Go to Content Go to Navigation Go to Navigation Go to Site Search Homepage

House Tax Bill Includes Buried Attempt to Restrict Abortion

For Immediate Release: Nov. 2, 2017


Washington, DC -- The House released a tax reform package today that includes hidden language aimed at restricting access to abortion. With this move, House Republican leaders have once again made clear that they will stop at nothing in their relentless attempt to block women from accessing basic reproductive health care.

Statement from Dana Singiser, Vice President, Public Policy and Government Affairs for Planned Parenthood Action Fund:

"It is absurd that House Republican leaders would use a tax bill to try to advance their agenda to undermine access to safe, legal abortion. Denying women access to safe, legal abortion is wildly out of touch with what the majority of Americans want. Politicians in Washington, DC have no place inserting themselves in decisions about women's health and lives, not on this bill and not on any bill."

The House bill includes language that explicitly allows an “unborn child” to be an account beneficiary of a 529 college savings plan, defining “unborn child” in statute. In fact, the law already allows people to create 529 accounts for their future children, making the new language unnecessary and their agenda clear: to insert language into this bill that is solely designed to support relentless efforts to restrict access to safe, legal abortion.  

This proposal is wildly out of touch with what the majority of Americans want. Support for Roe v. Wade is at the highest it’s ever been, with 7 out of 10 Americans saying they believe a woman should have the right to safe, legal abortion -- that’s more popular than Congress, the Republican party or the Democratic party.

###

Planned Parenthood Action Fund is an independent, nonpartisan, not-for-profit membership organization formed as the advocacy and political arm of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. The Action Fund engages in educational and electoral activity, including voter education, grassroots organizing, and legislative advocacy.

Planned Parenthood cares about your data privacy. We and our third-party vendors use cookies and other tools to collect, store, monitor, and analyze information about your interaction with our site to improve performance, analyze your use of our sites and assist in our marketing efforts. You may opt out of the use of these cookies and other tools at any time by visiting Cookie Settings. By clicking “Allow All Cookies” you consent to our collection and use of such data, and our Terms of Use. For more information, see our Privacy Notice.

Cookie Settings

Planned Parenthood cares about your data privacy. We and our third-party vendors, use cookies, pixels, and other tracking technologies to collect, store, monitor, and process certain information about you when you access and use our services, read our emails, or otherwise engage with us. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences, or your device. We use that information to make the site work, analyze performance and traffic on our website, to provide a more personalized web experience, and assist in our marketing efforts. We also share information with our social media, advertising, and analytics partners. You can change your default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our Necessary Cookies as they are deployed to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information, please see our Privacy Notice.

Marketing

On

We use online advertising to promote our mission and help constituents find our services. Marketing pixels help us measure the success of our campaigns.

Performance

On

We use qualitative data, including session replay, to learn about your user experience and improve our products and services.

Analytics

On

We use web analytics to help us understand user engagement with our website, trends, and overall reach of our products.