Diamond and Silk’s Facebook censorship claim is a hoax

By JUDD LEGUM via think progress

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg came to Washington and testified, for the first time, in front of two Congressional committees. It provided a unique opportunity for senators and House members to ask the person controlling the world’s largest social network about critical issues involving foreign interference in democratic functions, data privacy, and transparency.

Instead, many of the Republicans focused on Diamond and Silk.

Diamond and Silk are the stage names of two African-American women, Lynette Hardaway and Rochelle Richardson, who support Trump. They appeared at Trump rallies, are frequent guest on Fox News, and have a large presence on social media, including Facebook.

Beginning in September, Diamond and Silk began claiming that there was “bias censorship and discrimination against [the] D&S brand page.” Their claim was that their page was being discriminated against because of their political views and, as a result, they were reaching fewer people.

ThinkProgress has examined Facebook data about their page and its performance, and the numbers clearly show this claim is totally without merit.

Still, Republicans in Congress latched onto their claim of censorship and focused a significant amount of time questioning Zuckerberg about it.

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Billy Long has brought out a poster of Diamond and Silk and is reading a question they sent to him to ask Zuckerberg!

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Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), claimed that Facebook had “blocked Trump supporters Diamond and Silk’s page, with 1.2 million Facebook followers.” Cruz told Zuckerberg that Diamond and Silk’s experience was proof that Facebook had engaged “in a pervasive pattern of bias and political censorship.”

“Why is Facebook censoring conservative bloggers such as Diamond and Silk?” Congressman Joe Barton (R-TX) asked the next day. “Diamond and Silk is not terrorism,” Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), scolded.

Some of the controversy stemmed from a communication that Diamond and Silk received from Facebook that described their content as “unsafe.” Facebook said the message was sent in error and did not reflect their policies.

But what about the underlying claim that Diamond and Silk are being censored by Facebook because of their political views? It’s not even remotely true.

Data from Crowdtangle, a social media analytics platform owned by Facebook, show that total interactions on Diamond and Silk’s Facebook page were steady. The “total interactions” metric covers the total number of reactions, comments, and shares of content posted to the page. Diamond and Silk’s Facebook page actually received more total interactions in March 2018 (1,088,000), when they were supposedly being censored, than in March 2017 (1,060,000). Diamond and Silk received more interactions in January 2018 (1,328,000), when they began complaining about censorship, than in any month the previous year.

CROWDTANGLE DATA

Things get even more stark when you compare Diamond and Silk’s total interactions to liberal-leaning pages that also frequently post video content. From March 2017 to March 2018, the total interactions on the Rachel Maddow Show page, went from 3.3 million to 1.6 million. Rachel Maddow hosts the most widely watched cable news show in America, and her page has 2.6 million fans to Diamond and Silk’s 1.2 million. Over the same time period, on the Facebook page of The Young Turks, perhaps the most popular independent provider of liberal videos online, total interactions declined from 2.3 million to 760,000. Meanwhile, interactions on Mic’s Facebook page, a left-leaning publisher with 3.8 million Facebook fans, plummeted from 8.9 million to 475,000.

CROWDTANGLE DATA

Digging deeper into the data, if you isolate only the videos posted to Diamond and Silk’s page — excluding links and other kinds of status updates — their reach did go down. But the decline was still less pronounced than similar liberal-leaning pages.

Over the last year, views of original videos posted to Rachel Maddow’s Facebook page have declined from 6 million to 1.2 million. Diamond and Silk’s video views have declined from 4.1 million to 1.8 million.

In other words, Diamond and Silk videos now get more video views on Facebook than Rachel Maddow, even though Maddow’s show has a much larger page and is the most popular cable news program in the country.

A spokesperson for Facebook told ThinkProgress that the company regrets the way it communicated with Diamond and Silk, particularly the email in which they were told their content was “unsafe.” The Facebook spokesperson added that changes to Facebook’s monetization policies, implemented in September 2017, were not properly communicated to Diamond and Silk and may have added to the confusion.

Facebook’s spokesperson, however, categorically denied that any page, including Diamond and Silk, was targeted or penalized due to their political beliefs. Rather, any changes to their page performance over the last few months were not targeted at them, but the result of broader shifts across Facebook.

