In an open letter to former Sen. Rick Santorum, prominent pro-life philanthropist Ray Ruddy takes Santorum to task for his connections to The Global Fund and The ONE Campaign.
Ruddy, founder of a 501 (c)(3) called The Gerrard Health Foundation backed Mitt Romney last time around, but has remained neutral this cycle.
In his letter, Ruddy warns Santorum that The Global Fund “channels a large portion of its funds through Planned Parenthood’s affiliates” around the world. (Note: It was recently reported that the head of The Global Fund would step down, due to a misuse of funds.)
Ruddy then scolds Santorum, writing that,
it was baffling to learn that the person who functioned as your chief of staff when you were in the Senate, Mark Rodgers, left the Senate and founded a public relations firm called the Clapham Group that counts as one of its major clients The ONE Campaign and to learn that the Clapham Group provided $125,000 out of the $900,000 you earned during the year before you filed to run for President.
Ruddy also calls on Santorum to pledge that if elected president, he would “eliminate US funding for the Global Fund.” Additionally, he asked Santorum to “disclose all personal and financial relationships with the Global Fund, The ONE Campaign, the Clapham Group, and any other group promoting the Global Fund.”
The letter is especially notable, because over the years, Ruddy and his foundation have provided millions of dollars to conservative organizations, including The Susan B. Anthony List, Students for Life of America, Live Action, Heartbeat International, CareNet, and others. These are groups which should ostensibly be in the Santorum camp.
Read the letter here:
AN OPEN LETTER TO SENATOR SANTORUM RE: THE GLOBAL FUND
Dear Senator Santorum:
The Gerard Health Foundation which my wife, Marilyn, and I founded, has one giving objective: saving lives. Over the past decade we have provided millions of dollars to pro-life groups such as Students for Life of America, Live Action, Heartbeat International, and CareNet. Our Life Prizes event honors pro-life heroes.
For the past eight years, our commitment to saving lives has given us deep concerns about the mismanagement and misdirection of the Global Fund, which was created by the United Nations to fight HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. The US taxpayer has spent more than $6 billion on the Global Fund, only to see it use our money to pursue a radical social policy agenda. Using the euphemism “harm reduction,” the Fund advocates for and funds private groups to campaign for the repeal of laws against needle exchanges, prostitution, and heroin and other illegal drugs. Moreover, the unwillingness of faith-based groups to support such policies leads the Fund to discriminate against them in favor of groups that share its radical social agenda.
With regard to abortion, the Global Fund channels a large portion of its funds through Planned Parenthood’s affiliates around the world and through a British group Marie Stopes International (the largest chain of abortion mills in the UK, with 66,000 abortions a year.) The Fund subsidizes Marie Stopes to operate in Cambodia, Fiji, Bangladesh, Sierra Leone, Uganda, Burma, Kenya, Tanzania, and other countries.
It makes no sense in this time of fiscal crisis for the United States to borrow from the Chinese to fund a trillion dollar budget deficit, give billions to the Global Fund, and then watch the Global Fund give more than a half billion dollars back to the Chinese Government. Similarly, it makes no sense for the American taxpayer to pay the lion’s share of the costs of the Fund’s programs in North Korea and Iran. Finally, it makes no sense to have taxpayers go into debt so the US can give money to the Global Fund to pass on to organizations run by multi-billionaire George Soros, such as the Open Health Institute in Russia. It should be noted that Morton Halperin, who represents Soros’s Open Society, is on the Board of an organization called The ONE Campaign, an organization dedicated to campaigning for increased US funding for the Global Fund. Another founder/Board member and financial supporter of The ONE Campaign is Susan Buffett who has spent billions of dollars funding abortion clinics, Planned Parenthood, and other pro abortion groups and activities.
Given all these issues, it was baffling to learn that the person who functioned as your chief of staff when you were in the Senate, Mark Rodgers, left the Senate and founded a public relations firm called the Clapham Group that counts as one of its major clients The ONE Campaign and to learn that the Clapham Group provided $125,000 out of the $900,000 you earned during the year before you filed to run for President.
You purport to be pro-life. Yet, your support of the Global Fund and its radical social agenda through your work at the Clapham Group contradicts everything we have wanted to believe about you.
When you were in the Senate we, a prominent pro-life leader, high level representatives of the Bush Administration, and others alerted you to many of the Global Fund problems and urged you to withdraw your active support for this Fund and you refused. Now, we ask you to agree to, and post on your web site, the attached position paper we previously forwarded to you agreeing that, if elected President, you will eliminate US funding for the Global Fund. We also believe you should take this opportunity to disclose all personal and financial relationships with the Global Fund, The ONE Campaign, the Clapham Group, and any other group promoting the Global Fund.
Ray Ruddy