(OSV News) -- Vice President Kamala Harris on March 14 toured a Minnesota abortion clinic, marking the first time that a president or vice president has done so, according to Harris' office.
During a trip to the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, part of a nationwide tour Harris launched earlier in 2024 to advocate for expanding abortion access after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, the vice president spoke with staff at a Planned Parenthood clinic.
Harris has frequently argued that access to abortion should be expanded by congressional legislation, a position the Biden-Harris re-election campaign has also advocated for.
In remarks after her visit, Harris said Planned Parenthood "runs the gamut" of reproductive health care, including abortion and cancer screenings.
"Right now in our country, we are facing a very serious health crisis," she argued in comments to reporters about abortion restrictions enacted in a number of states following the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health ruling.
"As America's largest abortion business, Planned Parenthood is far from benign," Marjorie Dannenfelser, a Catholic and president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in a statement.
"While fewer and fewer cancer screenings or prenatal services are provided, they brutally ended more than 374,000 babies' lives in the last reported year and raked in over half a billion dollars from taxpayers," Dannenfelser said. "Meanwhile their political arm spends more than any other abortion-related group to lobby the federal government against commonsense policies like protecting babies born alive after failed abortions."
Dannenfelser argued that Planned Parenthood stands in contrast to "the compassionate and truly empowering support offered by thousands of pregnancy resource centers across America, not only during pregnancy but well after their child is born."
Dannenfelser praised former Vice President Mike Pence for becoming "the first sitting vice president to visit a pregnancy resource center" during his time in office.
"It couldn't be clearer who is aligned with the overwhelming majority of Americans who support pregnancy centers and want fewer abortions, not more," she said. "We need leaders who will champion national minimum protections at least when babies in the womb can feel pain, to stop Planned Parenthood and the Democrats' all-trimester, no-limits abortion agenda. They are extreme and wildly out of step with America."
The Catholic Church opposes abortion, outlining its teaching in the Catechism of the Catholic Church that human life "must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception." Because abortion takes the life of an already conceived child, it is "gravely contrary to the moral law," the catechism says.
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