Indeed, many pages, including liberal pages, have suffered large declines because Facebook has reduced the distribution of videos and other content published by pages in favor of content from “friends and family.”

Diamond and Silk, however, have seen their total interactions increase slightly because the reach of their video content has more than replaced status updates that include links.

The data shows there is absolutely no case to be made that Facebook is censoring Diamond and Silk’s page. Their content is actually performing significantly better than providers of liberal political video. Yet their claims, made without any data, have been widely repeated: by members of Congress and the media alike.

It plays into a broader narrative that Facebook favors liberal media over conservatives. This, like the Diamond and Silk narrative, is false.

An analysis of the top 25 publishers features numerous right-wing outlets, including Fox News, the New York Post, and Breitbart. It also includes far-right publishers, like WesternJournal.com, that have little presence outside of Facebook. A look at the reporters who generate the most engagement on Facebook found that 5 of the top 12 work for the far-right Daily Wire.

Diamond and Silk did not return a request for comment.

Facebook co founder called a hero for dodging taxes

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Facebook Unfriends Uncle Sam: Mark Zuckerberg’s Plan To Avoid Taxes

By Pat Garofalo/Think Progress

The right-wing has been lauding Facebook co-founder Edward Saverin for his decision to renounce his U.S. citizenship in order to avoid taxes. But he isn’t the only one who’s going to slash his tax bill in the wake of Facebook’s upcoming initial public offering: both CEO Mark Zuckerberg and the company itself will lower their tax bill for years to come.

While Zuckerberg will pay a hefty tax bill right off the bat if he follows through on his plan to sell $5 billion in Facebook stock options, as the New York Times noted, he may then never pay a dime of taxes on the rest of his Facebook wealth. “Instead, he can simply use his stock as collateral to borrow against his tremendous wealth and avoid all tax,” the Times reported.

And, as Citizens for Tax Justice has noted, Facebook may use the issuance of stock options to avoid corporate income taxes, instead receiving hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in refunds:

The tax law says that if a corporation issues options for employees to buy the company’s stock in the future for its price when the option issued, then if the stock has gone up in value when employees exercise the options, the company gets to deduct the difference between what the employee bought it for and its market price.

When, as Facebook expects, the 187 million stock options are cashed in this year, Facebook will get $7.5 billion in tax deductions (which will reduce the company’s federal and state taxes by $3 billion). According to Facebook, these tax deductions should exceed the company’s U.S. taxable 2012 income and result in a net operating loss (NOL) that can then be carried back to the preceding two years to offset its past taxes, resulting in a refund of up to $500 million.

“When profitable corporations can use the stock option tax deduction to pay zero corporate income taxes for years on end, average taxpayers are forced to pick up the tax burden,” said Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI). “It isn’t right, and we can’t afford it.” This tax preference for corporations costs the U.S. about $2 billion in revenue per year.

In addition, Zuckerberg’s using a totally legal accounting gimmick to transfer money to his unborn children, thus avoiding the gift tax. He also — by virtue of accepting a $1 dollar salary and purely living off his wealth — could be eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit, which is intended to benefit low-income Americans.

Fox Attacks Facebook Jobs Initiative After Tea Party Started Pressuring Businesses Not To Hire

by Solange Uwimana/Media Matters

Two days ago, as Right-Wing Watch reported, leading tea party group Tea Party Nation sent a message to its members calling "for a strike of American small businesses against the movement for global socialism." Activist Melissa Brookstone wrote:

I, an American small business owner, part of the class that produces the vast majority of real, wealth producing jobs in this country, hereby resolve that I will not hire a single person until this war against business and my country is stopped.

I hereby declare that my job creation potential is now ceased.

"I'm on strike!"

On the heels of this initiative to pressure companies not to hire employees, Fox is complaining about a company trying to help unemployed Americans find jobs:

Fox linked to a report by The Hill that referred to a partnership Facebook has struck with the Obama administration to offer employment resources to Americans:

[Labor Secretary Hilda] Solis said the goal of the partnership is to connect employers with people looking for employment. The initiative will allow the Labor Department to provide information and resources to the millions of users on Facebook, Solis said.

[...]

As part of the partnership, Facebook created a "Social Jobs Partnership" page to provide job information and resources to users. "Think of this as a free online job fair that can be accessed seven days a week, day or night," said Marne Levine, Facebook's vice president of global public policy.

