Mark O. Hatfield
Chairman, Committee on Appropriations
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510

Dear Mark:

I have read your letter of March 5, along with the numbers generated by the Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI) on the effect of cuts in population control programs on the numbers of (1) abortions, (2) births, and (3) maternal deaths worldwide.

As you know, AGI is a wholly owned subsidiary of Planned Parenthood, which provides IGA with both office space in its New York headquarters and the lion's share of its annual budget. And Planned Parenthood, for its part, is heavily involved in population control programs. These institutional ideologies and connections raise questions about AGI's ability to objectively access the effects of population control cuts.

It is true that AGI statistics on abortion have been widely cited. Its close connections with the U.S. abortion industry, much of which is owned and operated by Planned Parenthood, enable it to gather more accurate statistics in this regard than even the U.S. government. But this singular fact does not guarantee the accuracy of its other projections in other countries.

I enclose an alternative appraisal of the likely effect of the reduction in population control funding recently completed by the Population Research Institute (PRI). Since PRI does not benefit, either directly or indirectly, from U.S. and international population control funding, I consider its analysis to be objective and reliable.

Those who consider that even one abortion is one too many will be reassured by PRI's findings.

Sincerely,

Chris Smith
Chairman