What has arms, legs, eyes and a heart? “Fetal tissue,” according to the three broadcast networks.
ABC, NBC and CBS journalists have not uttered the word “baby” once in their reports on the videos exposing Planned Parenthood’s trafficking of aborted baby parts.
Instead, the networks defaulted to “fetal tissue” in their morning and evening news shows. Additionally, both NBC and CBS incorporated “aborted fetuses” and “fetal organs.” The closest to “baby,” CBS dared to use, was the term “body parts.”
The only time the word “baby” was heard on NBC and CBS broadcasts covering the videos, was when a politician or representative from The Center For Medical Progress used the word. Anchors and correspondents never uttered the word themselves.
ABC didn’t even go that far, and censored “baby” completely. That might be because the network has spent only 1 minute and 27 seconds on the entire scandal.
On July 31, CBS correspondent Julianna Goldman quoted “baby” by citing a tweet from Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla., that connected Cecil, the African lion shot by an American dentist, to the Planned Parenthood “controversy.”
Goldman read Rubio’s tweet that said, "Look at all this outrage over a dead lion, but where is all the outrage over the Planned Parenthood dead babies.”
(Note: the networks unabashedly devoted 1 hour, 32 minutes on Cecil the lion. In contrast, they found the story of baby parts “all mixed up together in a bag” by Planned Parenthood worth a mere 20 minutes.)
A day before, NBC Nightly News interviewed David Daleiden of the Center for Medical Progress. As he explained his videos, he used the phrase “body parts of the babies.”
The last “baby” mentions came from Evening News on July 15, when CBS played clips of politicians challenging Planned Parenthood:
“Are we going to look the other way while babies are being brutally killed and organs harvested?"
– Rep. Martha Roby, R-Ala.
“Does it cost $70 more to ship a – a little baby liver versus a little baby lung, or is the market driving the cost of these organs?”
– Rep. Sean Duffy, R-Wis.
Methodology: MRC Culture searched Nexis between July 14 and August 6 for reports on Planned Parenthood including the word “baby.”
