An
expert report submitted to congressional leadership today, concludes
that the secretly recorded and heavily edited videos, released about
Planned Parenthood and life-saving fetal tissue donation ‘significantly
distort and misrepresent’ actual events.
“A thorough review of these videos in consultation with
qualified
experts found that they do not present a complete
or accurate record of the events they purport to depict,”
- Glenn Simpson, a partner at the research firm Fusion GPS,
in a 10-page report submitted to leadership of the House and Senate.
Documents
Fusion GPS assembled three teams of experts in video forensics, production, and transcription to review five secretly recorded videotapes of Planned Parenthood staff that have been released as part of a three-year fraud by a group of
anti-abortion activists with extremist ties. The experts, which include Grant Fredericks who is a contract instructor of video sciences at the
FBI National Academy and one of the most experienced video experts in
North America, reviewed the five short videos (of eight to 15 minutes in length) that have been widely reported on and viewed, as well as the longer versions of those videos (which total 12 hours for all five) that were released hours or days later.
Key quotes from the expert report:
“The short videos take a great deal of dialog out of context
so as to substantively and significantly alter the meaning of
the dialog contained in the long videos.”
“CMP edited content out of the alleged “full footage” videos,
and heavily edited the short videos so as to misrepresent
statements made by Planned Parenthood representatives.”
“The short videos significantly distort and misrepresent the
conversations in the full footage. Mr. Fredericks notes that
the short videos contain ‘edited conversations where
some spoken words are eliminated and some spoken words
are added out of content.”
“At this point, it is impossible to characterize the extent to
which CMP’s undisclosed edits and cuts distort the meaning
of the encounters the videos purport to document. However,
the manipulation of the videos does mean they have no
evidentiary value in a legal context and cannot be relied
upon for any official inquiries unless supplemented by CMP’s
original material and forensic authentication that this material
is supplied in unaltered form.”
Planned Parenthood Federation of America President Cecile Richards
said today:
“Our commitment is to get all the facts and share them fully,
and that’s what we’re doing today. We’ve said all along that
these videos were heavily edited to deceive the public, and
that’s what this expert analysis now shows. The more the
public learns about this fraudulent, baseless attack on women’s
health, the better, and that’s why today we’re laying everything
out for leaders in Congress and for the public.”
Key data from the summary:
- Collectively, the five videotapes of Planned Parenthood staff have
- at least 42 splices where content is cut and edited together to
- make it appear to be a seamless conversation.
- In some cases, these splices completely change the meaning
- of statements. On one video, a Planned Parenthood staff member’s
- remarks about lab protocols were edited to make it sound like she
- was talking about changing abortion procedures. Phrases on the tape
- were isolated and removed, stringing together unrelated sentences
- to change the meaning.
Anti-abortion activists used the doctored “quote” to support
- false claims that she was talking about changing how an abortion
- would be done, and the “quote” was published by mainstream
- media as if it were real.
- On one tape, a Planned Parenthood staff member in Colorado
- says 13 separate times that any arrangements related to fetal
- tissue donation need to be reviewed by attorneys and follow
- all laws – and all 13 are edited out of the video.
- On another tape, a Planned Parenthood staff member in Texas
- says nine separate times that there is no “profit” related to
- fetal tissue donation – and all nine are edited out of the video.
The summary of edits and expert report were submitted to Senate and
House leadership with
a letter from Planned Parenthood Federation of
America that provides extensive background and information on our
involvement with fetal tissue research. The letter explains that fetal
tissue research is critical for helping develop cures for serious diseases
and advancing public health.
Planned Parenthood affiliates in
two states -- 1% of Planned
Parenthood’s health centers --
currently offer tissue donation
as an option for women who want it.
To date, four separate committees in the House and Senate have launched
investigations into Planned Parenthood.
In the last two weeks,
five
states have concluded
investigations into
Planned
Parenthood – and
every one
of them has found
Two states – California and Texas – have also called for investigations
into the Center for Medical Progress. Last month, a bill to defund
Planned Parenthood and block millions of women from having
access to health care failed to pass in the U.S. Senate.
copied from the website of Planned Parenthood
from chloelouise:
here is what gets me real angry.........
Bill makes is seem as if Planned Parenthood is doing something
real bad, as if they are bad people doing a disservice to society.
He influences many people, but he might want to know the facts.
Organs are harvested every day and tissue donation takes place
every day in the United States--usually it is looked upon as a good
thing as in the word ...... donation.
My question--how would Bill handle things differently if the
tissue would not be donated--he never really answers that
question. We know he is against abortion and that is his right
but what would his preferred outcome be for the intended tissue?
Just asking.......
he is not really looking out for the folks on this one--certainly
not the individuals that might want to take advantage of the
services of Planned Parenthood.