Congress was still torn on how to deal with the issue of Planned Parenthood with only hours left before the fiscal year ended on Wednesday, September 30th; they voted to pass a temporary federal budget until December 11, closely avoiding the second government shutdown.

However, this leaves the over 800,000 federal workers wondering if they will be asked not to come in to work two weeks before Christmas.

The conflict over the budget for the next fiscal year stems from democrats and republicans disagreeing on whether or not to defund Planned Parenthood, a non-profit which provides reproductive health services as well as maternal and child services.

Republicans began pushing for defunding the organization after videos were released of conversations involving a Planned Parenthood doctor discussing selling aborted fetal tissues for profit. Donating tissue for scientific research is legal; however, selling for profit is not.

News came out later that the videos were proven to be fraudulent. This information, however, did not undo the political movement that started as a result to prohibit abortions. After the videos were released, a large wave of pro-life supporters pushed for defunding the organization in the new year’s fiscal budget.

However, what many don’t understand about Planned Parenthood is that the non-profit is already forbidden from using government funding for abortions. No government funds are used for performing abortions for patients. Instead, the money is used for things like birth control or gynecology care.

On September 29, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a hearing to discuss the videos. Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards testified at the hearing, explaining that there was no truth to the videos and faced much ridicule and attack from the representatives questioning her. On multiple occasions she was interrupted and cut off so frequently that she did not have time to answer the question.

Rep. Brenda Lawrence (MI-D) addressed the fact that many obviously did not understand the system of how Planned Parenthood uses their government funding. She said, “It is exhausting to keep hearing about federal dollars being spent on abortion when repeatedly the facts state, and it’s not a controversy, read the facts, do your research before you ask these exhausting sometimes I feel insulting questions, we can not use federal dollars for abortion.”

That truth highlights that if the government does decide to defund federal funding for Planned Parenthood in December because pro-life advocates stressed the cruelty of abortions, the defunding would ultimately not affect Planned Parenthood’s abortion process at all. Instead, it would harm women attempting to get proper health care that they could not afford without the organization.