President and CEO of Planned Parenthood Illinois Action Carole Brite recently issued a press release thanking Republican U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk and Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin for opposing another bill that would have blocked federal funding for Planned Parenthood.
Kirk was one of at least six Republicans who voted against this “shutdown bill”—a measure that the organization said would have taken away care from millions of patients, including the nearly 70,000 Planned Parenthood patients in Illinois.
Brite said, “Fortunately for us in Illinois, we were able to count on the leadership of Senators Kirk and Durbin who wisely voted against defunding Planned Parenthood. Thanks to Illinois’s two Senators Planned Parenthood is able to continue to provide critical care like breast and cervical cancer screenings, STI tests and birth control to serve thousands of Illinois women it sees every year.”
Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, also thanked the senators.