Gottheimer urges colleagues to vote against anti-choice Crisis Pregnancy Centers bill

WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Congressman Josh Gottheimer Thursday urged his colleagues in Congress to vote against far-right extremist legislation that supports taxpayer dollars going to anti-choice Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPC).

These extremists want to pass a bill to stop the Administration from clarifying that CPCs do not qualify for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families grants which are meant to provide money for work programs, child care, and pre-kindergarten programs for America’s neediest families, Gottheimer said.

CPCs fraudulently represent themselves as legitimate reproductive health care providers, but instead intentionally mislead patients by dissuading them from accessing certain types of safe, and often lifesaving, reproductive health care, including abortions.

Gottheimer launched his shutdown tour of dangerous Crisis Pregnancy Centers in October.

“Women go to these so-called ‘pregnancy centers’ thinking they will get real medical help, real healthcare support, but instead, they are greeted by people with no medical background whose goal is to manipulate women with their own ideological agenda. These centers are often right down the street from Planned Parenthood clinics,” said Gottheimer. “I’ll be voting no on HR. 6918, a bill forced to the floor by far-right extremists who want taxpayer dollars to continue to fund deceptive and manipulative practices with federal TANF dollars.”

The dangers of crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs):

• CPCs pose as a healthcare clinic with doctors and nurses, but are not staffed by licensed medical professionals.
• CPCs regularly ignore medical ethics and are staffed by people with no medical background whose goal is to manipulate women with their own ideological agenda.
• New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin issued a consumer alert, warning people that crisis pregnancy centers do not provide health care. They are organizations that seek to prevent people from accessing reproductive health care and provide false or misleading information.
• CPCs lie about the risks associated with abortion, use aggressive tactics to manipulate women into changing their minds based on no medical information, and deceive women into thinking they’re too far along to legally get the care they need.
• CPCs promote dangerous medical misinformation such as abortion pill “reversal” — an unproven and unethical treatment. This so-called treatment can be potentially harmful by giving pregnant women misleading information that an abortion can be undone.
• In June, a woman sued a CPC for failing to diagnose her ectopic pregnancy, which resulted in an emergency surgery and the loss of her fallopian tube.
• CPCs don’t provide legitimate prenatal care or refer women to health clinics that would offer a full range of health services.
• CPCs locate their facilities near real healthcare clinics so their employees can physically divert women away from real healthcare providers.