Supporting Pregnant and Parenting Women and Families Act

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, as families across the country are being crushed by rising costs and stripped of their healthcare, it is shameful that Republicans have chosen to bring a bill to the floor that does nothing to address these crises for pregnant women and families.

Instead, the bill before us today would allow Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, dollars to be used to fund so-called crisis pregnancy centers that have a proven track record of intentionally lying to, misleading, and endangering women.

It is no coincidence that this bill is being rushed to the floor this week as Republicans once again prioritize appeasing a national anti- abortion group in town for its annual rally instead of addressing the real crises facing American families.

I want to paint a picture as to what happens to a young woman who suspects that she may be pregnant. She has a mix of emotions. She may have overwhelming fear and anxiety, especially if she has few resources. She goes to what she thinks is a medical center or clinic, and it is called a pregnancy center of some sort.

When she gets there, she is greeted so warmly with open arms. There are people in white coats, who she assumes are medical professionals. They tell her she can get so many things for free: pregnancy tests, ultrasounds, pregnancy counseling, and, after the birth, even free diapers and formula. It all sounds so wonderful to this woman that she says sign me up.

They don't tell this woman that, in order to get these free services, she has to first sit through an ideological or religious indoctrination session in which all the reasons not to have an abortion are given.

They don't tell her that the person administering the ultrasound has no medical credentials, that, in fact, this is not an official ultrasound, and that she could be misdiagnosed.

They don't tell her that half of the personnel in the so-called clinic have no medical credentials at all and, therefore, are not equipped to advise on any medical complications, such as an ectopic pregnancy.

They don't tell her that this is not a medical clinic at all. In fact, because it is not, this woman's privacy is not protected, and her information could be shared with the public.

The real world of the crisis pregnancy centers is exemplified by an OB/GYN in Iowa, who has seen patients who visited these centers and were told that using contraceptives was the same as having an abortion. She has seen patients who suffered miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies because they were misdiagnosed by these anti-abortion centers.

These women were told that their pregnancies were in the early stages or that they were experiencing normal amounts of pain because the staff members they saw were not actual, qualified medical professionals.

As a result, these women ended up in the hospital, needing emergency care and surgery to save their lives.

In Illinois, a woman seeking an abortion was deliberately misled by a fake clinic. She was subjected to graphic videos and told that having an abortion would make her infertile and, ultimately, mentally ill.

Ultimately, she was coerced into carrying a pregnancy to term. After giving birth, she lost her job and health coverage, and the so-called clinic never offered real medical care or follow-up support.

This is why the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have raised serious ethical and medical concerns about these clinics.

Now, Republicans want to guarantee that taxpayer dollars through these TANF funds will fund these centers and that there will be no accountability for these dollars.

Let's first be clear about what TANF is actually supposed to be for. TANF exists to help families experiencing poverty meet their most basic needs and stabilize their lives so parents can work and children can thrive. TANF was never intended to subsidize anti-abortion propaganda or unregulated sham clinics that endanger women's health. Yet, that is exactly what this bill does.

Not only that, it goes beyond the regular TANF program, which requires reporting and accountability. Actually, this bill says that nothing shall be construed to restrict TANF funding for these centers, meaning that funding could not be taken away from them even if the center engages in deceptive practices or even causes a woman's death.

When the Ways and Means Committee marked up this bill last week, Democrats offered commonsense amendments that should have been uncontroversial to anyone who cares about women and families. We simply proposed that TANF funds not go to pregnancy centers that have engaged in deceptive or misleading practices that provide medically inaccurate information or that have endangered the health of a woman seeking care.

We also offered amendments to address the real crisis affecting the TANF program, which is the Trump administration's decision to seek revenge against five Democratic Governors by preventing them from accessing $10 billion in already appropriated funds for TANF and childcare.

Republicans rejected every one of these amendments.

Clearly, this bill is not about supporting pregnant women and families. It is about shielding deceptive actors, supporting Trump's revenge tactics, and using public funds to advance an extreme anti- abortion agenda.

If Republicans truly cared about pregnant women and families, we would be debating how to undo their $1 trillion cut to Medicaid, which rips healthcare away from millions of pregnant women, new mothers, and children, and how to help the millions of women seeing their health insurance premiums skyrocket due to months of Republican inaction.

Instead, this bill is merely an attempt to distract from these devastating realities with the ultimate goal of appeasing the anti- abortion advocates parading around Washington this week as countless women suffer and die under extreme Republican abortion bans. Their priorities are clear and profoundly misguided.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no.'' Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Ms. CHU. Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out that the previous speaker said that these clinics have trained staff, but many of these centers pose as clinics, offer incorrect medical advice, and even go so far as to wear scrubs and white coats to appear as though they are trained. Actually, fewer than half of crisis pregnancy centers have a licensed medical professional on staff. Mr. Speaker, 95 percent do not provide prenatal care, and only 1 out of 607 provides contraception, and the facilities are unregulated.

Mr. Speaker, I wish the previous speaker could have met this Massachusetts woman who sought care at a crisis pregnancy center after a Google advertisement led her to believe it was a legitimate medical facility where she could confirm her pregnancy. At Clear Way, a nurse administered an ultrasound and told the plaintiff that she had a viable intrauterine pregnancy. The nurse was not licensed to diagnose viable pregnancies and did not undertake appropriate medical measures to rule out an ectopic pregnancy.

Rather than referring the patient for immediate medical evaluation, Clear Way staff focused on encouraging her to continue the pregnancy. As a result of the misdiagnosis, this woman's ectopic pregnancy ruptured, causing massive internal bleeding and requiring emergency surgery. She lost a fallopian tube and narrowly avoided death.
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Ms. CHU. Mr. Speaker, I wish we could think of the woman in Pennsylvania who was pregnant who sought care at what she thought was a medically certified clinic, but during her appointment, the staff told her she had already miscarried and was sent home.

As time went on, though, she continued experiencing pregnancy symptoms, so she later went to a licensed doctor who told her she was still pregnant and that the crisis pregnancy center had given her the wrong information. This misdiagnosis greatly increased her risk of having pregnancy complications.
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Ms. CHU. Mr. Speaker, I would like to talk about Kentucky, where a postpartum nurse with 20 years of experience was motivated to volunteer at a crisis pregnancy center. During her training, she learned that the clinic was using expired disinfectants to sanitize ultrasound equipment. Not only that, the kind of disinfectant that the clinic was using was ineffective in targeting human papillomavirus, which causes 90 percent of cervical cancer cases.

The volunteer nurse quit. She filed whistleblower complaints with the State, but nothing was ever done, highlighting the lack of accountability at the centers.

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Ms. CHU. Mr. Speaker, let me say, there is a comprehensive study by the Alliance for Women's Rights and Gender Equality that studied 607 crisis pregnancy centers across nine States, and they documented a consistent pattern of deception, misinformation, and patient harm.

Nearly two-thirds of the centers promoted patently false or biased medical claims about pregnancy, abortions, contraception, or reproductive health providers, and fewer than half reported having a licensed medical professional on staff.

These are not isolated incidents. These are standard practices for these centers.

Morrison).

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Ms. CHU. Mr. Speaker, well, it is not hogwash to this woman in Georgia. She sought care from an unregulated clinic that offered free ultrasounds and medical advice. She thought that was so great. The ultrasound technician incorrectly informed her that her baby's kidneys were filled with water and that she needed to see a primary care doctor.

The diagnosis was incorrect, but the stress of that misdiagnosis severely impacted the mother. She said: The irony in all this is that they could have caused me to lose a perfectly healthy pregnancy.

Moore).

Mr. Speaker, I would like to clarify that this bill actually allows these funds to be free of any accountability. It actually changes the way in which these TANF funds are being used.

Right now, there has to be accountability if States use TANF funds for the crisis pregnancy centers. What this bill does is, by amending section 404 of the Social Security Act to state that nothing in this part may be construed to restrict TANF funding for pregnancy centers, this bill actually overrides TANF's statutory purposes, reporting requirements, penalty authority, and HHS enforcement provisions.

As a result, any future Federal effort to limit condition or review TANF funding for these crisis pregnancy centers could be challenged as prohibited by this statute.

Even if that center engages in deceptive advertising and does actions that even result in the death of a woman, there would be nothing that could be done about that crisis pregnancy center.

Moore).

Mr. Speaker, the truth is abundantly clear. Both the American Medical Association and The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have raised serious ethical and medical concerns about so-called crisis pregnancy centers.

These facilities are unregulated. They have no obligation to provide accurate medical information. They are not subject to HIPAA. They are not required to protect patient confidentiality. Yet, Republicans are determined to send them Federal taxpayer dollars anyway.

I talked about this very comprehensive report by the Alliance for Women's Rights and Gender Equality, which studied 607 crisis pregnancy centers across 9 States. They documented patients' experiences at the centers.

In one case, a patient seeking abortion care was misled into believing she was too early in pregnancy to receive medical care and was encouraged to delay seeing a licensed provider, despite experiencing symptoms consistent with a pregnancy complication.

In another documented case, a patient was falsely told that abortion would cause infertility and severe mental illness, information that directly contradicted established medical evidence.

Several patients reported being reassured that severe pain or bleeding was normal, only to later require emergency medical intervention when complications were left untreated.

If Republicans truly cared about TANF oversight, they would have spoken out when millions of TANF dollars were stolen from struggling families in Mississippi to build a volleyball stadium and when the Trump administration stepped in to shield the perpetrators from accountability. Instead, they were silent.

The bottom line is simple. Anti-abortion centers that spread misinformation and put women at risk should not receive taxpayer dollars. Certainly, they should not receive taxpayer dollars that are completely unregulated.

If we want to support parents and pregnant women, let's continue helping them.

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