Faith-based, pro-choice opponents have established "crisis pregnancy centers" across the country in order to disrupt legitimate health care delivery and despoil the reproductive freedom of women. Some of them adopt pseudo-medical business branding. Many do not disclose their affiliations with religious organizations. Their "family planning" in online and offline advertising falsely include abortion among available health services, but dispense propaganda, "Christian therapy," and relentless interventions. A January NYT article reported that there are 2,300-3,500 "crisis pregnancy" centers nationwide, compared with about 1,800 comprehensive clinical services providers.
A House bill HR 5052 was introduced March 30, 2006, to stop the fraudulent practices of fake clinics. Congress returns from recess April 24. Planned Parenthood is leading public lobby to support this Congressinal bill.
Tell your representative to take a stand on these invidious practices Click through to the PP-sponsored contact form directed to your representative.
This action item came to me by email from Planned Parenthood (PPOnline) with an anecdote about a young woman, her boyfriend, and her mother who were seeking the organization's assistance. But they unwittingly walked into a "crisis pregnancy center" run by an anti-abortion group that
shared a parking lot with the real Planned Parenthood clinic. The "crisis pregnancy center" took the girl's confidential personal information and told her to come back for her appointment
The "crisis pregnancy center" staff then proceeded to wage a campaign of intimidation and harassment over the following days, showing up at the girl's home and calling her father's workplace. Our clinic director reports that she was "scared to death to leave her house." They even went to her school and
urged classmates to pressure her not to have an abortion.
This story dramatically illustrates how anti-choice business operations perpetrate civil fraud and disinformation through false advertising.
H. R. 5052 or the `Stop Deceptive Advertising for Women's Services Act' is specifically directs to the Federal Trade Commission to prescribe rules prohibiting fraudulent advertising of abortion services. It has been referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection.
HR 5052 was introduced by Carolyn Maloney (D-NY14)and is co-sponsored by the following
HINCHEY (D-NY22), MCGOVERN (D-MA3), SANDERS (I-VT), ACKERMAN (D-NY5), SCHAKOWSKY (D-IL9), KUCINICH (D-OH10), WAXMAN (D-CA30), WEXLER (D-FL19), CAPPS (D-CA23), GRIJALVA (D-AZ7), CROWLEY (D-NY7), WOOLSEY (D-CA6)
The PP alert highlights recent FedVC appropriations amounting to $60M to fund such faith-based initiatives in "family planning". But Bush's interest in and support of "crisis pregnancy centers" can be traced to a campaign stump speech in 1999.
Eight pages into search engine results, all "crisis pregnancy" ADVERTISEMENTS, I found this WaPo/AP relic, Bush visits crisis pregnancy center in Dubuqute, IA.
Touring a crisis pregnancy center Wednesday, Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush touted "the beauty of adoption" but said he wasn't prepared to offer direct federal help to churches that finance such programs. But Bush, the Texas governor, said he saw no conflict with taxpayer support for programs to which women are referred from the 3,000 such centers nationwide. (...) In touring the crisis center, Bush said he was focusing on pragmatic ways to reduce the number of abortions, including adoption.
Talk2Action writer Esther Kaplan criticized the NYT report the day after it appeared, 17 January 2006, for failing to document the critical role the Bush administration has played in propping up these groups, channeling millions in federal grants their way through DHHS.
Bush's abstinence-only initiative has become a gravy train for these deceptive centers, many of whom, with no legitimate background in health education or sex education, have become leading grant recipients. In 2001, Health and Human Services gave $1.1 million to at least four crisis pregnancy centers. In 2002, that number rose to $2.2 million and at least seven centers. In 2003, the grants totaled $2.8 million to at least six crisis pregnancy centers--or one in every five grantees.
Leland's NYT report spotlighted a Louisville organization called A Woman's Choice Resource Center, which says it has an annual budget of $900,000 and provides free ultrasound and other services, including counseling, diapers, baby clothes and adoption referrals, to more than 4,000 women a year.
A Woman's Choice is an offshoot of the largest church in Kentucky, Southeast Christian Church, an independent evangelical congregation with weekly attendance of 18,000 and an annual budget of $25 million. The center is a separate nonprofit corporation but was founded by the church and shares board members with it. The church started the center after deciding not to join the political fray with Operation Rescue, a confrontational anti-abortion group.
Kaplan's book demonstrates how Federal grantmaking has created an anti-abortion industry and promulgated dysfunctional health care delivery across the nation ... and abroad through non-governmental organizations that depend on USAID funding. The DHHS pattern of patronage -- abstinence policy enforced by "crisis pregnancy centers" -- by now is well established through block grants to state sex ed.
These abstinence grants have taken small, volunteer-run organizations and turned them into substantial institutions; one crisis pregnancy center in Boston, A Woman's Concern, received a $488,000 grant that allowed the group to bump its staff up from two to 12
.
The pathology of big business in reproductive rights isn't so sexy to many progressive. But it is a real and insidious battlefront to be monitored. HR 5052 is a small but constructive step in the right direction to provide SCOTUS-free protections for our liberties. With other commerce-oriented civil statutes, it may well provide the legal foundations for future litigation over the availability of real health care or damage due to medical negligence.