Planned Parenthood Video Journalist: California ‘Coordinated Attack on Civil Liberties of Pro-Life Americans’
The man who led the undercover effort to expose the fetal tissue sales practices of Planned Parenthood and others in the abortion industry says pro-life Americans are victims of a “coordinated attack” by top-level officials in California.
David Daleiden, project lead at Center for Medical Progress (CMP), told Breitbart News in an interview prior to the March for Life in Washington, DC, Friday, that, in addition to one civil case and one criminal case against him, his legal team is about to appeal a third case from the National Abortion Federation.
Daleiden said the three cases “are really all part of the same conspiracy.”
“Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Federation and Kamala Harris and the California Attorney General’s office,” he summarized. “All violating our First Amendment civil rights.”
“It has to stop and, hopefully, the appeals courts are going to put a stop to it,” he continued. “We didn’t do anything different than what regular, local news reporters do on a daily basis in California and everywhere else when they record and publish undercover video.”
Daleiden said CMP has “almost 200 hours of unreleased undercover footage that has been held back by a biased judge in San Francisco – Judge Orrick – or held back by the litigation.”
Prior to the start of the civil case brought by Planned Parenthood, U.S. District Judge William Orrick III ruled the jury would not be allowed to consider any information Daleiden gleaned from his video recordings. Subsequently, in November, the jury found in favor of Planned Parenthood.
According to Daleiden:
The footage is some of the most damning and incriminating stuff that’s ever been recorded, and we intend to release it in the near future as soon as we can. We’re going to continue to fight to liberate that footage so that it can be entered into the record of public opinion, because the public has to know what Planned Parenthood and their business partners have been doing to children in the womb and have been doing to infants for decades at this point.
The pro-life activist said Planned Parenthood has engaged in a “coordinated strategy with their allies at the National Abortion Federation and their cronies in politics, particularly in the state of California and the San Francisco elite.”
“Kamala Harris and Jerry Brown and Gavin Newsome and Nancy Pelosi – all of them,” Daleiden asserted. “So, it absolutely has been a coordinated attack on the civil liberties of pro-life Americans.”
Daleiden’s words come as the Trump administration has issued a “notice of violation” to California for its mandate of universal abortion coverage in health insurance plans.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office for Civil Rights (OCR), announced the action on Friday, the day of the March for Life event on the National Mall.
In a press release, HHS said:
OCR is issuing a Notice of Violation to the state of California, formally notifying California that it cannot impose universal abortion coverage mandates on health insurance plans and issuers in violation of federal conscience laws. California has deprived over 28,000 people of plans that did not cover elective abortion, but now must cover abortion due to California’s mandate.
HHS Secretary Alex Azar said:
Once again, President Trump’s administration is delivering on his promise to protect human life and all Americans’ freedom of conscience. Under President Trump, HHS has been vigorously enforcing the statutes Congress passed to protect Americans’ consciences and institutionalizing these protections within the department’s civil rights work.
OCR investigated two complaints from the Missionary Guadalupanas of the Holy Spirit, an order of Catholic religious sisters, and Skyline Wesleyan Church, a non-profit Christian church – both of which abide by faith beliefs that conflict with the abortion coverage mandate.
The notice to California that the state has violated the Weldon Amendment by mandating all organizations – even faith groups – to provide abortion coverage in their health insurance plans, must be answered within 30 days with sufficient assurance California will comply with federal law.
If the state does not comply, HHS states “OCR will forward the Notice of Violation and the evidence supporting OCR’s findings in this matter to the HHS funding components from which California receives funding for appropriate action under applicable grants and contracts regulations.”
“This action may ultimately result in limitations on continued receipt of certain HHS funds,” the agency said.
“No one in America should be forced to pay for or cover other people’s abortions,” said Roger Severino, OCR director. “We are putting California on notice that it must stop forcing people of good will to subsidize the taking of human life, not only because it’s the moral thing to do, but because it’s the law.”