed video clips from top Planned Parenthood leaders’ sworn deposition testimony about the way Planned Parenthood abortion doctors change abortions to harvest more usable fetal organs and tissues.

The new video includes unsealed deposition testimony from Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Senior Director of Medical Services from 2009 to 2016, who now holds regional leadership positions with the organization.

Dr. Nucatola famously described Planned Parenthood’s fetal tissue research programs, casually over wine and salad at a crowded Los Angeles restaurant, in CMP’s first undercover video release in 2015. In the undercover video, Dr. Nucatola described using ultrasound guidance to flip a fetus to a feet-first position for intact extraction and successful organ harvesting at Planned Parenthood. Yet when questioned by Congressional investigators, Dr. Nucatola denied that such abortions were used in Planned Parenthood’s fetal tissue research programs.

But under oath in her deposition, Dr. Nucatola confirms, “If I was aware that it was a donation case, yes” she would change where she grasped the fetus with her forceps in order not to crush certain organs. When asked about her description of flipping a fetus to breech position in order to obtain intact organs, Dr. Nucatola first seems to deny doing so. But when confronted with her conclusion on the undercover tape, “We’ve been pretty successful with that,” Dr. Nucatola admits, “I was referring to PPLA.” Asked if that included herself, Dr. Nucatola testifies, “Yes, including me, I worked at PPLA.”

Using ultrasound guidance to manipulate the fetus from vertex to breech orientation before intact extraction is the hallmark of the illegal partial-birth abortion procedure (18 U.S.C. 1531), which attempts to draw a brightline between abortion and infanticide by criminalizing the intact extraction of a living fetus for the purpose of killing the child afterward.

The new video also shows testimony from Tram Nguyen, Vice President of Abortion Access at Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast in Houston, TX. The federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals found in 2019 that CMP’s undercover footage of Nguyen admitting Planned Parenthood could sign a statement disclaiming “intent” to perform an intact extraction abortion, and then go on to procure an intact fetus, was forensically authentic and accurate evidence that Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast had committed partial-birth abortions. Under oath, when shown the video clip and asked if it was her understanding that an abortion provider could provide an intact fetus so long as the form was signed, Nguyen testifies, “Yes,” and when asked if it is true that intact abortions occur in spite of the form, Nguyen admits, “It is true.”

The new video also includes testimony from Dr. Mary Gatter, former medical director for PPLA, admitting that after internal debate in the organization, she “evolved” in her thinking to believe that changing abortion “techniques” in order to harvest higher quality fetal tissue was acceptable. Dr. Gatter testifies that Planned Parenthood makes a distinction between the abortion “technique” and the abortion “procedure,” and that changing the former is allowed while changing the latter is not. The federal law at 42 U.S.C. 289g-1 prohibits any changes to the “procedures used to terminate the pregnancy,” and not simply “the procedure” as a singular category.

Earlier this month, 28 U.S. Senators wrote to Attorney General Bill Barr demanding an update on action the Department of Justice has taken to enforce the laws against trafficking in human fetuses and other violations. In May, the Small Business Administration demanded 37 Planned Parenthood affiliates return $80 million in federal relief loans they fraudulently certified they were eligible for. In late 2017, the DOJ announced it had opened a federal investigation following criminal referrals by Congress of Planned Parenthood and their business partners. The same week, two southern California companies admitted guilt for illegally selling body parts from Planned Parenthood Orange & San Bernardino Counties in a $7.8 million settlement with the Orange County District Attorney.

CMP founder and project lead David Daleiden notes, “Planned Parenthood reflexively proclaims innocence to the public and to a compliant establishment press, but when Planned Parenthood abortion leadership is placed under oath, they testify to crimes against women and infants. Criminality in the national taxpayer-funded abortion industry will continue to spread unless federal authorities hold them accountable once and for all.”

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Watch the new video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POdbu4bp5rQ

View more documents and testimony here: https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/fetal-trafficking-under-oath/

To learn more about CMP, visit: www.CMP.org