The page will offer Labor Department resources, including job listings and job search services, along with resources from partnering nonprofits.

Facebook will target public announcements to users in the 10 states with the highest unemployment rates and Puerto Rico. The announcements will include information about job resources available in the users' area.

Levine also said Facebook plans to invest in developing new social technologies to help people find jobs.

Fox later changed its headline to read: "Facebook and Obama Join Forces Again."

As we've noted, and as Fox News' own Bob Beckel pointed out yesterday, Fox News relentlessly promoted the tea party movement in 2009.

Boycott targets contributors to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker

By Eric W. Dolan

Wisconsin citizens upset with Gov. Scott Walker's attack on public employees' collective bargaining rights have launched a boycott campaign aimed at his campaign contributors.

The Republican governor signed a bill Friday that eliminates most union rights for public employees.

One Wisconsin resident, Sam Hokin, started a Facebook pagethat lists companies and political action committees that had at least one contribution of $5,000 or more to Scott Walker's campaign, Channel3000 reported.

"I just grabbed the top contributors off of wisdc.org and put them up on a Facebook page," Hokin said. "We've had companies say, 'We give to both sides. It's not fair for you to boycott us.' It's not an issue of fair. If I don't want to buy your products, I'll choose not to buy your products."

According to the page, the goal of the boycott is to "bring economic woe to companies that support Scott Walker, and therefore his anti-worker, anti-education and anti-progress politics."

Another website, ScottWalkerWatch.com, also has listed companies to boycott. The website said it would remove companies from the boycott list if they renounced Gov. Walker’s policies and supported his recall as soon as possible.

Jennifer Alexander, President of the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce, warned that the boycott could have the unintended consequence of hurting workers.

Madison prides itself on diversity of ideas and political perspectives," she said in a statement. "Workers hurting other workers seems to run contrary to that Madison ideal."

The boycott is part of a larger backlash against Republicans in Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Democratic Party has collected over 56,000 signatures supporting a recall of eight state senators who aligned themselves with Gov. Walker's controversial budget repair bill, making theDemocrats nearly halfway to recalling the GOP state senators.

Sarah Palin's Latest Facebook Lie

By Geoffrey Dunn

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin -- recently dubbed by Gabriel Sherman of New York Magazine as the "President of right-wing America" -- and her Anchorage attorney Thomas Van Flein continue to deal in duplicity and fraud in response to findings issued by the Alaska Department of Law regarding Ethics Act complaints levied against Palin and her deceptively named Alaska Fund Trust.

In a widely reported posting on Palin's Facebook page -- the intellectual bunker from which Palin launches her lies and verbal grenades, yet another "filter," as Andrew Sullivan recently noted, that "protects Palin from scrutiny" -- Van Flein issued yet another troubling and intentionally misleading statement about Palin's violations of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. Van Flein, who is as pompous as he is verbose, rambled extensively in a missive entitled "Hit and Miss":

Yesterday we learned that another "ethics" complaint that was filed against Governor Palin was dismissed as baseless. (If you are counting, the Governor is 26-0-1 regarding such complaints or suits, with one still pending). Only this complaint was actually filed after she left office, and alleged that the mere existence of the Alaska Fund Trust (the legal defense fund set up for her to help defray the costs incurred during the Troopergate fiasco and related machinations that followed in its wake) was violative of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act as well as its solicitation or receipt of contributions. The raison d'être of the legal defense fund was inexorably linked to Governor Palin's nomination as the Republican candidate for Vice President and the post-nomination political tactics arising therefrom; thus making the nomination sine quo non for the fund. In a detailed opinion, the complaint was dismissed as lacking a factual or legal basis.

Quite a mouthful (French, Latin and ungrammatical English in a single sentence!), and it's a pack of lies further obfuscated by the fact that neither Palin nor Van Flein had the intellectual integrity to make the opinion public. (Indeed, Palin is to political transparency what raw crude is to ocean water, but that's another matter).

