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Rep. Allyson Schwartz (D -Pa.)
(CNSNews.com) – Rep. Allyson Schwartz (D-Pa.) said Tuesday, “I do think the respect for life is something that we were built on certainly in our country and that means – obviously different things to different people.”
In the context of the school shooting in Newtown, Conn., a caller on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal program said the legalization of abortion, and taxpayer funded abortions, have led to a “culture of death.” The shooter murdered 26 people, 20 of them were children, mostly kindergarteners.
The caller to the program said, “Roe v. Wade took away the right to life. We encourage the culture of death by giving money to Planned Parenthood - they kill more people. Now it’s terrible what happened in Connecticut but unborn persons killed with the support of taxpayer money – these are persons too.”
Schwartz said she sees no connection between the shooting and the 1974 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling that determined abortion must be legal nationwide, prohibiting state laws against it.
“Well, I don’t see the connection here. Of course we have seen gun violence against those who actually do provide reproductive health services and abortion services and that’s been pretty tragic,” Schwartz said.
“Obviously, the use of gun violence against doctors, for example has really been really put off. I don’t see the connection between the two issues,” she continued. “I do think the respect for life is something that we were built on certainly in our country and that means – obviously different things to different people. So I would just respectably disagree with you on the connection here between gun violence and the opportunity for women and their families to make reproductive decisions independent of government intervention."
Scwhartz is serving in her fourth term in Congress representing a northeast Philadelphia district. She is the number two ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee.
Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion-provider in the nation. According to its own fact sheets, Planned Parenthood performed 985,731 abortions between 2008 and 2010 – 329,445 in 2010 alone. Planned Parenthood also receives taxpayer money every year and got $487.4 million in 2009-2010.
A Congressional Research Service report published on Aug. 28 said that the federal government gives Planned Parenthood about $66 million per year in Title X “family planning” grants. The law prohibits recipients from using Title X money for abortion except in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother. However, Planned Parenthood and other organizations that receive federal subsidies under Title X can take the federal money and do abortions at the same time as long use other dollars—not the dollars they got from the federal government--to pay for an actual abortion.