of health be required to stop funding fetal tissue research, and that the huge health provider planned parenthood be stripped of u.s. funding." according to science, the report contained multiple inaccuracies. democratic members of the panel – who had not been permitted to read, respond to, or vote on the final report – released an alternate report, in which they criticized the committee for relying on "mccarthy-era tactics" and of relying on "unsourced, unverified documents" in writing the report. a planned parenthood spokesperson described the report as "nothing more than a partisan attack on planned parenthood and women's access to safe and legal abortion" and noted that 13 state-level investigations and other congressional inquiries had found no wrongdoing. the washington post, new york magazine and los angeles times described the panel's inquiry as a "witch hunt" and criticized both its findings and tactics in editorials. court orders on july 31, 2015, the national abortion federation sued cmp and daleiden. a los angeles judge placed a temporary restraining order on the release of further videos of employees of stemexpress, one company which planned parenthood does business with, based on california's anti-wiretapping law. the order also prohibited the group from disclosing names or addresses of national abortion federation members, or dates and locations of future meetings. the restraining order was later lifted, allowing release of more videos. a hearing was held on august 27, 2015. cmp has said that it follows "all applicable laws". daleiden has stated that, in the suppressed video, the "top leadership" of stemexpress "admitted that they sometimes get fully intact fetuses shipped to their laboratory from the abortion clinics that they work with and that could be prima facie evidence of born-alive infants". stemexpress has denied daleiden's "intact fetuses" allegations: cmp's accusations that this conversation somehow refers to "intact fetuses", which were never mentioned at any point during the entirety of the illegally recorded conversation, are false. stemexpress has never requested, received or provided to a researcher an "intact fetus". cmp and daleiden's claims to the contrary are unequivocally false. stemexpress ceo cate dyer explained the discrepancy as a misuse of terms by cmp operatives: as anyone can see and read, the entire discussion was, in fact, about "intact livers." my use of the term "intact cases" is a medical term of art that refers solely to "intact livers," as there was absolutely no mention of "intact fetuses" at any point in over two hours of illegally recorded video. stemexpress has severed ties with planned parenthood as a result of the controversy, stating that their business with planned parenthood was a small percentage of their activities. in september 2015, two courts ruled that daleiden and cmp must turn over private documents and submit to depositions about how they orchestrated their video sting, and could require daleiden to turn over paperwork and details of the operation, and provide the full raw footage he collected while posing as an executive of the fictitious tissue procurement firm biomax. on december 4, 2015, u.s. supreme court justice anthony kennedy ruled on an emergency appeal from the cmp. the cmp's appeal had asked the justice to block the lower courts' order that would require cmp to release the names of its donors. justice kennedy denied the appeal. in september 2019, a hearing was held in san francisco to determine whether david daleiden and his associate sandra merritt should go to trial for fifteen criminal counts of felony invasion of privacy. in this hearing, daleiden's attorneys disputed the warrant by which agents with the california department of justice entered daleiden's home and seized computers and digital storage devices, along with some phony identification documents in april 2016. the court, however, denied their claim that daleiden was protected by california's shield law for acting as a citizen journalist, because the department of justice had sufficient probable cause of criminal activity to make the seizures. following this hearing, planned parenthood and others affected by daleiden's videos initiated a civil jury trial against daleiden, merritt, troy newman, albin rhomberg and gerardo adrian lopez in state court. they are being accused of fraud, breach of contract, unlawful recording of conversations, civil conspiracy and also violation of federal anti-racketeering law. scientific impact in august 2015, stemexpress cut all ties with planned parenthood for the procurement of human fetal tissue, which has had a severe impact on medical researchers. stemexpress was one of the main providers of human fetal tissue along with advanced biosciences resources. according to a congressional report, research into the zika virus has been stalled along with investigations into alzheimer's disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, diabetes, and childhood leukemia. science friday aired a segment about dr. eugene gu, one of the fetal tissue researchers subpoenaed by congress. gu studies congenital heart and kidney diseases in infants but has since placed his research on hold after united states marshals delivered the subpoena to his nashville apartment, which is in proximity to marsha blackburn and diane black. this is in spite of broad support for fetal tissue research by the scientific community. the new england journal of medicine (nejm) published an editorial in support of planned parenthood's "efforts to channel fetal tissue into important medical research". the editorial argued that many medical advances would not have been made without fetal tissue research and that "planned parenthood, its physicians, and the researchers who do this work should be praised, not damned." the nejm described cmp's actions as a "campaign of misinformation" and said that it is shameful that cmp "continues to twist the facts to achieve its ends". in addition, the nejm praised planned parenthood's contributions to women's health care and stated that the "contraception services that planned parenthood delivers may be the single greatest effort to prevent the unwanted pregnancies that result in abortions". political impact the videos were shown to several anti-abortion congresspeople, including diane black, trent franks, and tim murphy, weeks before being made publicly available. black said that she was given advance screening of the videos, which "literally made sick to stomach" as well as "emotional and tearful", so that she would be prepared to comment on them after their