The Center for Medical Progress released the fourth installment of its “Human Capital” series on Tuesday. The video, titled “Planned Parenthood Federation of America’s Criminal Enterprise,” is the 10th released by the organization.
The undercover video features a conversation actors portraying potential buyers from a human biologics company had with Dr. Carolyn Westhoff, senior medical advisor for Planned Parenthood Federation of America; Dr. Vanessa Cullins, vice president for external medical affairs for PPFA; and Deborah VanDerhei, national director for the Consortium of Abortion Providers at PPFA.
In the video, the executives expressed concern over the potential public relations issues that might arise from the program’s discovery.
“This is important. This could destroy your organization and us, if we don’t time those conversations correctly,” Cullins told the actor in one clip.
“I have been talking to the executive director of the National Abortion Federation. We’re trying to figure this out as an industry, about how we’re going to manage remuneration, because the headlines would be a disaster,” VanDerhei said.
VanDerhei explained that the national organization is “absent a policy” on fetal tissue donation, but it encourages affiliates to “really think about what you’re doing” and to “vet your procurement service.”
“If there’s any way you can do it mission-based, that’s probably better,” VanDerhei said. “If you do decide that you want to engage in remuneration, that you really need to, like, think that through, and think ‘New York Times headline’ when you’re creating your policy.”
In another clip, VanDerhei said, “If they do it, that’s fine, we’re not going to say no.”
She asked the buyer “what a specimen generally brings in.”
He responded that the rate starts at “probably $100 per specimen.”
“But we have independent colleagues who generate a fair amount of income doing this,” VanDerhei replied.
In a conversation with VanDerhei, Vanessa Russo, the compliance program administrator for Planned Parenthood Keystone in Pennsylvania, said, “A company like this that wants to give our organization money for the tissue—I think that that’s a valid exchange, and that that’s okay.” VanDerhei nodded in agreement.
Russo added that “we can’t consent to be bullied by ridiculous laws” and that Planned Parenthood shouldn’t be forced to “curtail our business for ridiculousness.”
VanDerhei also told the actor the fetal tissue program is “an issue that you might imagine we’re not really that comfortable talking about on email.”
“We’ve just been working with people who want particular tissues, like, you know, they want cardiac, or they want eyes, or they want neural, people want spinal cords,” Westhoff said in another exchange. “So, I mean that sort of thing. Certainly, everything we provide—oh, gonads. Oh my God, gonads. Everything we provide is fresh.”
Westhoff added, “Obviously, we would have the potential for a huge P.R. issue by doing this,” before directing the actors to Planned Parenthood’s “national office abortion people.”
David Daleiden, the project lead for the Human Capital series, said in a statement:
From email black-outs to contorted oxymorons like ‘donation for remuneration,’ the lengths to which Planned Parenthood leadership will go to cover-up their illegal sale of aborted baby parts are nothing less than the desperation of a guilty conscience. Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards openly admits they receive ‘$60 per tissue specimen,’ and their contracts with StemExpress offer payments per fetus ‘determined in the clinic to be usable.’ Planned Parenthood runs their abortion and baby parts business in open disregard for the law and should be prosecuted immediately. Their taxpayer funding should be reassigned to Federally Qualified Health Centers, which provide more and comprehensive health services at locations outnumbering Planned Parenthood 20 to 1.
A spokesperson for Planned Parenthood did not immediately return The Daily Signal’s request for comment.
The videos released by the Center for Medical Progress have raised allegations that Planned Parenthood is trafficking aborted fetal body parts.
Profiting from transactions involving fetal human organs is a felony in the United States.
Spokespersons for Planned Parenthood have denied illegal conduct. The organization faces several state and congressional investigations.
The Center for Medical Progress has also made the videos of its full undercover conversations with VanDerhei and Westhoff available on its YouTube account.
