WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — The abortion industry has received almost $2 billion from U.S. taxpayers just since fiscal year 2019, according to a new report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
The report, released Tuesday, finds that total sum was distributed to multiple so-called providers of “family planning and sexual and reproductive health services. The lion’s share went to Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) and its affiliates, which received $1.54 billion in Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP payments, plus $148 million from various other grants and $89 million in loans from the COVID-era Paycheck Protection Program.
The International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) received another $2.03 million from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and Marie Stopes International (MSI) Reproductive Choices won an estimated $1.35 million from the same program.
The report was made at the request of more than 140 Republican members of Congress led by Sens. Marsha Blackburn and Vicky Hartzler and Rep. Chris Smith last year, Live Action reported. At the time, they noted that “Current federal law prohibits federal funding of abortions but has no limitation on funding abortion providers,” and said that “Proper oversight of public funds and programs is crucial for determining the value of the goods and services provided to and funded by American taxpayers.”
The Hyde, Dornan, and Aderholt Amendments (which the Biden administration has proposed repealing) are attached to federal budgets every year and technically prohibit federal dollars from being spent directly on abortions. But such money ostensibly for other services has long been understood to indirectly subsidize abortion by freeing up whatever money the beneficiaries receive from other sources.
In April, Planned Parenthood released its first annual report since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, which revealed that the organization received $670.4 million in taxpayer funds last year (which Catholic University of America professor and top pro-life researcher Michael New calls a “significant 5.8% increase from 2021”), as well as $360.9 million in non-government service revenue and $694.9 million in private donations.
The report also revealed that despite Roe’s overturn significantly reducing abortions overall by allowing states to directly ban abortion, Planned Parenthood itself committed 374,155 abortions, its second-highest abortion numbers ever – a testament to its prioritization of the issue over all other services (which once again declined) – and received $670.4 million in taxpayer funds last year from the pro-abortion Biden administration.
Federal funding of the abortion industry is generally justified in the name of “women’s health,” but on top of the abortions it subsidizes, financial data also reveals a simpler, more self-interested motive for the abortion industry to lobby for it.
In June, American Life League’s (ALL’s) STOPP International 2023 Report on Planned Parenthood CEO Compensation found that all 53 chief executive officers of Planned Parenthood affiliates make more than $100,000 per year, with the average compensation rising from $237,999 in 2015 to $317,564 in 2020. Planned Parenthood Federation of America president Alexis McGill Johnson makes $683,697 and its top 10 affiliate heads all made more than $450,000, far higher than the average salary for U.S. nonprofit CEOs of $184,809.
As ALL’s report indicated, reducing abortion “access” through pro-life laws also threatens to significantly impact lavish salaries for the abortion industry. Planned Parenthood says it charges an average of $580 per chemical abortion, $600 per first-trimester surgical abortion, and anywhere from $714 to $2,000 per surgical second-trimester abortion depending on when in pregnancy the abortion is committed, with late second-trimester abortions being the most lucrative.