Live Action Rallies Pro-Lifers Outside D.C. Planned Parenthood
Kate Scanlon /
Speakers from several pro-life organizations gathered at a Washington, D.C. Planned Parenthood on Tuesday to protest abortion and the organization’s taxpayer funding.
Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider in the country and received $500 million in taxpayer funds last year.
Lila Grace Rose, the founder and president of Live Action, a pro-life advocacy group, hosted the event along with speakers from several other pro-life organizations.
Drew Belsky, Live Action’s communications director, told The Daily Signal that the event was intended to draw attention to Planned Parenthood’s “dangerous sex-ed practices and counseling,” and that “contrary to promises, taxpayers are funding abortions under Obamacare.”
“Someone has to draw attention to it,” said Belsky. “We decided that it should be us.”
Planned Parenthood volunteers in orange vests reading “pro-choice clinic escort” sought to keep the sidewalk clear as protesters gathered outside the Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington. Live Action volunteers handed out stickers featuring a woman looking like Rosie the Riveter saying “we can end abortion.”
Stephanie Schmitt, an event volunteer and a student at Catholic University of America, told The Daily Signal that she was rallying because “Planned Parenthood is a big mess.”
“We want to show people that they hurt women,” said Schmitt. “It’s a big, harmful company.”
Rose called Planned Parenthood a “$1.2 billion corporation that has a dangerous sexual agenda for teens,” and has a history of “rampant sexual assault cover up.”
Rose called abortion a “violation of our human rights.”
“Abortion is the opposite of empowerment,” said Rose. “No woman walks into an abortion clinic feeling powerful.”
Rose was briefly interrupted by a heckler who shouted that “real men stand up for women’s rights.”
Alison Howard, communications director at Concerned Women For America, called Planned Parenthood an organization that “profits on pain.”
She said that while “women must stick together in times of crisis,” abortion is “not just a woman’s issue, men and women are hurting.”
Howard also said that Planned Parenthood should not benefit from taxpayer funding. “Go raise your own money,” said Howard. “Pitch your cause to donors like we do. Don’t make us complicit.”
Ryan Bomberger, the co-founder and chief creative officer of the Radiance Foundation, shared his personal connection to abortion with the crowd.
“My biological mother was raped,” said Bomberger. “But she chose to be stronger than her circumstances. Planned Parenthood tells women that they are not strong enough. Planned Parenthood likes to act as if it’s the victim, but it’s really the bully.”
Bomberger was adopted into a large, multi-racial family, that he says “disproves the notion that there is such a thing as an unwanted child.”
Bomberger said that abortion rates are so high, especially among minorities that “in New York City, black children are more likely to be aborted than born.”
Missy Martinez, national high school coordinator for Students For Life, said for every one adoption referral at a Planned Parenthood, they also performed 145 abortions–a statistic in Planned Parenthood’s annual report.
“To [Planned Parenthood], the pre-born child is a dollar sign,” said Martinez.
Rose concluded the rally with a quote from Mother Teresa:
Mother Teresa, an expert on peace who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, said that ‘the greatest destroyer of peace in the world is the cry of the innocent unborn child.’ The womb, which should be a safe, secure place, has become a war zone.