A Los Angeles court has issued a temporary restraining order preventing the California-based group behind the Planned Parenthood videos from releasing footage of a company that provides fetal tissue to researchers.
The Associated Press reported that the Los Angeles Superior Court on Tuesday barred the non-profit Center for Medical Progress from releasing footage of three officials at the company StemExpress, also based in California, that was recorded at a restaurant in May. Planned Parenthood is a provider of fetal tissue to the company.
The move comes just days after Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.) used the Planned Parenthood controversy to fundraise for senatorial candidate California Attorney General Kamala Harris. The state attorney general has vowed to investigate the Center for Medical Progress for its recording of the footage.
The Center for Medical Progress has released four secretly recorded videos showing Planned Parenthood officials touting the sale of body parts from aborted fetuses.
In the first video released earlier in July, Dr. Deborah Nucatola, senior director of medical services at Planned Parenthood Federation of America, discussed the organization’s sale of aborted baby body parts to StemExpress.
In a statement Wednesday, the founder of Center for Medical Progress David Daleiden claimed StemExpress is using "meritless litigation" to conceal its involvement in "illegal baby parts trade."
"The Center for Medical Progress follows all applicable laws in the course of our investigative journalism work," he explained. Daleiden said this week that the organization plans to release a total of 12 videos exposing Planned Parenthood for its abortion practices.
A spokesperson for StemExpress insisted that the company is "grateful its rights have been vindicated in a court of law." The restraining order will remain in place until a hearing is held on the issue on Aug. 19.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, has defended Planned Parenthood amid the controversy, demanding the Department of Justice launch an investigation into the Center for Medical Progress.
As Republican lawmakers vie to strip Planned Parenthood of federal funding, Pelosi and fellow Democrats remain staunch defenders of the pro-abortion group, which has received $27.8 million in taxpayer money just this year.
The fourth video, released by the Center for Medical Progress Thursday, allegedly shows Dr. Savita Ginde, the vice president and medical director of Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains, negotiating fetal tissue prices.