Those Investigations into Planned Parenthood Have Found a Whole Lot of Nothing

For over a month now, anti-abortion extremists have been carrying out a bogus attack on Planned Parenthood and the health care it provides — using heavily edited videos as a pretext for restricting women’s access to health care.

Certain governors have even been willing to put taxpayer dollars toward investigations of Planned Parenthood health centers. All of these investigations that have been concluded so far have (surprise!) come up empty.

That’s right. All of the completed investigations into Planned Parenthood have shown that there was no “wrongdoing” to find. Why? Because no matter what lengths anti-abortion extremists go to, it doesn’t change the truth: Planned Parenthood is a high-quality health care provider that millions rely on each year.

Investigating Something That Doesn’t Exist

Interestingly, many of these state investigations are focused on fetal tissue donation programs, which none of the investigated health centers even participate in.

Why would state leaders launch investigations into programs that do not exist at Planned Parenthood? It goes back to those widely debunked videos: A group called “The Center for Medical Progress” — which politicians have said should come under investigation itself — has been releasing the heavily edited videos for more than a month, claiming they show Planned Parenthood engaging in illegal activity related to fetal tissue donation.

Basically, states are launching bogus investigations based on deception. Wonder what the public thinks about elected officials spending government time and taxpayer money on that....

BREAKING: Investigations Discover That Health Care Provider Provides Health Care

To get a better idea of what’s going on with the investigations, take a gander at these telling headlines:

• States Try to Dig Up Planned Parenthood Violations, Fail Miserably (Huffington Post)
• Investigations Turn Up No Planned Parenthood Wrongdoing (MSNBC)
• Investigations Into Planned Parenthood Are Falling Totally Flat (ThinkProgress)

Five states  have completed their investigations to date and found absolutely nothing. Here are the highlights from each state that has concluded investigations:

• Officials in Pennsylvania, Indiana, Massachusetts, and South Dakota found full compliance with state laws and regulations, and found the allegations against Planned Parenthood are baseless.

• After clearing Planned Parenthood of any wrongdoing in its investigation, Georgia also lifted its threats to end Planned Parenthood’s ability to use state labs to provide critical STD testing services.

• Similarly, an AP open records request suggests there is no wrongdoing in Kansas, while officials in Florida backed down about limiting women’s access to safe, legal abortion at Planned Parenthood health centers.

All these results lay bare that the extremists’ smear videos and the state investigations launched by anti-abortion politicians are all really nothing more than a campaign against the essential health care Planned Parenthood affiliates provide.

Five Governors (and Counting) Decline to Investigate

Not all governors have caved to the pressure that the anti-abortion movement is putting on them. Officials in five states (Delaware, Idaho, Minnesota, New Hampshire and Virginia) told the extremists to buzz off, and we’re still counting.

Here’s how the Delaware Division of Public Health responded to calls to investigate Planned Parenthood:

“It is our understanding that Planned Parenthood of Delaware does not have a tissue donation program.”

“There is no tissue donation program at Planned Parenthood to investigate.”

“There are no active investigations at this time.”

After dozens of state officials asked Idaho’s governor to investigate Planned Parenthood, he said he won't do it citing — yet again — the complete lack of evidence of any wrongdoing. He is the fifth governor to come out in support of Planned Parenthood, and against these politically motivated investigations.

Why These Politicians’ Actions Are Really Dangerous

Even though the allegations against Planned Parenthood are baseless, they could really hurt the 2.7 million patients that depend on Planned Parenthood’s reproductive health services every year.

Despite warnings from the federal government that such moves are against the law, three states have moved to kick Planned Parenthood out of their Medicaid programs, and two other states have tried to defund Planned Parenthood from other programs providing preventive health care. And they likely won’t be the last. What’s more, we expect some anti-women’s health members of Congress to use the video hoax as a way to drum up support for defunding Planned Parenthood — and to try to shut down the federal government if they don’t get their way.