Ben Sasse: Fire Officials Who Approved Pandemic Aid For ‘Big Abortion’ Provider Planned Parenthood

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE) called for President Trump to fire the bureaucrats who illegally approved millions of dollars worth of small-business loans for Planned Parenthood clinics.

Sasse issued a strong statement on Wednesday slamming the well-known abortion provider for taking advantage of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans that it is ineligible to receive.

“Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion business, tried to defraud taxpayers during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression,” Sasse said. “The Paycheck Protection Program is supposed to be a lifeline for small businesses, not a slush fund for Big Abortion. The administration needs to reclaim that money and fire the bureaucrats who signed off on this scam.”

Thirty-seven Planned Parenthood affiliates applied for and received over $80 million dollars in PPP loans. The funds were approved by Congress in March to go to small businesses during the coronavirus pandemic, and affiliates of any organization with more than 500 employees are ineligible for such loans. Planned Parenthood has more than 600 employees.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) slammed the abortion provider on Tuesday and called for each clinic to immediately return the funds it had received.

“There is no ambiguity in the legislation that passed or public record around its passage that organizations such as Planned Parenthood, whose parent organization has close to half a billion dollars in assets, is not eligible for the Paycheck Protection Program,” Rubio said.

“Those funds must be returned immediately. Furthermore, the SBA should open an investigation into how these loans were made in clear violation of the applicable affiliation rules and if Planned Parenthood, the banks, or staff at the SBA knowingly violated the law, all appropriate legal options should be pursued,” Rubio added.

Officials in the Small Business Administration (SBA), which oversees the PPP, have been reaching out to the funds’ recipients, telling them to return the loan money, according to Fox News. The SBA is also warning that if any Planned Parenthood employee lied on an application to get approved for the loans, they and their clinic could face criminal and civil penalties.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) called for a federal investigation into the lending, and for charges to be brought against anyone found to have lied on a PPP loan application.

“The money needs to be recovered and if anybody knowingly falsified applications, they need to be prosecuted,” Hawley said.

Within the past year, Planned Parenthood has made several decisions that have cost the organization significantly more money than clinics requested in PPP loans. In August, the abortion provider opted to lose more than $60 million in federal funding rather than stop performing abortions.

In January, Planned Parenthood’s political action arm committed $45 million to pro-abortion candidates running for office in 2020, claiming that “the stakes have never been higher” in an election year.