In fact, the ruling -- which I have exclusively obtained -- is extremely limited in its scope (at two-and-half pages it is hardly "detailed") and does nothing to address the "factual" basis of the complaint, as Van Flein contends. Instead, it asserts simply that the Ethics Act applies solely "to a current officer and does not apply to a former public officer by definition." The complaint referenced was filed against Palin last year after she quit her governorship midterm amid mounting political controversies in Alaska. Furthermore, the Alaska Fund Trust (set up to pay for Palin's mounting legal bills -- and not to be confused with SarahPAC, with which she spends money on her political allies and sycophants) remains "frozen" following a "preliminary finding" in July of 2009 in which independent Alaska Personnel Board investigator Thomas Daniel contended that "there is probable cause to believe that Governor Palin used, or attempted to use, her official position for personal gain" in establishing the fund.

At least six months after Palin quit her position, solicitations on the AFT website still referenced "current Governor Sarah Palin." It was palpably dishonest.

Those are details, of course, that Palin and Van Flein would rather not make public, particularly to the masses outside of Alaska who follow Palin on Facebook as she shamelessly promotes herself towards a run for the presidency in 2012. They also diminish the Palin "brand" as marketed in every medium imaginable since her self-serving resignation nine months ago. (In Alaska, she is still widely referred to as a "grifter.")

Alaska political watchdog Andree McLeod -- the longtime Anchorage-based Republican who has filed five of the claims against Palin, including the one to which Van Flein referenced -- has called the Van Flein-Palin post "deception filled with contempt, lies and derision."

Sarah Palin's score-keeping of ethics complaints disappoints. It shows she doesn't get it. As governor, she breached the public's trust by consistently putting her interests above the state's interests, and feathering her nest.

In what has been an ongoing culture of political corruption in Alaska -- one remarkably lacking both transparency and accountability -- Van Flein acknowledges that there have now been 27 Ethics Act complaints lodged against Palin and one legislative investigation.

The findings have castigated Palin's behavior during her brief term in office far more significantly than Van Flein's scorecard would have us believe:

• McLeod's first ethics complaint brought against Palin -- long before she was chosen to be John McCain's nominee -- was directed at the governor's office for the inappropriate hiring of a Palin supporter for a classified position. It resulted in the finding that a key member of Palin's staff, Frank Bailey, get "training and counseling" on the Alaska Personnel Act to "prevent the potential for future violations of the act."

• McLeod's initial Records Act request -- also made long before she was named as McCain's running mate--revealed that Palin and several members of her administration were conducting state business on private email systems -- a rogue government communications network with Palin at the helm. The requests further exposed the fact that Palin was using state funds for her family travels and collected a per diem for living at her home in Wasilla.

• Palin has also had to repay the state for travel expenses and to pay back income taxes on thousands of dollars in expense money she received while living at her Wasilla home.

• Perhaps most troubling of all Van Flein's comments is his derogatory reference to the "Troopergate fiasco"--which, once again, was initiated well before Palin's nomination. In the investigation conducted by the bi-partisan Alaska Legislative Council, former Republican prosecutor Steve Branchflower found "that Governor Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act."

• Even the Petumenos Report, processed by the Alaska Personnel Board and which exonerated Palin for abuse of power, came to the often overlooked conclusion:

A cautionary note must be made with respect to the investigation conducted. Efforts to locate and secure all relevant e-mails have been exceedingly difficult in this case...We are concerned about the use by the Governor and some of her staff of private e-mail accounts for government business. In particular, the Governor and Frank Bailey conducted government business on private accounts...The Governor...deleted e-mails without consulting [document retention schedules].

26-0-1? Really? Who are they trying to fool?

Moreover, the investigative process in all of these Ethics Act complaints has been decidedly stacked in Palin's favor. In the case of the McLeod's Fund Trust complaint, the decision was rendered by the Department of Law which is overseen by Attorney General Dan Sullivan. While Sullivan formally recused himself from this investigation, it was conducted by a DOL associate whom he supervises. (Nonetheless, the dismissal letter was inexplicably issued under Sullivan's name.)

The three-member Personnel Board which has overseen the other ethics act complaints is also shamefully partisan. The three members sit at the pleasure of the governor for six-year terms, meaning that current board members have all been appointed by a succession of Republican governors (including Palin). And while the board was intended by statute to be bipartisan, there's not a Democrat in the bunch. The board is bubbling with biases and hidden agendas. (The most recent appointment by Governor Sean Parnell is a member of the Republican National Committee.)

