Republican skepticism over abortion funds leads to Planned Parenthood votes
Plain Dealer – Existing laws to keep tax dollars from being used for abortions aren’t enough for some abortion foes in Congress, who contend the millions of federal dollars that Planned Parenthood gets each year for family planning actually end up funding abortions.
Planned Parenthood insists it keeps the $363 million it gets in yearly federal funds separate from private donations that pay for abortions to comply with a 30-year-old law called the Hyde Amendment.
But GOP skeptics on Thursday forced congressional votes on a measure that would have stripped federal money from Planned Parenthood. Democrats agreed to the votes as part of a budget compromise to fund the federal government through September.
The Planned Parenthood defunding measure passed the House of Representatives by a 241 to 185 vote, but was rejected in a 42 to 58 U.S. Senate vote. All Ohio Republicans supported the measure and all Democrats opposed it.
