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Eighth video targeting Planned Parenthood surfaces

by Megan R. Wilson - 08/22/15 11:05 AM ET

The anti-abortion-rights group targeting Planned Parenthood released its eighth video, following a judge’s ruling that it could do so.

The newest video, released by The Center for Medical Progress late Friday evening, is a tightly-edited two-minute string of clips taken from its previous undercover releases.

“So if we alter a process and we are able to obtain intact fetal cadavers,” Melissa Farrell, the director of research for the Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, says in the video, “it’s all just a matter of line items.”

{mosads}The clip first appeared in the group’s fifth video in its Human Capital series.

In all, five different Planned Parenthood leaders from around the United States appear in the most recent video, in addition to Holly O’Donnell, a former technician for StemExpress, a biomedical research company that worked with Planned Parenthood.

The Center for Medical Progress aims to show that Planned Parenthood, which offers a variety of women’s health services, is profiting off the sale of fetal parts.

The charges have caused congressional Republicans and GOP presidential hopefuls to call for cutting all federal funding for the organization. Planned Parenthood is already unable to use any of the more than $500 million it receives from the federal government annually for abortion services.

“There’s nothing on this extremely heavily edited video that hasn’t already been seen and discredited,” Eric Ferrero, a Planned Parenthood spokesman, told CNN. “There seems to be no limit to how far this group will go to deceive the public in order to pursue an extreme political agenda.”

Although a California judge put a temporary restraining order on the California-based advocacy group — saying it could not release a different new video featuring StemExpress executives until it looked into whether it was filmed illegally — the order was lifted Friday.

It is unclear when that video may surface, but this could be a signal that video is coming soon.

StemExpress said the footage, filmed by the group during a dinner with company officials, was taken illegally and it would seek a stay from an appeals court, according to reports.

StemExpress acquires tissue samples in order to resell them to pharmaceutical companies and researchers. It does not work exclusively with Planned Parenthood.

A judge said the company could likely win any privacy challenge against the group, but that The Center for Medical Progress had a First Amendment right to release any video it had.

The videos, most of which have been highly edited, have created a firestorm around Planned Parenthood and its abortion practices.

It is illegal to profit from the sale of fetal tissue, though charges to cover costs such as processing and shipping are allowed. There is no law to regulate how much — or how little — the charges can be.

The Center for Medial Progress has not yet released any videos featuring any current StemExpress employees, but the company says it knows the videos are out there, according to court filings.

Once the videos targeting Planned Parenthood were released, the company says, it realized it had also met with individuals posing as officials from a biomedical company interested in purchasing fetal tissue.

Tags Planned Parenthood