By Tom Venzor
Last Tuesday (March 13), the state legislature advanced the state budget bill (LB944) through first round of debate. Nearly the entire six-hour debate centered on critical pro-life language that ensures taxpayer dollars are not used for abortion services.
The budget’s pro-life provision was championed by several senators who represent legislative districts in the Diocese of Lincoln. Their leadership was indispensable to the passage of the provision through the first round of debate. Notably, the legislature still has two more rounds of debate, one of which will already have taken place by the time you read this.
Refresher on Title X. On Jan. 10, the Governor introduced his recommended budget. Like last year, the Governor’s budget includes certain conditions for receiving Title X funds.
Title X is a federal grant program that includes important preventive health services such as annual well-woman exams, STD testing and treatment, and HPV testing and vaccinations. However, Title X also includes problematic services such as contraception.
The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services receives Title X grant funds from the federal government and distributes the funds to grantee organizations. Over $1.5 million are distributed in Nebraska and the leading recipient is Planned Parenthood of the Heartland receiving nearly $300,000 per year.
Governor Ricketts’ proposal prohibits Title X funds from being distributed to an organization that performs, assists with the performance of, provides directive counseling in favor of, or refers for abortion. If a provider engages in abortion activity, but wants to continue receiving Title X funds, they would have to be “objectively independent” from the organization providing abortion services. Objective independence requires legal, financial and physical separation between the abortion services entity and the Title X provider. This provides basic accountability and ensures taxpayer dollars are not supporting abortion.
Courage of Pro-Life Senators. Many pro-life Senators courageously and vocally supported the Title X provision as commonsense, pro-life policy. Some of these Senators represent legislative districts within the Diocese of Lincoln. Their arguments are worth summarizing.
Sen. Mike Hilgers (Lincoln) lucidly spoke on many occasions defending both the reasonableness of the policy and the constitutionality of the Title X language. This was a critically important task as a few senators tried to argue that the Title X provision would illegally undermine the entire Title X program.
Sen. Dan Watermeier (Syracuse) exposed the mismanagement of Title X dollars by Planned Parenthood, as revealed by state audits from 2015 and 2016. Sen. Watermeier noted that the mismanagement of these funds put the program in jeopardy and the Title X provision would prevent that from happening in the future.
Sen. John Kuehn (Heartwell) also highlighted the 2015 and 2016 audits, emphasizing that these audits were not just suspicions that taxpayer money might have been misused for abortions, but that these audits provided certainty that this was the case. Sen. Kuehn made a passionate defense for the unborn children whose lives were taken by the misuse of Title X funds for abortions.
Sen. Suzanne Geist (Lincoln) rose in defense of women, explaining that a woman’s strength is not dependent on whether or not she chooses to have an abortion, as one senator suggested, but in how she lives out her gifts and virtues.
Sen. Bob Clements (Elmwood) ardently defended life by providing commonsense financial input to the discussion. As a lifelong banker, Sen. Clements discussed the importance of adequately separating financial accounts and records, since money is fungible and can easily be appropriated for other activities.
Sen. Mike Groene (North Platte) staved off accusations that the Title X provision is simply a “Catholic bill,” noting that Catholics do not support all Title X services and that protecting the unborn and taxpayer dollars is an issue for everybody. He also noted that the language merely carries out the federal law which prohibits Title X funds from supporting programs where abortion is a method of family planning.
Senators Steve Halloran (Hastings), Bruce Bostelman (Brainard), and Dan Hughes (Venango) also rose up in defense of pro-life values. They emphasized the fact that most Nebraskans and Americans do not want taxpayer dollars funding abortion in any way.
Please thank these senators for their pro-active, pro-life commitment, and look for updates at necatholic.org.
