The founder and chief executive of Susan G. Komen for the Cure said Thursday that abortion politics had no bearing on the cancer charity’s decision to sever ties with Planned Parenthood, the Los Angeles Times writes.
Breaking two days of silence on the controversy that has engulfed the nation’s largest breast-cancer organization, Nancy G. Brinker said Komen terminated funding to Planned Parenthood clinics as part of an effort to improve how it selects grantees.
“Our only mission is to design treatments and cures for this disease and to take care of women in need of services,” she told reporters in a conference call. “You have to be sure you are granting to the right people.”
The Komen foundation cut off Planned Parenthood grants for breast exams under a new policy barring it from funding groups facing a government investigation. A Florida congressman is examining whether Planned Parenthood has used federal money for abortion services, an investigation supporters of the reproductive-health group claim is politically motivated.
Ms. Brinker said three Planned Parenthood affiliates—in Northern Colorado; Waco, Texas; and Orange County, California—will continue to get Komen grants because they are their regions’ only providers of breast-cancer services, Bloomberg writes.
Both Planned Parenthood and the Komen foundation said they have received a flood of donations since the controversy broke Tuesday. New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg lent his support to Planned Parenthood, pledging up to $250,000 in matching funds for other donations, and 26 Democratic senators signed a letter to Ms. Brinker, urging Komen to reconsider.
The decision has prompted division with in the Komen organization, according to media accounts.
Mollie Williams, who headed the charity’s community-health programs, resigned in December after the Komen board voted to break with Planned Parenthood, The Atlantic reports. The executive director of the cancer group’s Los Angeles chapter told local TV station CBS2 that she is resigning in protest, and Komen’s seven California affiliates issued a statement opposing the Planned Parenthood decision, writes The New York Times.
