REP. TED BUDD JOINS LETTER CALLING OUT ANTI-LIFE PROVISIONS IN BIDEN'S FY 2023 BUDGET

Press Release

Rep. Ted Budd (R-NC) joined 125 House members on Rep. Ralph Norman's (R-SC) letter to President Joe Biden calling out his FY 2023 budget for including several pro-abortion provisions and removing protections against taxpayer funding of abortion.

The full text of the letter is below:

We write to you today to express our extreme opposition to your Fiscal Year 2023 Budget Proposal. Specifically, we are concerned that for the second year in a row, you have released a budget proposal that includes numerous anti-life and anti-family provisions which stand in stark contrast to our values and the values of an overwhelming majority of Americans.

Every human life is precious, sacred, and deserving of protection. Unfortunately, your proposal expands abortion on demand, paid for by taxpayers. We are deeply concerned that your budget proposal makes no mention of the Hyde Amendment -- a policy that you have supported for most of your political career and has saved nearly 2.5 million lives since 1976.1 Eliminating the Hyde Amendment breaks decades of settled precedent and allows for direct taxpayer-funded abortion.

Additionally, your budget proposes providing $400 million in funding for the Title X Family Planning Program -- a 40 percent increase from previous funding levels. Shortly after taking office, you moved to undo President Donald Trump's Protect Life Rule that prevented clinics from receiving federal funding if they referred patients for abortions. With this reversal in effect, you are now proposing to pour an additional $400 million into a program that funds abortion providers. The Title X statute, created by Congress in 1970, clearly intended to prohibit federal funds from being used in programs where abortion is a method of family planning. We strongly oppose allowing the Title X Family Planning Program to serve as a slush fund for the abortion industry.

Furthermore, you propose a 72 percent increase to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), which has actively partnered with some of the worst human rights abusers in the world, like China and North Korea. Specifically, UNFPA has a long history of supporting China's oppressive population control activities, including forced abortions and sterilization. 77 percent of Americans oppose using taxpayer dollars to promote abortions overseas, and nearly 60 percent of Americans oppose using taxpayer money to fund abortions in the United States. We stand strong with this overwhelming majority of Americans who oppose the taxpayer subsidization of the global and national abortion industry.

This budget proposal is anything but moderate. Your administration continues to double down on a deeply unpopular agenda that disregards the sanctity of life. We stand strong in our opposition to your current proposal, and we will reject any budget that omits or undermines vital pro-life protections.

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