Washington: US Republicans will seek to defund US women’s health care provider Planned Parenthood through a bill that repeals President Barack Obama’s landmark health care reform, the top Republican in Congress said yesterday.
“Planned Parenthood legislation would be in our reconciliation bill,” House Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters when asked how his party would attempt to defund the organisation now that the White House and both chambers of Congress will be in Republican hands when Donald Trump is inaugurated president on January 20.
Reconciliation is a special congressional procedure by which legislation can bypass Senate blocking tactics and need only a simply majority to pass, rather than a 60-vote supermajority in the 100-member chamber.
Planned Parenthood has been perennially attacked by conservatives. Many Republicans have long sought to end all federal funding to the decades-old network, which reportedly received more than $550m in government funding in 2014, about half its total revenue.
Conservatives have accused decades-old network of serving as an abortion factory. Outrage swelled in 2015 when video secretly recorded by anti-abortion activists showed a Planned Parenthood official discussing scientific research community’s demand for fetal tissue, and best abortion techniques for preserving certain organs.
In August 2015, at the start of the presidential race, Senate Republicans introduced a controversial bill to halt federal funding to Planned Parenthood, but Democrats were able to block the legislation.
Planned Parenthood is described by its supporters as a vital supplier of health care services, including contraception, family planning, HIV prevention and cancer screenings for millions of women in the United States.
It operates some 650 clinics nationwide.
