Executive Order Will In No Way Prevent Federal Funding of Elective Abortion

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins released the following statement in response to reports that President Obama may issue an executive order regarding government funding of elective abortions in the Senate health care bill (H.R. 3590):

"Those few pro-life Democrats that would place the fate of the unborn in the hands of the President, will be placing their own political fate in those same hands secured only by a promise that runs counter to everything he has said and done.

"By offering an executive order as a so-called solution, President Obama is finally admitting there is a problem with a bill that would force taxpayers to pay for elective abortions for the first time in over three decades. However, there is no way that an executive order will protect the unborn or prevent the greatest expansion of elective abortion since Roe v. Wade.

"Pro-life lawmakers would be making a serious mistake to trust those who have repeatedly attempted to mislead the American people into believing that abortion is not in the bill.

President Obama and the Democratic leadership know that such a plan, due to legal precedent, would be worth little in the long run. Court rulings in cases such as Commerce of U.S. v Reich and Hamdan v. Rumsfeld make it very clear that such an executive order likely wouldn't survive.

"Regardless of any executive order, the reconciliation bill will make matters worse by increasing funding for community health centers, which will bypass any abortion funding restrictions in appropriations bills because it is directly appropriated.

"The President could also lift such an executive order at any time with a stroke of a pen. During the campaign, President Obama promised he would treat abortion as a basic health care mandate for both taxpayers and private health insurers to subsidize. He told Planned Parenthood that 'reproductive care' would be at the 'center' of his health care plan.

"And after only three days in office, he lifted the Mexico City Policy which prohibited taxpayer funds from going to foreign non-governmental organizations that promote and perform abortions.

"Since massive abortion funding remains in these bills and an executive order would provide no protections, FRC Action still plans to score votes on both the Senate bill and on the reconciliation bill in our annual scorecard."

Download summary of abortion funding in the bill http://downloads.frcaction.org/EF/EF10C07.pdf

A chart comparing the Stupak-Pitts amendment language in the original House passed bill vs. abortion language in H.R. 3590. http://downloads.frcaction.org/EF/EF10C08.pdf).