Melissa Bean for US Congress (IL 8)

Melissa Bean has a 100% voting record with Planned Parenthood

During her two terms as a congresswoman, Melissa Bean has supported international family planning assistance as well as abortion access for women in the military. Read more about these issues below.

International Family Planning Assistance

International family planning assistance supports education, information, and services to help poor people around the world protect themselves from unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV. UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, is the only multilateral agency primarily dedicated to addressing the unmet need for family planning and reproductive health care services worldwide. It provides contraceptives and information, health care for mothers and children's, and services to prevent STIs, including HIV, for women living in some of the poorest, most remote regions of the world, or those areas most devastated by war and natural disaster. Since 2002, President Bush has withheld congressionally-appropriated funds for this program, claiming that UNFPA supports coercive family planning practices in China. Representatives voted on restoring funding to UNFPA. (6/16/05, Maloney UNFPA Amendment to H.R. 2863, amendment failed 192-233, roll call 266).

Abortion Access for women in the military

Congress has used its funding powers to single out certain classes of women (low-income, federal employees, military personnel serving overseas, residents of the District of Columbia and women in federal prisons) and restrict their access to legal abortions because their health care is funded in part by the federal government. As part of this relentless attack on access to abortion services, Congress continues to bar military service members and their dependents from obtaining abortions in U.S. military hospitals overseas - even if they use their own money. Representatives voted on lifting this ban, which contains exceptions only for cases of life endangerment, rape, or incest, and is especially harmful to those women stationed overseas in countries where abortion is illegal and/or unsafe. (05/10/06, Andrews Amendment (formerly known as the Davis-Harman-Sanchez Amendment) to H.R. 5122, a vote in favor of this amendment was a pro-choice vote, amendment failed 191-237, roll call 136).