ABC’s Martha Raddatz Fact Checks Ben Carson’s Bald-Faced Lies About Planned Parenthood
In the aftermath of the first GOP primary debate, one of the candidates who saw a bump in his poll numbers — besides Donald Trump — was former neurosurgeon turned Tea Party darling Ben Carson. One of the reasons why he’s seen his arrow trend upwards is his tendency to saw absolutely insane shit at the drop of a hat. Recently, he’s called President Obama an “anti-Semite” and suggested that we need to send tens of thousands of ground troops into the Middle East to confront ISIS, which will lead the rest of the world to join us in a huge coalition.
It would appear that his latest comments about Planned Parenthood, which has become an easy target for social conservatives in the wake of deceptively edited videos targeting the women’s health organization, are a big reason why he’s been moving up in the polls. The good doctor, despite using fetal tissue in research earlier in his career, has claimed that PP is profiting off of aborted fetuses. While this is in line with the rest of the GOP presidential field, Carson has gone even further in his criticism of the non-profit health provider.
During an appearance on Fox News last week, Carson claimed that Margaret Sanger founded Planned Parenthood largely so she could control the black population in America. He brought up Sanger’s support of the eugenics movement and then stated that today most of PP’s clinics are located in black neighborhoods, suggesting that Planned Parenthood’s mission is to kill African-American babies in order to keep the black population under control.
First off, it appears that Carson believes that women, and especially black women, just don’t have any free will to make the choice of whether or not to have an abortion, which is pretty fucking insulting. Beyond that, he stated as pure fact that the majority of Planned Parenthood clinics are located in areas where the majority of the population is African-American, which is blatantly false.
On Sunday, Carson appeared on ABC’s This Week and guest host Martha Raddatz took him to task on the falsehood he had spread. She also hit him on his belief that the organization is trying to kill off blacks.
RADDATZ: OK, you made some controversial comments this week about Planned Parenthood, saying, “…one of the reasons you find most of their clinics in black neighborhoods is so that you can find a way to control that population.”
Do you really believe that Planned Parenthood is targeting African American communities to control the population?
CARSON: Well, again, you have to go back to the beginnings of Planned Parenthood and Margaret Sanger, who was a great believer in eugenics and believed that certain people were like weeds that needed to be controlled.
RADDATZ: But we’re talking today, and Planned Parenthood estimates that fewer than 5 percent of its health centers are located in areas where more than one-third of the population is African American.
CARSON: I believe we could find some data quite contrary to that. I have seen some of their maps.
RADDATZ: But you just don’t believe that data? You believe this is happening today?
CARSON: Well, here’s what’s important. Margaret Sanger believed that certain people, including blacks, were inferior and that the way you strengthen the society is you get rid of them.
Of course, pesky things like facts won’t faze Carson or his supporters. But it was good that Raddatz exposed Carson for disseminating obvious lies in an effort to bolster his opinions on Planned Parenthood and abortion in general. At the same time, it won’t fucking matter to the pro-life crowd, who are just looking for any possible thing to change public perception about PP.
Below is video of the segment, courtesy of ABC News:
