New Video Shows Planned Parenthood Rep Admitting Under Oath to Being Paid for Baby Body Parts
A new video released by the same organization that conducted an undercover investigation into Planned Parenthood’s sale of aborted baby parts shows unsealed video footage of officials being questioned under oath about their knowledge of the payments, including one who admitted that the affiliate was only paid when it provided “usable” samples. Email communication and other documents likewise unsealed by a court also reveals the affiliate had an internal awareness of the exchange of organs and tissues for monetary payment.
Planned Parenthood has denied for years that it engaged in the sale of aborted baby parts, which is illegal under federal law.
The Center for Medical Progress (CMP), led by David Daleiden, released the video on Tuesday after a court unsealed the recorded testimony and documents, which came out of a lawsuit that Planned Parenthood had filed against the pro-life activist.
A number of Planned Parenthood officials gave deposition last year during the legal proceedings, being questioned in person by an attorney in relation to the subject matter in the lawsuit.
One of those that gave sworn testimony was Tram Nguyen, the director of Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, who was among those who were sent a proposed contract in 2015 by Daleiden as he posed undercover as a representative of a procurement company called BioMax. The contract offered to pay $750 per fetal liver and $1,600 for each liver/thymus pair.
Email correspondence shows that Nguyen advised colleague Dyann Santos that she wanted to “move forward” with the contract. She similarly stated when questioned, “I knew I wanted to move forward with it.” When asked if there is anything in writing that shows she opposed the payment, she said “no.”
Planned Parenthood had told the media previously that it rejected the contract.
A 2010 email from the Planned Parenthood Mar Monte research director to Chief Medical director Dorothy Furgerson similarly shows that the California affiliate wanted to switch from its business partnership with Advanced Bioscience Resources (ABR) to Stem Express because ABR was only showing up one day a week.
“Cate Dyer from Stem-Ex would like to start collecting samples … on Fridays,” the yet-unidentified research director advised, outlining that the entity’s relationship ABR was sluggish as “the last invoice I sent to ABR was for two samples collected in April at ‘B’ Street” in Sacramento, California.
“[Dyer’s] business is starting to take off, which is good for her and us as well,” she wrote.
While being questioned under oath, Furgerson said that it was preferable to contract with Stem Express as they were working with more researchers and she wanted to contribute to research. But she also seemed to admit that the payments were directly for the baby body parts, based on their usability.
When asked whether Planned Parenthood would still be paid if a “sample” was found to be unusable, Furgerson simply answered “no.” Asked again whether Planned Parenthood Mar Monte would only be compensated if the sample was usable, she replied “yes.”
Daleiden notes that this admission is important because Planned Parenthood had claimed to the media and others that it was only donating the “tissue” and the funds received were not for the aborted “tissues” themselves but for general administrative “costs” associated with their transferal.
Further, the Stem Express contract with Planned Parenthood Mar Monte also expressly stated that the affiliate would be paid “$55 per POC [product of conception] determined in the clinic to be usable and $10 per maternal blood.”
“Planned Parenthood Mar Monte will invoice Stem-Ex monthly for the number of POC’s and number of maternal bloods procured by Stem-Ex,” it reads.
Invoices sent from Planned Parenthood Mar Monte to Stem Express, which were a part of the court record, show the abortion giant billing Stem Express for thousands of dollars each month.
Additionally, a Stem Express pamphlet created to generate partnerships with abortion facilities, which was distributed at a national abortion conference, also characterizes the relationship as “financially profitable.”
Planned Parenthood documents show that in 2011, the organization wished to remind affiliates about federal law prohibiting payment for “aborted pregnancy tissue” — as Planned Parenthood worded it — but officials apparently failed to check with affiliates to ensure that the law was being followed.
Deborah Nucatola, the senior director of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, who was also recorded during the undercover investigation in 2015 nonchalantly discussing adjusting unborn children during their abortion so as not to crush certain organs due to the demand for the body part, was asked under oath how she found out that payments were being received.
She said that when the “video thing” came out, people started assessing the situation. However, Nucatola also testified that “I knew [Planned Parenthood Los Angeles] was getting payments because I was a provider there,” and said she never sought to ensure the affiliate’s compliance with federal law because she simply trusted those in charge.
Mary Gatter, the former medical director of Planned Parenthood Los Angeles, who was similarly recorded in 2015 haggling with undercover investigators about the compensation for the fetal organs, laughing, “I want a Lamborghini,” testified that she obtained a waiver from the Planned Parenthood Federation of America to start a business relationship with a procurement company.
View the video below.
“The time has come for federal consequences for Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood lied to the public and to Congress, but now there is no longer any reasonable doubt that Planned Parenthood sold fetal body parts, commodifying living children in the womb and treating pregnant women like a cash crop,” Daleiden said in a statement. “The U.S. Department of Justice must escalate the enforcement of laws against fetal trafficking to the highest level of priority.”
As previously reported, following the release of Daleiden’s undercover videos in 2015, then-Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards firmly denied that the organization received compensation for aborted babies, stating in a recorded video:
“I want to be really clear: The allegation that Planned Parenthood profits in any way from tissue donation is not true. Our donation programs — like any other high-quality health care providers — follow all laws and ethical guidelines.”
Planned Parenthood also claimed that the videos had been deceptively edited, but the full versions of the recordings were freely viewable on YouTube for all who wished to watch the hours-long raw footage as well.
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