



When an organization adopts a purportedly blanket policy as cover for undertaking a biased action, the natural laws of the universe (at least of the PR universe) mandate that said policy wrap tightly back on an organization like a pink straitjacket woven with threads of hypocrisy and gall.

That the Susan G. Komen Foundation thought it could get away with stripping funding for Planned Parenthood is not surprising. One of the nation's biggest charities is likely to have some hubris in that regard. That they hired Ari Fleisher to manage the policy rollout and got, well, Ari Fleisher'd is not terribly remarkable either. That the media bought the Komen half-hearted, quasi-sorta reversal as some complete 180 that guaranteed Planned Parenthood funding was also to be expected.

What I didn't expect was that this scandal would still, days later, be a never-ending black hole filled with excuses, contradictions and confusion. It's a marathon of a scandal, and Komen doesn't look to be in any shape to finish strong.

The "investigation" excuse

As soon as news broke that Komen was relying on the existence of a sham federal investigation to pull Planned Parenthood's funding, thousands of keyboard researchers put on their Google mining hats and went digging. They found gold.

The most obvious grant that highlighted Komen's hypocrisy was the $7.5 million to Penn State (Penn State is under federal investigation for its role in a sexual abuse scandal). Others were just as embarrassing. Days before the Komen scandal erupted, the USDA announced it launched an investigation into Harvard's treatment of primates in its research labs. The Education Department had just announced an investigation into whether Harvard discriminated against Asian-Americans in its undergraduate admissions policies. Meanwhile, two members of Komen's prestigious Scientific Advisory Board work at Harvard, while Harvard Medical School and the affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute received over a million dollars in Komen funding.

From Komen-funded hospitals being investigated for Medicare fraud (example) to Komen-funded universities being investigated for civil rights violations, it became immediately apparent that the "local, state or federal investigation" prohibition cast a shadow over a substantial portion of Komen's good work. Within hours of the scandal breaking, it was clear Komen needed a new excuse.

The "education" and "pass-through grant" excuses

Komen founder and CEO Nancy Brinker appeared on MSNBC's "Andrea Mitchell Reports" and proclaimed that the real reason Komen cut off almost all grants to Planned Parenthood was because "many of the grants were education-oriented. We don't need to do that kind of education anymore" (watch the video here). In other media outlets, she again disassociated Komen from the "investigation" excuse, reiterated the "education" position and also embraced a "pass through grant" excuse:

“It was nothing they were doing wrong,” Brinker said of Planned Parenthood. “We have decided not to fund, wherever possible, pass-through grants. We were giving them money; they were sending women out for mammograms. What we would like to have are clinics where we can directly fund mammograms.”

More from Brinker from the Mitchell interview:

Our issue is grant excellence. They do pass-through grants with their screening grants. They send people to other facilities. We want to do more direct-service grants. You know, we contacted them in the fall, because we've been a longtime partner of Planned Parenthood, almost 20 years. MITCHELL: I know. BRINKER: We've given them over $9 million. Many of our grants worked for a long period of time. This is not -- this is about the restructure of our grant program. [...] MITCHELL: Are you going to put out the evidence that you have that there's been anything flawed in the way they've delivered services to -- BRINKER: All we're doing is explaining, again, to our mission, what the criteria for new grants and community-based grants are, for our organization, for the time we are. Many of the grants were education-oriented. We don't need to do that kind of education anymore. We've done it for 30 years. Now we need to translate this care into usable clinical care in communities.

Think Komen abandoned the "direct funding" and "education" excuse with their new mea culpa policy?

Think again.

Both excuses survive even in Komen's new policy (emphasis added):

We will continue to fund existing grants, including those of Planned Parenthood, and preserve their eligibility to apply for future grants, while maintaining the ability of our affiliates to make funding decisions that meet the needs of their communities. It is our hope and we believe it is time for everyone involved to pause, slow down and reflect on how grants can most effectively and directly be administered without controversies that hurt the cause of women.

The absurdity of Komen's position is best evidenced by taking a look at their most current IRS filings. I've put the grant data from both Komen's Parent and Group filings into public spreadsheets here and here. The classifications of "education," "treatment," "research" and "screening" are Komen's own grant classifications.

Even a cursory review of the data reveals the selectivity of the past and possibly future slash-and-burn approach used against Planned Parenthood.

While Planned Parenthood was singled out by Brinker for its use of "education" grants, that organization actually uses a lower percentage of its grants on education than other organizations that receive grants from Komen affiliates:





Brinker's reliance on a "pass through" grant excuse never made any sense either. Take for example the YWCA, an organization that does great work for women coast to coast. Even though YWCA received more than double the funding of Planned Parenthood and spends more on "education" than Planned Parenthood, and even though it spends more actual dollars on pass-through grant screening, Komen didn't make a peep about that funding. In fact, despite repeated demands from the press and the public, Komen was unwilling to cite a single other organization that fell under Komen's purportedly blanket policy .





Brinker's words, both before and after the "reversal," box Komen into a corner. If true, the desire to shift Komen funding away from education ("we don't need to do that kind of education anymore") and towards "directly administered" screenings and treatment would mean a seismic shift in the organization. Indeed, that's what Brinker suggested in the Mitchell interview when she stated that "this is about the restructure of our grant program." If Brinker was telling the truth, it would mean that thousands of charities, small and large, whose funding is 100% categorized as "education" by Komen would suffer:

That doesn't even take into account the millions in funds meant for screening services undertaken by organizations that do not "directly administer" medical services.

Of course, the truth is, Komen isn't going to stop funding clinics and foundations that offer support groups, education and doctor referrals. The outcry to that policy would be even more deafening. The sudden aversion to "education" and "pass through" grants is nothing more than a doorstop meant to keep hope alive for anti-choice groups and to give Komen a possible out to decrease, if not eliminate, future Planned Parenthood funding.

The policy from the very start was hand-tailored specifically for Planned Parenthood's circumstances, which is why it was and still is so ill-suited for blanket application.

Komen was rated the nation's most trusted charity in 2010. With this debacle, its standing is sure to suffer. Although that pink ribbon has been transformed for many into a badge of shame, and although Komen is still tying itself in knots over how to resolve the matter, the real victims of Komen's biased plan and bungled PR strategy are the thousands of organizations whose funding may be in limbo because Komen can't get its story straight and the thousands of women who depend on those organizations to save their lives.