FBI seeks documents for Planned Parenthood probe

WASHINGTON—The FBI has requested unredacted documents the Senate Judiciary Committee obtained from abortion providers, signaling a broader probe into the abortion industry, according to a report from The Hill. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the committee chairman, asked the FBI in December to investigate Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers after lawmakers concluded their own probe into the fetal tissue procurement industry. In 2015, the Center for Medical Progress released undercover videos showing Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers selling the body parts of dead babies for a profit. Under federal law enacted in 1993, abortion providers can give remains from abortions to researchers but cannot profit from the transactions. The videos launched two congressional probes into how researchers obtain fetal remains. The Senate Judiciary Committee conducted one, and the House Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives completed the other, releasing its final report in January. “The FBI’s investigation of Planned Parenthood’s taxpayer-funded, criminal abortion enterprise is long overdue,” David Daleiden, founder of the Center for Medical Progress, said in a statement following The Hill report. “Planned Parenthood’s sale of aborted baby body parts is the greatest human atrocity of our times and must finally be brought to justice under the law.”