A member of the Republican Planned Parenthood investigation said Thursday she stands behind the anti-abortion videomaker who is now facing a racketeering lawsuit from the group.
“This is the Planned Parenthood way,” Rep. Diane Black (R-Tenn.) wrote in a statement to The Hill. “They are confronted with a horrific truth they cannot defend, so they seek a victory in the courts instead. It won’t work.”
{mosads}She praised the “courageous efforts” of the Center for Medical Progress and David Daleiden, who has released 10 videos that have shown hidden camera footage of Planned Parenthood officials as they bluntly discuss fetal tissue donations.
Planned Parenthood announced Thursday that they have filed a civil lawsuit against Daleiden and his group, with charges ranging from trespassing to illegal recordings while they were making the videos. They have not said how much money they are seeking in damages.
Republicans announced last fall the creation of a select committee to investigate abortion providers engaged in fetal tissue donation — namely Planned Parenthood — in addition to several other GOP-led committee investigations.
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the investigative panel, said Thursday that she “fully” supports Planned Parenthood’s claims that the Center for Medical Progress broke state and federal laws.
Last summer, Schakowsky asked both the U.S. Attorney General and the California Attorney General to investigate the campaign against Planned Parenthood.
“Republican lawmakers have seized on the doctored, manufactured videotapes to justify votes to defund Planned Parenthood and to launch a series of Congressional and state investigations,” Schakowsky wrote in a statement to The Hill.
The committee investigating Planned Parenthood, which was formed as a last act of former Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), has yet to meet.
– This story was corrected to reflect that Rep. Diane Black is a member of the Planned Parenthood select committee. A previous version contained incorrect information.