America's Talking - ‘Appalling’: Abortion Advocacy Groups Received Nearly $2B in Taxpayer Money

Episode Date: December 16, 2023

Abortion-providing groups received $1.89 billion in taxpayer money from fiscal years 2019 to 2021, a newly released federal watchdog report shows. The Government Accountability Office, a federal agency, conducted the report at lawmakers' request, showing that Planned Parenthood received the lion's share, taking in $1.78 billion in those years. Planned Parenthood is estimated to have performed more than one million abortions during that time. Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/america-in-focus/support Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome to America in Focus, powered by the Center Square. I'm Dan McAlo, Vice President of News and Content at the Franklin News Foundation, publisher of the Center Square Newswire service. Joining me again today, as he does each and every week is the Center Square's Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief Casey Harper. How are you, Casey? Doing good, Dan. How are you?

I am doing well, thank you. We are recording this on Friday, December 15th. Casey, some news this week about, abortion providing groups across the country receiving just about $2 billion in taxpayer money from fiscal years 2019 to 2021. Many of them, much of that money, COVID-related relief funds. Now there's some questions about whether or not groups like Planned Parenthood should have received that money.

You wrote about it at thecenterSquare.com. What's going on here, Casey? Yeah, this is a very interesting and controversial story, you know, at thecendersquare.com and on this podcast, we always try to take the taxpayer angle. And so we are asking ourselves, how are tax dollars being used? Not necessarily what Republicans and Democrats say, but how are taxpayer dollars being used? What is the average person who, you know, is worried about gas prices and grocery bills going to think when they see that their tax dollars went to this or that? And so I think this story qualifies as that. So a new federal watchdog report from the government

accountability office showed that $1.89 billion. from those fiscal years you mentioned, went to these abortion providing an abortion advocacy groups, really. These aren't just health care groups. These are groups that actively advocate to, and really even probably lobby for more abortion access. Planned Parenthood took the lion share. So this is really about almost $2 billion going to Planned Parenthood, which I think most people are familiar with. They took in $1.78 billion in those years, right? So it's a lot of money, I would say most of that money came from reimbursements for, like, health care, to be clear, I think it's important to note that, you know, people went and received some kind of health care or examination at Planned Parenthood,

and the government reimbursed them. But one thing that Senator Marshall Blackburn, a Republican from Tennessee, for instance, is, is accusing Planned Parenthood of breaking the law. And Planned Parenthood did not get back to me or respond to these allegations. But they said that Planned Parenthood broke the law because you remember PPP loans, Dan, the Paycheck Protection Program? I sure do. Yeah, I mean, they took almost $100 million, $90.4 million during the COVID-19 pandemic to, and that money was really meant for small businesses to help pay their employees

and stay open during COVID. So there's multiple levels here. First off, you may not have known it if you're a listener, but Planned Parenthood gets, you know, billions of dollars a decade. We can just put it that way. Billions and billions of dollars a decade. And they, like many other companies, may have taken advantage of this PPP. loan or put it another way. All that COVID money and those big deficits that were floating around

during the pandemic, so much of it was sent to crazy places, was lost to fraud and abuse. We don't even know, you know, billions went to fraudsters. Others, you know, money were finding out in the aftermath went to a lot of questionable sources, and this may be one of them. Yeah, just as a refresher on the pay check protection program, of course, during the height of COVID-19, when governments across the country essentially shut down small businesses that they themselves deemed were non-essential. The PPP program was meant so because there were massive layoffs, right, millions and millions of layoffs during this time because small businesses couldn't operate because of government

decisions was meant to keep these small businesses to keep people on the payroll. So they didn't, so they had money to continue to survive, et cetera. I remember we wrote dozens and dozens of stories of questionable groups, even millionaires and billionaires getting PPP money. Right. And so this is sort of an extension of that. Yeah, it is an extension of that. I mean, there's the, you know, questionable use of PPP. And then, of course, you know, abortion is such a controversial issue, especially the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

But in that same time that Planned Parenthood received that almost $2 billion, they performed well over $1 million. in abortions, right? So this is not a, it's not a small amount of money and it's not a small number of abortions. It's not like Planned Parenthood, you know, just got a little bit of money and the occasional abortion. I mean, they're front and center as an abortion provider in the U.S. And it seems as a front and center in getting this money. They also are receiving a lot of grant money, which is really interesting. I've written a lot about grants. I think that grant providing is one of the biggest areas where there's some things that can start to happen at the lower level of these grant provisions. It's pretty questionable and where a lot of the political bias can really start to play out.

