“Once again, women’s health will be on the line today when extremists in the House vote on two bills that would undermine access to comprehensive reproductive health care and criminalize the practice of medicine.

Extremists in Congress have long wanted to deny women access to contraception and abortion care. They are trying to use the deceptive, discredited videos designed to mislead people about Planned Parenthood’s work to achieve that goal but it is just an excuse to advance their dangerous agenda and undermine women’s health. It is clear they will stop at nothing, even if doing so means denying critical preventive health care services to millions of women or undermining the practice of medicine.

Not only is this callous, it’s not what the nation wants: In a Reuters poll last month, 73 percent of respondents said they support federal funding for groups to provide women’s health exams – precisely the services Planned Parenthood provides, often to women in underserved or rural areas with limited health care options.

Lawmakers have a responsibility to protect and improve the health of our citizens; these votes and related recent committee hearings are circus sideshows that must stop. Congress needs to get back to the business of governing in ways that help, not hurt, women’s health.”