Planned Parenthood rolled out an extensive ad campaign on Thursday, calling out three Republican senators over the Trump administration’s domestic ‘gag rule’ on abortions, as reported by CNN. Sens. Martha McSally of Arizona, Cory Gardner of Colorado, and Thom Tillis of North Carolina will each have an ad play in their respective states. These senators will vote on funding for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The ad campaign reportedly rings in at more than $1 million.
The TV ads allege the senators "let the Trump-Pence administration force Planned Parenthood out of Title X." Planned Parenthood did indeed leave the Title X program in August due to the rule.
Gag rules, as a refresher, aim to stop health care providers in the federally-funded Title X grant program from providing abortions or offering abortion referrals, in spite of it being a safe, legal medical procedure. Now, Title X funds have never been used directly for abortions. The gag rule specifically stops providers who receive these funds from referring or providing abortions, even though the Title X funds go toward other reproductive care, like contraception or STI and cancer screenings.
The end result? Pregnant people aren’t able to receive their full range of medical care, and providers are under immense pressure not to give their patients the most full, accurate medical information.
Title X allows low-income people and those without insurance to access birth control and other reproductive care, which in turn provides people with more autonomy. An attack on Title X is an attack on all people’s reproductive health, but gag rules may have a particularly negative effect on communities of color, people who lack insurance, people in rural areas, and people who live in financial insecurity.
Planned Parenthood’s new campaign includes television, radio, digital, and mailed advertisements, as reported by CNN. Notably, these ads do not directly mention abortion, but instead focus on overall reproductive health.
According to a statement from Planned Parenthood as reported by CNN, the ads aim to “reach and mobilize key communities, such as Black women in North Carolina and the Latinx community in Arizona, that have been hit the hardest by the Trump administration's attacks on sexual and reproductive health care programs, including Title X.”
Here is the ad targeting Sen. McSally.
And here is the ad targeting Sen. Gardner.
And lastly, Sen. Tillis: