WASHINGTON — The Senate blocked a Republican drive Monday to terminate federal funds for Planned Parenthood, setting the stage for the GOP to try again this fall amid higher stakes — a potential government shutdown that could echo into next year’s presidential and congressional elections.
The derailed legislation was the Republican response to videos, recorded secretly by anti-abortion activists, showing Planned Parenthood officials dispassionately discussing how they sometimes provide medical researchers with tissue from aborted fetuses. Those videos have led conservatives to accuse the group of illegally selling the organs for profit — strongly denied by Planned Parenthood — and inserted abortion and women’s health into the mix of issues to be argued in the 2016 campaign.
Monday’s mostly party-line vote was 53-46 to halt Democratic delays aimed at derailing the bill, seven short of the 60 votes Republicans needed. Even so, the GOP is hoping to reap political gains because the videos have ignited the party’s core conservative, anti-abortion voters.
The fight is already creating heated talking points for Republican presidential candidates, who convene Thursday for their first debate of the 2016 campaign. Several of them, including Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky, are calling for Congress to end Planned Parenthood’s federal payments.
Longer term, GOP leaders are hoping that three congressional committees’ investigations, plus several state probes and the expected release of additional videos, will produce evidence of Planned Parenthood wrongdoing and make it harder for Democrats to defend the organization. Planned Parenthood provides contraception, testing for sexually transmitted diseases and abortions in clinics from coast to coast.
Democrats were largely muted when the videos were first distributed, but their defense of Planned Parenthood has grown more robust. They sounded a theme Monday that they have employed in recent elections, characterizing the GOP drive as an assault on health care for women.
Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa sponsored the measure as party leaders sought ways to blunt Democratic charges of GOP insensitivity to women.
The only senators to cross party lines were Democrats Joe Donnelly of Indiana and Joe Manchin of West Virginia, and Illinois Republican Mark Kirk, who faces a tough re-election fight next year. McConnell joined Democrats in voting to block the bill, a procedural move that allows him to force a fresh vote later. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a presidential candidate, was in New Hampshire and didn’t vote.
Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards said Monday’s vote showed the bill was “a political non-starter.” Tony Perkins, president of the ant-abortion Family Research Center, said Congress “must take the next step” and remove Planned Parenthood’s funding when lawmakers return next month from summer recess.
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