The GOP's Plan to Fund Anti-Abortion Activists

While Congressional Republicans have proposed cutting funds going to support women's health and family planning and citing the need for fiscal reform, they have been introducing bills that will provide federal funding to crisis pregnancy centers whose main focus is to dissuade women from seeking an abortion, often in unregulated and uncertified offices that look like medical clinics.

Congressional Republicans have made a big deal about slashing funds for Planned Parenthood and other family planning programs, claiming that these cuts are necessary to address the federal deficit. But one of those lawmakers has been pushing his own measure to provide additional federal funds to so-called crisis pregnancy centers—unregulated and uncertified clinics that try to deter women from seeking abortions.

A bill that Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) introduced in January would provide federal funds for the purchase of sonogram machines at organizations that counsel women against having an abortion (the American Independent reported on this bill last week). These crisis pregnancy outfits, sometimes called "pregnancy resource centers," are often run by religious groups; many have been found to provide women with false and misleading information to dissuade them from having an abortion.

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