The final charge against pro-life activist David Daleiden has been dismissed and his case fully expunged, ending a nearly 11-year California prosecution that began after he recorded Planned Parenthood officials discussing selling body parts of aborted babies. The investigation was launched under then-Attorney General Kamala Harris, whose office chose to target Daleiden rather than examine the practices described in his undercover videos.
In 2015, Daleiden and reporter Sandra Merritt released hidden-camera footage showing Planned Parenthood officials and abortionist doctors discussing the procurement and sale of tissue from aborted babies. The videos ultimately led to the Senate Judiciary Committee calling on the Department of Justice to investigate Planned Parenthood Federation of America, but no charges were ever brought against the nation’s largest abortion provider.
Some of the most revealing material came from Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast in Houston, then described as one of the largest abortion facilities in the Western Hemisphere. The details of the footage explain why pro-abortion activists wanted it buried.
The videos captured senior personnel discussing how cervical dilation affects how much of the baby’s body can be removed intact, how many “passes” with forceps it might take, and techniques to avoid crossing into a partial-birth abortion (PBA). At one point, a physician said that if she feared the procedure was getting too close to that legal line, she might “hold the body at the cervix, and pull off a leg, or two, so it’s not PBA.”
The conversation also referred to an abortion procedure involving a minor in which the patient was non-cooperative, forcing the doctor to “just hurry it up” and making tissue procurement more difficult. The speakers contrasted that case with smoother procedures involving cooperative patients and good dilation, which one described as “just like one pass.”
The abortionists also discussed whether a baby had received digoxin – a poison used to kill babies in the womb – and whether the tissue remained usable, reinforcing the impression that aborted babies were being treated as commodities rather than as human beings.
Kamala Harris’s office met with Planned Parenthood staff before ordering a criminal investigation and a 2016 raid on Daleiden’s home following the release of the videos.
Even more shockingly, as emails shared by The Washington Times show, top Harris staffers worked directly with lawyers for Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California to draft AB 1671. That bill expanded criminal penalties for recording and distributing conversations with health care providers.
In other words, Planned Parenthood drafted legislation to criminally punish journalists like Daleiden for exposing its repulsive practices – and Kamala Harris was a willing participant in this scheme. The legislation was such an egregious attack on the First Amendment that The Los Angeles Times and other liberal media outlets opposed the bill in a rare public rebuke of Democrat officials in California.
Harris left office for the U.S. Senate in early 2017, but the case against Daleiden continued under her successor, Xavier Becerra, who filed 15 felony charges against Daleiden and Merritt.
Although 14 charges were initially dismissed, prosecutors refiled them and kept the case alive for years. It was a transparent attempt to ruin Daleiden financially and keep him in legal limbo for as long as possible, even though the state knew that it had no case. In 2019, Daleiden was ordered to pay more than $13 million in attorneys’ fees.
The prosecution finally ended in a settlement with no jail time, no fines, no probation, and no admission of wrongdoing. A San Francisco judge recently dismissed the final charge and fully expunged the case from Daleiden’s record.
This outcome is a significant victory for Daleiden, for the pro-life movement, and for the basic democratic principle that prosecutors should not use the law to punish their political opponents.
In a statement last year following the initial settlement, Daleiden described the case as “lawfare launched by Kamala Harris” and said its end was “a huge victory for [his] investigative reporting and for the public’s right to know the truth about Planned Parenthood’s sale of aborted baby body parts.”
California officials did not pursue any sort of accountability from Planned Parenthood.
Steve Cooley, the former Los Angeles County district attorney and a member of Daleiden’s defense team, called the prosecution “a blatant exercise of selective investigation and vindictive prosecution.”
The case also served as a preview of what many pro-lifers feared from a Harris presidency. Harris’s early involvement, including her office’s coordination on AB 1671, suggested a willingness to use state authority to shield abortion providers from scrutiny while weaponizing the legal system against pro-lifers.
Daleiden’s story is also yet another reminder of why President Donald Trump’s victory in 2024 was so significant for the pro-life movement. Early in his second term, Trump pardoned 23 pro-lifers who had been prosecuted under the Biden administration for peacefully protesting outside abortion clinics. Trump’s re-election helped prevent the kind of aggressive lawfare that Daleiden endured — and that many feared would only intensify under a Harris administration.
Daleiden’s vindication is the end of one man’s long legal battle, but it is far from the end of the battle against the abortion industry. The ghastly reality that Daleiden documented is still in place, and groups like Planned Parenthood are still determined to target and harass anyone who threatens to expose them.
But so long as there are those willing to defend the defenseless and speak up for the voiceless – and political leaders with the courage to stand up for them – there is hope.
Sarah Katherine Sisk is a proud Hillsdale College alumna and a master’s student in economics at George Mason University. You can follow her on X @SKSisk76.
