Another ‘isolated’ abortion controversy?

The federally funded Planned Parenthood Federation of America came under attack this week when an antiabortionist activist group released undercover videos revealing clinic workers giving advice on covering up abortions for underage sex workers.

Following in the footsteps of James O’Keefe, the activist responsible for bringing down acorn, the activist group Live Action secretly filmed videos at two Planned Parenthood clinics in New Jersey and Virginia. The Christian Science Monitor reported:

One Live Action video, from a Planned Parenthood in Perth Amboy, N.J., shows a worker identified as Amy Woodruff advising a “pimp” on how he can get abortion services for 14- and 15-year-old sex workers without notifying authorities. A second from Richmond, Va., shows a worker explaining a “judicial bypass” to a request from the “pimp” to keep the young girls from getting parental consent for an abortion.

Officials in New Jersey and Virginia are investigating whether Planned Parenthood workers violated state laws by failing to report statutory rape crimes against underage girls.

Planned Parenthood receives $363 million in funds from federal, state and local governments, and performs about 300,000 abortions every year, according to reports.

Planned Parenthood has “zero tolerance” for unethical behavior and the incidents on the videos are “very isolated,” said organization spokesman Stuart Schear, according to the New York Times.

Live Action claims the problem is not isolated, but institutional, and is calling for Planned Parenthood to be stripped of federal funding. The videos are expected to fuel an already snowballing antiabortion lobbying effort. The campaign dubbed “Expose Planned Parenthood” includes supporting a House bill to cut $75 million in funding to Planned Parenthood and other similar organizations that perform abortions.

For more on this subject, read what we reported after the Gosnell abortion clinic scandal in late January.