David Daleiden, the undercover activist facing indictment for his role in a series of videos suggesting that Planned Parenthood sells fetal tissue, thinks the House investigators might be on the cusp of vindicating him.
The lawmakers have opted to subpoena the financial records of the organizations implicated in Daleiden’s sting. “The raw banking and accounting records will tell the full story of whether — and how much — StemExpress and their ‘business partners’ like Planned Parenthood profited off of aborted baby parts,” David Daleiden of the Center for Medical Progress said in a Friday statement.
Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., published the subpoenas Thursday following a congressional hearing about allegations that Planned Parenthood coordinates with biotech companies to sell organs harvested from abortions. The records could go a long way toward either absolving the abortion provider or vindicating Daleiden, who has been indicted for secretly recording conversations with industry officials who appeared to describe the sale of fetal body parts, including a whistleblower who said the practice extends to cases of babies being born alive.
A series of state-level probes failed to produce charges against Planned Parenthood, but House Republicans established a special committee to investigate the allegations, chaired by Blackburn. “We have learned that not only is this investigation warranted, but further examination of accounting records is needed to get the complete facts about what was actually going on,” she said Thursday.
Blackburn’s team noted that a panel of expert witnesses advised lawmakers to check the financial records of the fetal tissue procurement organizations tied to Planned Parenthood. “Ask them, how did you come up with this charge?” Fay Clayton, the Democratic witness at the hearing, said last month. “The second thing I would do is ask them, in each particular case, what aspect of the actual costs does a particular clinic incur?”
Daleiden regards the documents as a potential smoking gun in the probe of Planned Parenthood and the fetal tissue procurement companies that harvested organs at the abortion clinics.
“StemExpress’ accounting records could easily exonerate them if they did nothing wrong, so their refusal to voluntarily produce these documents speaks volumes,” Daleiden said.
