Thirty-seven Planned Parenthood affiliates applied for and received nearly $80 million in federal funding from the Paycheck Protection Program, a program that was created to aid struggling small businesses and organizations throughout the coronavirus pandemic, according to Fox News.
Planned Parenthood insists its individual affiliates were eligible for PPP loans due to the organization’s 501(c)3 nonprofit status. But the Small Business Administration, which is in charge of PPP funding, is right to question why a large organization with thousands of employees and hundreds of locations, many of which were allowed to continue operating throughout the shutdown, is using funds specifically reserved for small businesses with limited resources that had been forced to shut their doors.
It’s not clear whether Planned Parenthood’s affiliates were, in fact, eligible. Several congressional Republicans have already vowed to investigate whether “Planned Parenthood, the banks, or staff at the SBA knowingly violated the law,” according to Sen. Marco Rubio. This is a necessary step since the PPP’s restrictions specifically prohibit organizations with more than 500 employees from applying for coronavirus relief funding. Planned Parenthood’s parent organization, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, has more than 600 employees.
But if, upon review, Planned Parenthood’s applications are found to be legitimate, we should turn our attention to the lawmakers who drafted this legislation in the first place — because it is becoming increasingly clear that this relief funding was passed with too few restrictions and very little means-testing.
We already know that large chains and corporations, such as Shake Shack, were similarly awarded hefty PPP loans. Shake Shack did the right thing and returned the $10 million loan it had received from the SBA — but only after drawing attention to the PPP’s problematic application system, which “came with no user manual and was extremely confusing,” according to Shake Shack executives.
Planned Parenthood should also force its affiliates to return the federal funding. Unlike the vast majority of small businesses that need PPP funding, most of Planned Parenthood’s locations were not required to shut down. Indeed, the abortion provider was deemed “essential” by many state governments, which means many of its locations were allowed to continue operating throughout the pandemic. Two of these locations, located in California’s Orange and San Bernardino counties, received a collective $7.5 million from the PPP despite remaining open for the past few months.
So in that sense, this was indeed an abuse of the PPP. Those funds were specifically designated for small businesses, not individual affiliates backed by a massive parent organization. And it’s a shame that as a result of this abuse, even more of our tax dollars have landed in the lap of a company that proudly takes the lives of unborn human beings. For that reason alone, the public deserves answers.
