Seattle – Force 10 Hoops, the ownership group behind the WNBA team Seattle Storm, announced that they would be hosting a Stand With Planned Parenthood event to raise support and funding for clinics, which are known for providing abortions.
The event date is set for July 18 at the KeyArena’s West Plaza. For every ticket purchased for the game between the Storm and the Chicago Sky, five dollars will be donated to support Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands. The night will include a pre-game rally and a fundraising auction.
“We are thrilled about this first-of-its-kind partnership,” said Christine Charbonneau, CEO of Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands in a press release on Thursday. “The Seattle Storm owners made a decision to publicly support Planned Parenthood making them the first professional sports team to make their voice heard and their stance known. We are proud to work alongside the Storm and their efforts in leveling the playing field for women and girls. Right now, we are seeing a relentless effort to roll back progress for women. Being in this fight alongside our supporters and the Storm is an honor.”
The Seattle Storm, part of the world’s most successful women’s professional team sports league, is one of the few sports leagues to be owned by women. But despite being a team of women athletes owned by women, coached by women, and managed by women, the Seattle Storm’s partnership with Planned Parenthood will be hurting women.
According to The Daily Signal, Planned Parenthood is America’s largest abortion provide, committing over 30% of American abortions. This breaks down to 887 abortions a day, or one abortion every 97 seconds. Last year alone, Planned Parenthood provided over 320,000 abortions.
But the partnership between Planned Parenthood and the Seattle Storm fails to mention the shocking abortion numbers, instead focusing on the other aspects of Planned Parenthood “I think it’s wonderful,” Charbonneau told ThinkProgress.”There aren’t a lot of women’s teams that would embrace an issue like women’s contraception and education, but the Storm is. They’re very much about the success of women.”
Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands has 28 clinics in Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, and Western Washington. In the Hawaii locations, in-clinic abortions are offered up to 13 weeks and 6 days after the start of a woman’s last menstrual period. But if a woman’s period was after 13 weeks and 6 days, the clinic still provides resources and abortion referrals. Services provided in the Hawaii locations include:
- abortion pill (medication abortion)
- in-clinic abortion
- sedation options (medication to make the abortion more comfortable)
- pre- and post-abortion patient education
- post-abortion follow-up exams
- referrals for other abortion services, as needed
Team owners Dawn Trudeau, Lisa Brummel, and Ginny Gilder made it clear that players for the Seattle Storm were not obligated to become involved vocally in the support of Planned Parenthood.
Trudeau told the New York Times that the Storm had not done any market research before forming their partnership with Planned Parenthood.
“We just made the decision as an ownership group,” she said. “We were pretty confident that our fans would respond in a positive way, because we know the kind of people that we have coming to the arena, but we didn’t do any formal research.”
While the WNBA does not regulate what their teams can be involved with in terms of volunteering and community service, the Storm managers said they did inform the league about their Stand with Planned Parenthood event and received no retaliation or push back.
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