How Biden’s Abortion Agenda Reaches HIV/AIDS Program

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—Several Christian organizations have supported full authorization of an AIDS reduction program despite the fact that the cash has gone to organizations that advocate extra abortions abroad. 

In a number of public statements, President Joe Biden’s White House has known as for selling abortion overseas, often in references to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, higher referred to as PEPFAR. 

Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., the sponsor of reauthorizing PEPFAR in 2018, mentioned the Biden administration “hijacked” the AIDS reduction program to advertise abortion. Smith is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on world well being, world human rights, and worldwide organizations. 

Smith’s workplace documented that two dozen nonprofit organizations with PEPFAR authorizing explicitly advocated abortion. They embody the Population Council, which received $1.2 million in 2021 and 2022 and lists “safe abortion” as a prime precedence, and Population Services International, which received $96.5 million in 2021 and 2022 and devotes an internet site web page to reproductive choice with quite a few references to abortion. 

Although cash from the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief isn’t used straight for abortion, it’s utilized by sure nonprofit teams that advocate the worldwide enlargement of abortion, famous Lisa Correnti, govt vice chairman of the Center for Family and Human Rights, or C-Fam.  

“We all support PEPFAR. We just don’t want the money to go to abortion advocacy groups that are gaining a bigger role in foreign policy,” Correnti told The Daily Signal. “Abortion groups have become very sophisticated. They used to be only involved in family planning, but over the years have successfully integrated HIV/AIDS, gender-based violence, water and sanitation, and other programs where large amounts of federal money is available.”

She added that the “simple fix” could be to use the rules of the so-called Mexico City policy, which prohibits federal funds from selling abortion overseas, to PEPFAR.

“If Democrats insist that authorizing is not going to abortion groups, then the implementation of the policy will have no change,” Correnti mentioned. 

Nevertheless, Christian organizations such because the National Association of Evangelicals and World Vision, in addition to well-liked Pastor Rick Warren and his spouse Kay Warren, signed onto a coalition letter in late October that was circulated by the George W. Bush Institute to induce Congress to totally fund the AIDS program. 

On Wednesday night, a State Department spokesperson mentioned the company’s Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy was engaged on a response to The Daly Signal’s reporting and would offer it Thursday.

World Vision and the Warrens didn’t reply to inquiries from The Daily Signal on Tuesday or Wednesday. 

“It is one of the most successful international development programs since World War II,” the coalition letter to Congress from the Bush Institute, the forty third president’s charitable basis, says. The coalition contains greater than 30 organizations and people as signatories in support of PEPFAR. 

“Abandoning it abruptly now would send a bleak message, suggesting we are no longer able to set aside our politics for the betterment of democracies and the world,” the letter says. “It would also undo the tremendous progress we have made, threatening the reemergence of HIV/AIDS as an existential threat.”

A spokesperson for the National Association of Evangelicals referred The Daily Signal to previous statements by the group, together with the Bush Institute letter. The NAE, together with the World Evangelical Alliance, additionally counseled a letter from 350 African churches that mentioned: “We assure the United States Congress that the claim that PEPFAR supports or promotes abortion is to us strange, unfounded, and unfortunate.”

Biden’s ‘Reimagined’ PEPFAR

The House authorized an emergency measure, authorizing PEPFAR for one 12 months, that steers away from potential abortion authorizing. The program usually is reauthorized for 5 years.

“Regrettably, PEPFAR has been reimagined—hijacked—by the Biden administration to empower pro-abortion international nongovernmental organizations, deviating from its life-affirming work,” Smith said in a flooring speech in late September, after passage of the measure. “Thankfully, the House has voted to reject Biden’s new PEPFAR abortion promotion strategy and increase spending for its lifesaving programs while ensuring key pro-life protections.” 

The New Jersey Republican was referring to the Biden administration’s State Department report, “Reimagining PEPFAR’s Strategic Direction,” which makes quite a few references to “reproductive rights.” 

PEPFAR, established by President George W. Bush, beforehand had constant bipartisan support. However,  the State Department issued its “reimagining” report months after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization despatched the abortion difficulty again to the states.

“Where possible, PEPFAR will integrate HIV programming into strengthened public health systems to manage tuberculosis, high burden non-communicable diseases, sexual reproductive health, rights and services, as well as other local health priorities that impact PLHIV–to protect HIV/AIDS gains and strengthen health and economic outcomes,” the State Department report says. 

The report is measured sufficient to not use the phrase “abortion” straight, however makes further references to selling “reproductive rights” as a part of combating the unfold of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. 

The State Department report provides: “Leverage the very best of American ingenuity, including the scientific community, academic institutions, the diaspora, and faith- and community-based organizations and strengthen coordination between PEPFAR and other U.S. government global health and development programs, including for tuberculosis, malaria, sexual and reproductive health and rights (i.e., sexually transmitted diseases, cervical cancer, HIV prevention and testing, gender-based violence support), gender equality, LGBTQI+, and human rights.”

Biden’s Abortion Agenda Abroad

Days after his inauguration as president on Jan. 20, 2021, Biden issued a memorandum “to support women and girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights in the United States, as well as globally.” 

The memo mentioned the U.S. would resume authorizing for the United Nations Population Fund, which works carefully with the International Planned Parenthood Federation on HIV/AIDS programs.

Five months later, on June 30, 2021, the Biden administration announced that it might advance “sexual and reproductive health services in Haiti and 14 African countries.” 

The White House announced a “comprehensive agenda to advance gender equity” on Oct. 22, 2021, committing to “defend the constitutional right to safe and legal abortion in the United States, established in [the 1973 Supreme Court decision] Roe v. Wade, and promote access to sexual and reproductive health and rights both at home and abroad.”

A State Department spokesperson didn’t reply to The Daily Signal for this story, however told Time that non-reauthorization is not going to “jeopardize PEPFAR’s operations” throughout fiscal 12 months 2024, which ends on Sept. 30, 2024, and mentioned, “PEPFAR has sufficient funding available to cover most PEPFAR-supported operations, pending timely completion of required Congressional notification procedures.”

PEPFAR Recipients Advocate Abortion

The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation received $278.6 million in PEPFAR authorizing, based on Smith’s workplace. The basis has staunchly opposed the Mexico City coverage stopping U.S. tax {dollars} from selling abortion overseas. 

In 2021, the group praised Biden for ending that coverage. 

“President Biden recently repealed the damaging Mexico City Policy, a policy that blocks foreign aid to international organizations who use non-U.S. funds to provide information, referrals, or services for legal abortion in their own country,” the Pediatric AIDS Foundation mentioned. “Also known as the ‘Global Gag Rule,’ the Mexico City Policy causes significant harm by limiting interfering with the doctor-patient relationship and impeding women’s access to comprehensive reproductive healthcare.”

Abt Associates, which received $113.1 million in PEPFAR authorizing in 2021 and 2022, issued a press release in June 2022 after the Supreme Court overturned its Roe v. Wade ruling on abortion. 

“We know this decision undermines progress towards gender and racial equity,” Abt Associates President and CEO Kathleen Flanagan mentioned in a public statement. “For 57 years, we have worked to close the gaps in health equity in the U.S. and around the world. That has always meant supporting the policies and systems that protect and expand access to safe, affordable, high-quality reproductive health care.” 

Family Health International received $426.2 million in PEPFAR grants in 2021 and 2022. 

“This organization similarly blasted the [Supreme Court’s] Dobbs decision,” Family Health International said in a written statement in June 2022. “This decision restricts the rights and agency of women and people who can become pregnant, and, as evidence clearly indicates, will exacerbate growing disparities in access to reproductive health care in the United States.”

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