release. the timing of the first video led commentators to speculate it may have been released to coincide with a bill to raise money for susan g. komen for the cure, which gives funding to planned parenthood. after the first video was released, rand paul and diane black introduced pre-prepared legislation to discontinue federal funding of planned parenthood. on july 14, 2015, house speaker john boehner ordered congressional hearings into the practice procuring fetal tissues and organs by planned parenthood, and at least one committee committed to scheduling a hearing. senate minority leader harry reid has said that planned parenthood's practices "should be looked into". on august 3, 2015, the legislation failed to pass in the senate with 53 supporting discontinuing funding and 46 opposed. this was seven votes short of the 60 needed to pass the bill. on september 18, 2015, the u.s. house of representatives voted 241–187 to defund planned parenthood for one year, allowing time to investigate alleged wrongdoing by planned parenthood. the vote was largely symbolic and was not expected to pass in the senate; additionally, president obama stated that he would veto legislation to defund planned parenthood. some raised the issue that this kind of congressional vote could violate the united states constitution, which prohibits bills of attainder, which refers to lawmakers punishing an individual or organization based on alleged infractions without a finding of guilt by a court. presidential campaigns several republican presidential candidates repeated cmp's allegations that ppfa used tissue donation as a way to profit from abortion. rick perry said "the video showing a planned parenthood employee selling the body parts of aborted children is a disturbing reminder of the organization's penchant for profiting off the tragedy of a destroyed human life", and cited the videos as the reason why planned parenthood should lose federal funding. republican presidential candidate rand paul posted on twitter "...a video showing planned parenthood's top doctor describing how she performs late-term abortions to sell body parts for profit", vowed to campaign to defund planned parenthood, and called for hillary clinton to return planned parenthood's donations to her campaign. carly fiorina said "this latest news is tragic and outrageous. this isn't about 'choice'. it's about profiting on the death of the unborn while telling women it's about empowerment". during the september 16, 2015, gop presidential candidates' debate on cnn, she harshly criticized planned parenthood and their involvement in fetal tissue donation, stating "i dare hillary clinton, barack obama to watch these tapes. watch a fully formed fetus on the table, its heart beating, its legs kicking, while someone says, 'we have to keep it alive to harvest its brain'". the website politifact.com, however, said the video footage fiorina referred to was not obtained from a planned parenthood clinic, but was stock footage of an unrelated live fetus, obtained from the grantham collection, "an organization that hopes to stem abortion by promoting graphic images of the procedure". it was then added by cmp to dramatize the description by stemexpress procurement technician holly o'donnell. in the edited video, o'donnell alleged that while she was working in a pathology lab at a planned parenthood clinic, her supervisor told her that they would procure a brain from a well preserved fetus. o'donnell said: "i'm sitting here looking at this fetus, and its heart is beating, and i don't know what to think." the new york times reported that "while the authenticity of the videos remains a subject of debate, mrs. fiorina appears to have exaggerated their contents", and politifact.com rated fiorina's statement "mostly false". democratic presidential candidate hillary clinton, who "staunchly defended" the organization, said that the videos were "disturbing" and called for a national investigation into the sale of aborted fetal tissue. the white house said it would oppose any congressional attempts to defund planned parenthood. other reactions louisiana governor bobby jindal announced, on august 3, 2015, that the louisiana department of health and hospitals was terminating its contract with planned parenthood, which provides the organization with state medicaid funds. in court filings, the justice department argued that louisiana's action violates federal law by denying medicaid patients the choice of their healthcare providers. also noted, neither of the two louisiana clinics provide abortion services. the states of alabama, new hampshire, and utah also cut their respective funding to planned parenthood in the wake of the videos, while pennsylvania and wisconsin were considering similar measures. the obama administration has warned state legislators it may be illegal to cut funding to planned parenthood. after consulting with the university's bioethics advisory committee, colorado state university president tony frank suspended the further purchase of fetal tissue for research purposes. colorado springs planned parenthood shooting on november 27, 2015, a gunman shot and killed two civilians and a police officer during a five-hour gun battle at the colorado springs clinic. the 57-year-old gunman surrendered to police and was taken into custody. during his arrest, he gave a rambling interview in which, at one point, he said "no more baby parts", an apparent reference to protests against the clinic, echoing language used in the news media about the clinic. however, authorities could not clearly identify a specific motivation. u.s. attorney general loretta lynch called the shooting a "crime against women receiving health care services". colorado springs mayor john suthers said that the shooting and standoff "certainly appears" to be an act of domestic terrorism. vicki saporta, president of the national abortion federation drew particular attention to the videos, two of which were filmed at a clinic in denver, 75 miles (121 km) north of colorado springs; these videos resulted in a number of threats against one doctor featured in the videos, who had to move out of her home and hire 24-hour security as a result according to saporta. the cmp issued a statement condemning the shooting as a "barbaric killing spree" by a "violent madman". 2017 developments in march 2017, california attorney general xavier becerra charged daleiden and merritt with 15 felonies related to the videos, including one count of conspiracy to invade privacy and 14 counts of filming people without permission in los angeles. in response, daleiden issued a statement