Nonetheless, Palin and Van Flein continue to cast Palin as a victim of a sinister "partisan" conspiracy directed by Obama's White House against her. It's a sad joke that reveals the Palin camp's cultish paranoia. Everyone in Alaska knows that the vast majority of these complaints have been filed by McLeod and an assorted group of Republican and Independent activists from the conservative Alaska railbelt (not from the more liberal Southeast panhandle). Indeed, Alaska Democrats, with rare exception, have kept an arm's length from McLeod & Co., a distancing I witnessed firsthand during a research excursion in Alaska last summer.

None of which has stopped Palin from attacking McLeod, with whom she once worked closely in Alaska politics as recently as 2002. In Going Rogue, Palin refers to McLeod repeatedly as the "falafel lady." It's an intended slur of ethnic derision, loaded with all of Palin's adolescent fury.

McLeod's not buying any of it.

Maligning my efforts for accountability doesn't reverse the eventuality that although Palin quit and threw her oath of office into Lake Lucille after desecrating the position and office of the governor of our state of Alaska, she has yet to amend for her abuses while in office. After all, there should be consequences for bad behavior.

Olbermann: Make Facebook group praying for Obama’s death ‘crap their pants’

By David Edwards and Muriel Kane

For the past week, a Facebook group dedicated to praying for President Obama's death has been arousing both condemnations and demands that it be taken down. Now MSNBC's Keith Olbermann has made the group one of his Worst Persons in the World.

"It has a million Facebook friends," Olbermann began. "It is filled with doctored photos of the president. And it is dedicated to what one of the lunatic fringe Bible-thumpers called 'imprecatory prayer' for President Obama to die."

After noting the complaints, which include a Facebook petition to have the page removed, Olbermann remarked, "I'd like to suggest a better idea. These people evidently believe imprecatory prayer works -- that you can pray another person to death. History would suggest otherwise."

"But if they believe it," he continued, smiling slyly, "what would their lives be like if they knew everybody else was making imprecatory prayers for God to kill them?"

"They'd crap their pants," Olbermann concluded with a wide grin. "And it wouldn't even work -- but keep your site, and the rest of us will, you know, keep you in our prayers

The Facebook page begins with a common email "joke," reading, "DEAR LORD, THIS YEAR YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE ACTOR, PATRICK SWAYZIE [sic]. YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE ACTRESS, FARAH FAWCETT. YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE SINGER, MICHAEL JACKSON. I JUST WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW, MY FAVORITE PRESIDENT IS BARACK OBAMA. AMEN."

The most offensive aspects of the page, however, are the racist images and the many approving comments, some saying things like "I will now pray more often and this will be my focus," and other merely crude and insulting.

Facebook has declined to take the page down, saying that although it "may be considered distasteful and objectionable to some," it doesn't violate their policies.

M.C.L Comment: This what gets me about these right wing douchebags for eight years they made the tamest criticism of George W.Bush into a federal offense, question the war you had Bin Laden hiding out in your basement, doubt tax cuts for the richest one percent of the coutry was the wisest thing to do during a war and you down right hated the troops but a group of right wing piss ants can make a facebook page praying for Obama's death is ok to those on the political right who claimed they're taking offense not because Bush is a republican but people should have respect for the president.

This video is from MSNBC's Countdown, broadcast April 29, 2010.

Palin's new anti-health care reform Facebook post is full of old falsehoods

On March 14, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin posted a new anti-health care reform essay on her Facebook page that contains numerous falsehoods regarding reconciliation, House rules, and "federal funding of abortion."

Palin rehashes falsehoods about the House vote, reconciliation, abortion funding

Palin: Democrats want to use reconciliation to "bypass the regular voting procedure." In a March 14 Facebook post, Palin accused Democrats of trying to "ram through their takeover of our health care system regardless of the consequences" and of being "determined to use the Senate reconciliation process as a parliamentary trick to bypass the regular voting procedure."

Palin: House Democrats are trying to pass health care "without actually voting on it." Palin also accused House Democrats of trying to pass the Senate health care bill without a vote. She said: "The latest twists and turns in the Obamacare drama seem almost surreal. One minute the Democrat [sic] leadership is trying to amend a bill before the president has even signed it into law, and the next minute they're trying to draft a new rule that will allow the House to 'deem' a bill passed without actually voting on it!"