So since Biden took over the amount of grant money that Planned Parenthood has gotten has really increased and, you know, that money can be for research and different things. But overall, Planned Parenthood's reception of taxpayer dollars is up and they're doing just as many abortions, if not more than they've ever done. And I don't think they're, facing the mass layoffs that was, you know, a lot of small businesses had to, that money was meant for you. Well, on its surface, Casey, this could seem like a very, very political move by Republicans generally, not all not going to make a sweeping generalization here, but conservatives generally are more

anti-abortion. Of course, Democrats, more pro-abortion. But this is a report that came from the government accountability office. It's a federal agency, now currently under the Biden. administration. It's a nonpartisan organization. So the data is real here. Right. Yeah. I mean, the numbers are not political. Yeah, right. How you interpret the data, that's where it's probably getting a little bit of political. Exactly. I mean, you know, whether it's just, I think it's worth having a conversation about because the number is so high. This isn't, you know, we gave a $100,000 grant to them as a one-off. This is,

you know, we're talking billions of dollars. And at this rate, you know, over the next decade, next 20 years, I mean, they're going to receive tens of billions of dollars, right? So, and at the rate that our budget grows, it'll be even larger than this rate it has been. And with the level of abortions they're providing, it's just something we, you know, I think worse having a conversation about. I think that, you know, I've written a lot about these nonprofits or these groups that end up getting a lot of taxpayer money. And I just feel like the average American doesn't even know what's happening. And so it's one thing I've become passionate about is, you know, telling people that this stuff is happening. I wrote about another bill that would revoke tax exempt status of nonprofits that are giving money to Hamas, which is a thing.

It's been a thing, you know, money groups funneling money to Hamas, even foreign aid groups. You know, I've written in the past about how a lot of the foreign aid money that we send to the Middle East to help in particular Gaza, we just know the fact that money has ended up in the hands of terrorists. And so, you know, I think your average American, your average listener wants to know about this. And it's their money that this is all going to. So. Well, and, and of course, too, this coincides, too, with the, the, the budget deficit, the massive budget's deficit we're paying, we're experiencing now, which contributes to the just way beyond control national debt, which is, what, approaching $34 trillion dollars you wrote last week. And I think we might have talked about it on an earlier episode of American focus that every single American because of the national debt, uh, was, would owe $100,000 personally just to pay down that debt. So every single dollar the U.S. government spends needs to be scrutinized in our, you know, just because of how things are spiraling out of control.

Last word on this, Casey. Over $100,000 per person, several, like the highway fund is set to be insolvent and interest payments on the national debt are about to become our biggest expense. So if there was ever a time to start pinching pennies and counting closely where our money is going, I think now is that time. And I would agree with you, Casey, but that will be the last word. At least listeners can keep up with this story and more at thecentersquare.com. For Casey Harper, I'm Dan McKeel. Please subscribe. Thank you for listening. Are you tired of news that puts politics over people? At the nonprofit Franklin News Foundation,

we believe in putting people over politics by delivering nonpartisan news and audio content that serves you, the American taxpayer. With Franklin News Foundation, you can read fast. Bay State Focus News for free at thecenter Square.com. You can listen to civil, balanced conversations between policy experts through our podcast network at AmericasTalking.com. Or you can get in-depth news on K-12 education spending, curriculum, and school safety at chalkboard news.com. It's all free through Franklin, where we put you, the American taxpayer first in every story,

episode, and conversation. And it's only possible through our supporters. Together, we can produce content that puts people over politics and brings Americans the news they deserve. Become a supporter today at franklinnews.org slash donate. Once again, that's franklinnews.org slash donate.