5 things to know about the fight over Planned Parenthood

Republicans lost Monday’s Senate showdown over halting federal aid to Planned Parenthood. Yet the political offensive by abortion foes has just started, prompted by a batch of unsettling videos that has focused attention on the group’s little-noticed practice of providing fetal tissue to researchers.

 

Conservatives have long targeted Planned Parenthood, which provides health services, family planning and abortions in clinics across the country. The furtively recorded videos, with hair-raising close-ups of aborted fetal organs and Planned Parenthood officials dispassionately describing how “I’m not going to crush that part,” have forced the group and its Democratic champions into a defensive crouch.

 

Five things to know:

 

THE BATTLEGROUND

 

Citing statements in the videos by Planned Parenthood officials, opponents including the Center for Medical Progress, which recorded the videos, accuse the group of profiting from selling fetal organs. That would violate a federal criminal statute that lets providers recover only their expenses. They also say Planned Parenthood is altering abortion procedures to better recover usable tissue.

 

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