Cookie Cott 2014: Pro-Life Groups Boycott Girl Scout Cookies Over Abortion Ties

By Katherine Weber, Christian Post Reporter Friday, January 31, 2014

National pro-life groups have banded together to boycott Girl Scout cookies this year due to the youth organization's ties with pro-abortion advocates and groups, including Texas Sen. Wendy Davis (D-Fort Worth), HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Planned Parenthood.

The groups have united to form Cookie Cott 2014, which encourages all those who support pro-life to distribute flyers at locations where Girl Scout cookies are sold, detailing why they are boycotting Girl Scout cookies this year. The Cookie Cott website reads that it is boycotting the well-known treats because the youth organization's "national leadership continues to show its attachment to pro-abortion leaders and organizations."

As Breitbart reports, the boycott on the cookies was first started in 2004 by the Texas-based group Pro-Life Waco after the local Bluebonnet Girl Scout Council joined forces with Planned Parenthood to co-sponsor a teen sex education program called Nobody's Fool. The local pro-life group decided to reinstate its boycott this year due to the youth organization's ongoing connection with pro-abortion groups, and national pro-life groups have now joined the Cookie Cott cause. These groups, as Breitbart notes, include the American Life League, the Radiance Foundation, Pro-Life Waco, the Pro-Life Action League, LifeNews, Operation Rescue, the National Black Pro-Life Union, pro-life blogger Jill Stanek, Life Coalition International and Issues4Life Foundation.

The groups note on the Cookie Cott website their reasons for boycotting Girl Scout cookies. First, the groups point to an incident in 2013 when the Girl Scouts organization tweeted a Huffington Post article recommending Texas Sen. Wendy Davis (D-Fort Worth), among others, as a possible candidate for the media outlet's "Woman of 2013." Davis made national headlines in 2013 for filibustering a state bill that would have ended late-term abortions by banning the procedure at 20 weeks of pregnancy.

Additionally, those behind the boycott argue that Girl Scouts has also supported HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who appeared alongside other influential woman in a separate article posted on the Girl Scouts' Facebook page. The youth organization described Sebelius on its Facebook page as a woman of "with courage, confidence, and character." Sebelius has been criticized by pro-life groups for her staunch pro-abortion political record.

As LifeSite News points out, pro-life activists have also questioned the youth organization's connection to Planned Parenthood after a national survey taken in 2004 found 17 troops nationwide partner with Planned Parenthood to teach teens about sex education.

The Pro-Life Waco group notes on its website that it also chose to boycott the youth organization in 2004 because in 2003 the Bluebonnet Girl Scout Council named the CEO of the local Planned Parenthood Waco clinic as a "Woman of Distinction," encouraging young members of the Girl Scout troop to look up to her as a role model.

"I am offended that the Girl Scouts honor pro-abortion activists like Wendy Davis and Kathleen Sebelius and hold them up as leaders to be emulated by our young women and girls," John Pisciotta, director of Pro-Life Waco, who is spearheading the effort, said in a statement about his Cookie Cott campaign.

"The Girl Scouts were once a trusted organization dedicated to character building in young girls and women. Now, GSUSA is abusing that trust," Judie Brown, president of American Life League, another group participating in the Cookie Cott, said in a statement. "Most parents and grandparents remain painfully unaware that GSUSA has introduced so-called 'family planning' ideology in its curriculum and promotes groups like Planned Parenthood to our daughters and granddaughters."

The groups behind the 2014 Cookie Cott list all of their reasons for boycotting here. The boycott encourages all pro-life activists to print out a copy of a Cookie Cott flyer, which lists Girl Scouts' connection to pro-abortion groups and people, and distribute them to adults at cookie sales.