We, the undersigned organizations, are writing to set the record straight. Your spokesperson, Ari Fleischer, said your goal was to make abortion more rare. The Helms amendment to the Foreign Operations appropriations bill, renewed annually since 1973, explicitly forbids such activities. Your Administration has claimed bipartisan, broad support for your policy from both the American public and Congress.
Evidence indicates otherwise.
Furthermore, the real bipartisan congressional consensus exists around making family-planning services more widely available and more accessible, not undermining them. Either choice hurts the poorest women in the world. However, we respectfully request that you and your staff accurately and honestly depict current law and the nature of family-planning programs to the media, the American public, and women abroad.