The costs of baby organs increased dramatically in the last ten years, a Planned Parenthood executive said in video released by the Center for Medical Progress on Wednesday
In 2014, undercover videographers posing as organ procurers captured Planned Parenthood executive Dr. Mary Gatter discussing the cost of "specimens" obtained following abortion. When the pro-life activists mention $50 as the going rate for each specimen, Gatter informs them that costs have jumped over the last decade.
"You know, you have to pay a little money to use the space," Gatter says.
"What we’ve been quoting is $50 per specimen. I think some people are doing more, some slightly less," the CMP activist says.
"Yeah, $50's on the low end, $50 [per specimen] was like 12 years ago," she says.
A video released in 2015 showed her negotiating the price of body parts. "I want a Lamborghini," she joked when the prospective buyers offered to outbid other organ procurers.
The newly-published footage actually predates the "Lamborghini" clip. The Center for Medical Progress released the old footage as Congress and the administration work to defund Planned Parenthood, which receives more than $500 million from taxpayers each year and performs 300,000 abortions annually. The group hopes that reminding the public and lawmakers about the organ trading scandal could build momentum to convince GOP lawmakers to follow through on their 2016 campaign pledges.
CMP President David Daleiden said that Gatter's candid comments stand in contrast to Planned Parenthood's argument that all money exchanged in its organ operations was used to reimburse clinics. He called on the Department of Justice to file charges against Planned Parenthood since it is illegal to profit from the sale of organs obtained through abortion.
"The fact that Novogenix, StemExpress, and ABR stationed their own workers inside Planned Parenthood abortion clinics to perform the harvesting, packaging, and transport of aborted baby body parts demonstrates that Planned Parenthood had no reimbursable costs under the law," he said in a statement. "The volume-based sums that Planned Parenthood charged these businesses for baby parts are criminal trafficking and profiteering in fetal body parts."
Planned Parenthood has denied any wrongdoing, but stopped taking money in exchange for organs following the release of videos in 2015. The organization did not return request for comment.
Planned Parenthood has faced a series of state and federal investigations in the wake of CMP's documentaries. While it has been cleared of any wrongdoing by some states, a congressional committee found that abortion clinics generated "pure profit" from the organ harvesting because they were reimbursed without incurring any additional costs.
"The [abortion clinic] has no costs sothe payments from the [procurement business] to the [abortion clinic] are pure profit," an April 2016 committee report said. "All costs are born by the [procurement business] or the customer. The payments from the customer to the PB exceed its cost by a factor of 300 to 400 percent."
The video comes just weeks after California Attorney General Xavier Becerra filed 15 charges against Daleiden and another Center for Medical Progress videographer stemming from the release of the undercover footage. Becerra, a Democrat, has received $7,600 from Planned Parenthood and abortion lobbyist NARAL over his career.
Daleiden faced similar charges in Texas before a district court judge dismissed them in 2016. He has denied any wrongdoing, saying that his work is protected by the First Amendment.
At least one Planned Parenthood partner has also found themselves under indictment because of the videos. Executives at DV Biologics, an organ procurer that teamed with several California abortion clinics, faces charges of profiting from its operations and significantly marking up the costs of body parts. An Orange County judge dismissed the defense's motion to drop the charges in March.