CONCORD, October 5, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – New Hampshire officials have filed a formal protest against the Obama administration’s decision to grant a no-bid contract to Planned Parenthood in the state. The three New Hampshire (NH) Executive Council members also charge that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has not met their request for “documentation relating to the Grant and its award.”
In June, the state’s Executive Council voted in June not to award a $1.8 million contract to Planned Parenthood of Northern New England (PPNNE) for family planning services, becoming the fifth state to defund Planned Parenthood this year.
But then the Obama HHS announced in September that it was going over the head of the state council to fund PPNNE directly with a no-bid contract.
“Quite clearly, the September 13, 2011 HHS announcement of the Grant directly contravenes the authority of the Executive Council and supersedes a proper and legal decision of the sovereign State of New Hampshire,” said NH Executive Councilors David Wheeler, Raymond Wieczorek, and Daniel St. Hilaire in their complaint.
Join a Facebook page to end abortion here.
The September 28 complaint letter notes that Planned Parenthood of Northern New England (PPNNE) and its parent company Planned Parenthood Federation of America recorded large profits of $21.8 million in 2009 and $5.6 million in 2010. The Executive Council, therefore, had determined that taxpayer dollars should be “expended for the needs of the people of New Hampshire, not on subsidizing a multi-million-dollar abortion company.”
One of the reasons that the NH Executive Council decided to defund PPNNE was the $250,000 annual earnings of PPNNE CEO Steve Trombley. Chicago pro-lifers will recognize the name of Trombley, the former CEO of Planned Parenthood of Chicago, who was behind the underhanded construction of the Planned Parenthood abortion mill in Aurora, Illinois.
The NH Executive Council, which is part of New Hampshire’s executive branch, along with the governor, had pointed out that numerous alternative family planning providers were available throughout the state, contrary to an HHS determination that there were no family planning providers in Claremont, Derry, Exeter, Keene, Manchester, and West Lebanon.
In August, federal judges in Kansas and North Carolina forced authorities to continue funding Planned Parenthood with taxpayer monies.
A federal judge in June also forced Indiana to resume its Planned Parenthood funding after she deemed the Obama administration’s threat to cut all Medicaid funding over the change too dangerous for Indiana citizens.