Sen. Hawley, pro-life group: Abortion pill provider violates state, federal law ‘at the expense of women’s health’

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, is asking the Department of Justice to investigate an abortion pill provider’s “left-wing dark money operation” after a group of pro-life OBGYNs informed Congress of the company’s “medical malpractice” Thursday.

“The investigation shows that not only is no one with any medical knowledge reviewing these cases, but it is also absurdly far from the ‘telemedicine’ screening these companies claim it to be. From start to finish it puts profit over patient safety and fails women and young girls at a time when they are most vulnerable,” American Association of Pro-Life OBGYNs (AAPLOG) CEO Dr. Christian Francis wrote in a letter to four Congressional committee chairs July 16.

AAPLOG, founded in 1973 after abortion was legalized nationally, represents more than 8,000 members from various medical specialties, including emergency health care, midwifery, pregnancy care centers and radiology.

In March, Francis conducted an undercover investigation of Plan C, an online company that mails abortion pills nationwide. She posed as a teenage girl and found the company ignored blatant reported health risks, including conditions that could cause severe hemorrhaging or life-threatening emergencies if she took chemical abortion pills.

“What this investigation uncovered is far from anything that could be called healthcare,” she wrote in the recent letter. “In fact, it should be considered medical malpractice. The FDA removed patient safeguards during the Covid-19 pandemic, removing in-person dispensing requirements that had been in place for two decades. Yet this mail-order process for abortion pills remains in use with complete disregard for patient safety.”

Francis told Heartlander News in March abortion pill providers such as Plan C only “care about getting their money,” and wrote in the letter that it ignores women who are “subject to coercion and abuse” and creates a “public health crisis.”

Francis addressed the letter to the chairs of the U.S. House committees of Energy and Commerce, as well as Oversight and Government Reform, and to the two chairs of the U.S. Senate committees of Finance, as well as Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. She asked them “to do all within your power and purview to restore common sense and basic guidelines for abortion pill distribution.”

While Hawley was not addressed in AAPLOG’s letter, he also took issue with Plan C’s violation of state and federal law in his July 17 criminal referral letter to acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche.

Hawley called Plan C “the referral and logistics hub for shipping abortion drugs,” noting how it directs buyers to shadow-web sites that neither require ID nor offer any medical consultation and will ship abortion pills to residents in states that outlaw the drug.

“By Plan C’s own description, these websites ‘sell generic abortion pills that are not regulated or inspected by the U.S. government,’ and ‘Plan C tests these websites by buying pills from them,’” Hawley writes.

Additionally, Plan C will ship pills to women as late as 14 weeks of pregnancy – a month past the Food and Drug Administration’s ten-week gestational limit, Hawley noted. The virtual company knows it is violating the law and guides users to do the same, Hawley said.

“Plan C coaches its users on how to evade the law. Its website instructs users to protect their ‘digital footprint’ against investigations, recommending privacy-enabled browsers, virtual private networks, and encrypted email.”

Plan C’s actions violate the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act that prohibits selling “unapproved and misbranded drugs” as “interstate commerce,” Hawley explained, asking Blanche to investigate the company and its allied “co-conspirator manufacturers” and “the network of suppliers it promotes.”

“This coordinated effort between Plan C and the abortion drug manufacturers to violate state law at the expense of women’s health deserves the closest scrutiny,” Hawley concluded.