WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Rand Paul delivered the following remarks on the Senate floor today urging his colleagues to support S.1881. This legislation would eliminate taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, while at the same time protect and preserve federal funding of women’s health services provided by other eligible entities.

In July 2015, Sen. Paul introduced similar language to defund Planned Parenthood as both a stand-alone bill and an amendment to H.R.22, the Senate vehicle for the highway bill. Sen. Paul has repeatedly asked the Senate to hold a vote on both measures. 

A vote to take up the legislation required 60 votes for passage and failed, 53-46.

Below is the video and transcript of Sen. Paul’s floor speech.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH SEN. PAUL’S FLOOR SPEECH

TRANSCRIPT:

Sen. Paul: There comes a time in the history of nations when a civilized people must stand up and decide whether or not life is important, whether or not life is something special, and whether or not there’s maybe something greater than just us that has to do with life.

It sickens me to me what’s been going on with Planned Parenthood. Some of my first memories of my children were the ultrasound that I saw before they were born. We still keep those. We now find out, though, that this technology that can do wonders, that can save babies, you can perform surgery now in the uterus and the baby can survive, these same techniques that are being used by Planned Parenthood to manipulate the baby into a position to harvest the baby’s organs.

I think all America should be sickened by this, but it should also trouble us if we are a society that’s not sickened by this. And I think the time has come to have a full-throated debate about this, and the time has come to end all taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood. Some will say, well, where will people get their health? We have 9,000 community health centers and 700 Planned Parenthood clinics. Difference is abortion. In fact, you can get many things at a community health center you can’t get at Planned Parenthood.

But the only thing you get at Planned Parenthood that you can’t get anywhere else is abortion. This debate isn’t just about abortion. This debate is about little babies who haven’t given their consent. It’s about time we had a debate in our country about this, and it’s about time we said enough is enough.

The question is, can a civilization long endure that doesn’t respect life? Do we lose everything else about what makes us human if we’re unwilling to protect life? Can we stand up and defend our other rights if we’re not willing to stand up and defend the most basic of rights? So I come here today to ask my fellow senators to vote to defund Planned Parenthood, and I hope they will.

Thank you, Mr. President.

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