Planned Parenthood Suing Arizona

Organization aims to block defunding law
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 18, 2012 2:34 AM CDT
Planned Parenthood Suing Arizona
Bryan Howard, President and CEO of Planned Parenthood Arizona, poses in front of a Planned Parenthood facility in Tucson.   (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Planned Parenthood's newest legal battle with conservative Republicans is in Arizona, where it is suing to block a law defunding its health clinics because it also performs abortions. The organization says the law, which is set to go into effect Aug. 2, could leave thousands of low-income women without access to cancer screenings and birth control, reports the Hill. Planned Parenthood, which has won injunctions in five states with similar laws, says it is fighting in court and in legislatures in nearly every state in the country.

"The Republican Party leadership is on a crusade to end birth-control access in America," charges the president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund. But the issue wasn't always so partisan, notes Reuters. The wife of conservative icon Barry Goldwater was a co-founder of Phoenix's Planned Parenthood in the 1930s and Goldwater himself arranged for an illegal abortion for his teenage daughter in the '50s. "To see the funding be taken away—it 's just ignorance; it's unbelievable," says Goldwater's granddaughter, a trustee for Planned Parenthood in Arizona. (More Arizona stories.)

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