Palin falsely suggests that the Senate bill provides "federal funding for abortion." Palin commended the "Republicans in Congress" and the "Democrats [who] are standing with them" for "holding the line" in opposing health care reform. Palin specifically cited Rep. Bart Stupak as an example of a Democrat who is "holding the line" by saying "he won't vote for the Senate bill if federal funding of abortion is included." Stupak has repeatedly falsely claimed that the Senate bill allows for federal funding of abortion, while the abortion amendment he sponsored in the House bill does not. Stupak has also falsely maintained that his amendment does not go beyond the Hyde Amendment, which currently prohibits the federal funding of abortion, except in cases of life endangerment, rape, or incest.

Fox Nation highlighted Palin's post. Fox Nation posted Palin's Facebook essay and highlighted it with the headline "Palin: 'This is the Final Push!'" From Fox Nation:

Reconciliation is already part of Senate voting procedure, and has been used to pass health care legislation

Reconciliation process is part of congressional budget process. The budget reconciliation process is defined by the U.S. House Committee on Rules as "part of the congressional budget process ... utilized when Congress issues directives to legislate policy changes in mandatory spending (entitlements) or revenue programs (tax laws) to achieve the goals in spending and revenue contemplated by the budget resolution."

Republicans repeatedly used reconciliation to pass Bush's agenda. Republicans used the budget reconciliation process to pass Bush's 2001 and 2003 tax cuts as well as the 2005 "Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act." The Senate also used the procedure to pass a bill containing a provision that would permit oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. (The final version of that bill signed by Bush did not contain the provision on drilling.)

Reconciliation has repeatedly been used to reform the health care system. On February 24, NPR noted that many "major changes to health care laws" have passed via reconciliation. These measures include COBRA, which allows laid-off workers to keep their insurance coverage, and the State Children's Health Insurance Program:

On NPR, Rosenbaum stated, "[T]he way in which virtually all of health reform ... has happened over the past 30 years has been the reconciliation process." During the February 24 broadcast of NPR's Morning Edition, health policy correspondent Julie Rovner quoted George Washington University professor Sara Rosenbaum saying: "In fact, the way in which virtually all of health reform, with very, very limited exceptions, has happened over the past 30 years has been the reconciliation process."

House would still need to vote on changes to Senate bill

Report: House would still have to vote on corrections to the Senate bill. Contrary to Palin's claim that the House would " 'deem' a bill passed without actually voting on it," CongressDaily reported (subscription required) that the rule would require that the "House approves a corrections bill that would make changes to the Senate version" for passage. From NationalJournal.com's CongressDaily:

House Rules Chairwoman Louise Slaughter is prepping to help usher the healthcare overhaul through the House and potentially avoid a direct vote on the Senate overhaul bill, the chairwoman said Tuesday.

Slaughter is weighing preparing a rule that would consider the Senate bill passed once the House approves a corrections bill that would make changes to the Senate version.

Senate bill prohibits health insurers from using federal subsidies to pay for abortion services restricted by Hyde

Senate bill prohibits issuers from using federal funds "for purposes of paying for" abortion. The Senate health care reform bill as passed states that if a "qualified health plan" offered under the health insurance exchange provides coverage of abortion services for which public funding is banned, "the issuer of the plan shall not use any amount attributable" to the subsidies created under the bill "for purposes of paying for such services."

Senate bill establishes a separate premium to segregate funds used to pay for abortions from federal funds. The Senate bill as passed further requires issuers to "collect from each enrollee" in plans that cover abortions a "separate payment" for "an amount equal to the actuarial value of the coverage of" abortion services. This value must be at least $1 per enrollee, per month. All such funds are deposited into a separate account used by the issuer to pay for abortion services; federal funds and the remaining premium payments are used to pay for all other services.

Current law allows for Medicaid to provide coverage for abortions restricted by Hyde by using similar fund segregation. According to a November 1, 2009, study by the Guttmacher Institute, 17 states provide coverage under Medicaid for "all or most medically necessary abortions," not just abortions in cases of life endangerment, rape, and incest. Those states "us[e] their own funds" -- not federal funds -- "to pay" for the procedures. Therefore, in 17 states, Medicaid, a federally subsidized health care program, covers abortions in circumstances in which federal money is prohibited from being spent on abortion.