Kansas Lawmaker Demands Planned Parenthood Return $80 Million Received from PPP, Introduces Bill Prohibiting Abortion Providers from Receipt of PPP Funds

Kansas Lawmaker Demands Planned Parenthood Return $80 Million Received from PPP, Introduces Bill Prohibiting Abortion Providers from Receipt of PPP Funds

National abortion mill Planned Parenthood affiliate offices received approximately $80 million as part of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) meant to provide relief to small business hit especially hard by COVID-19 shutdowns.

Shortly after it was made public that the affiliate offices received a giant chunk of change, the Small Business Administration, who is in charge of the PPP, requested the money back.

Several other Republican lawmakers jumped aboard, publicly demanding the money back. Ahead of a potentially new relief package, Rep. Roger Marshall (R-Kan) is still asking for the money back and is going a step further in introducing legislation to prohibit abortion providers of any employee size from obtaining PPP funds.

From The Epoch Times:

Rep. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) wants Congress to ban abortion providers from receiving Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans and to require Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) offices to return the $80 million they received under the CCP Virus economic relief initiative.

“We want legislation that specifically demands that Planned Parenthood give the money back for several reasons, including the Hyde Amendment,” Marshall told The Epoch Times Monday.

“Also, they are a large association, this program was meant for businesses with 500 or fewer employees while they employee 16,000 people, and they have $2 billion in assets. This loan was not meant for them,” Marshall continued.

Marshall’s proposal—the Abortion Provider Loan Elimination Act—would extend the Hyde Amendment, which bans federal funding to groups that terminate unborn babies’ lives as a medical procedure, to the PPP program.

The Hyde Amendment was first adopted by Congress in 1976 and was named for then-Rep. Henry Hyde, an Illinois Republican. The measure has to be attached to specific appropriation bills and in recent years has only been added to those funding federal health care programs.

Congress did not apply the Hyde provision to the PPP program when it approved it as part of the $3 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Recovery and Economic Security Act (CARES).

“We believe it should be. Those of us who believe in life and regard the sanctity of life think it should have been. But these were federal funds and they were used as forgivable loans to abortion providers,” Marshall told The Epoch Times.

Marshall’s proposal currently has 23 co-sponsors, all Republicans. The proposal has also been endorsed by the Susan B. Anthony List, National Right to Life Committee, and the Family Research Council (FRC).

“We even sent a letter to the SBA saying, ‘do not give money to Planned Parenthood’ and despite our letter telling them not to, they went ahead and did it,” he said.

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