BLOOMFIELD HILLS, MI, May 2, 2014 (LifeSiteNews.com) – One of the top abortion facility owners in Michigan has appeared in an ad for the Democratic Party of Michigan. The ad supports Rep. Gary Peters against his likely Republican opponent for the U.S. Senate, Republican Terri Lynn Land.
In the ad, a number of women state their support for Peters. One of them is Renee Chelian, who owns Northland Family Planning, a series of three abortion clinics that provide abortion services from “4-24 weeks,” according to its website.
In the video, Chelian stands in front of “Exam Room 1” and says, “Choosing Gary Peters means protecting my daughter's and your daughter's future.”
Michigan Right to Life (MRTL) Legislative Director Ed Rivet, whose organization wrote a blog post critical of Chelian's involvement in the ad, told LifeSiteNews that Chelian “is one of the top three providers of abortions in our state, including [providing] late-term abortions. Recently, she has marketed her clinics to women in Ohio, whose state legislature enhanced protections for the unborn beginning at 22 weeks' gestation.”
In its post, MRTL noted that the appointment center manager for Northland has said that “we estimate 30 to 40 patients a month are coming from Ohio, and that is a low estimate…It seems to increase every week because of the clinic closures and people making appointments for late-term abortions.”
According to MRTL, despite what Chelian said in the ad, she “doesn't believe in protecting all daughters. Every year, thousands of unborn Michigan daughters are killed at her abortion clinics in Michigan and she and her family profit off of it.”
Chelian's abortion facilities are currently offering coupons for their abortion services, according to MRTL. The coupon takes $20 off “on any abortion service or ultrasound.”
In 2012, according to Business Week, Chelian and her husband made $203,000 in salaries through her clinics. Their home measures 6,500 square feet, and is located in what Business Week called “the upscale neighborhood of West Bloomfield, near where Mitt Romney grew up.”
The Peters campaign did not respond to a request for comment about whether it was aware that Chelian is one of the few abortion clinic owners in the nation to offer late-term abortions. The Land campaign also declined to comment on the ad.
The commercial is part of a series from the Democratic Party in Michigan, all focused on allegedly egregious policy positions held by Land, including being pro-life.
The two candidates are neck-and-neck in polls, and Land has a modest fundraising and cash-on-hand advantage. No Republican has won a Senate seat in Michigan since 1994.
The race has recently received a great deal of national attention, first after MRTL said on its website that Peters “wants to make sure abortion is accessible and cheap for his daughters.” That description received criticism from Peters and numerous pro-abortion organizations, though MRTL said it was an accurate interpretation of what Peters had previously said on his Facebook page.
More recently, Land has launched a pushback against the Democratic claims of a Republican “War on Women” in both a well-received ad and a blog post. In the ad, she says, “Congressman Gary Peters and his buddies want you to believe I'm waging a war on women. Really? Think about that for a moment,” she says, pausing for dramatic effect.
She concludes, “As a woman, I might know a little bit more about women than Gary Peters.”