(Texas Scorecard) – Newly released financial records report that the University of Texas at Austin funded a pro-abortion activist in 2021.
As previously reported, activist Rebecca Gomperts had sent an invoice to the university for work she had performed to assist Dr. Abigail Aiken—principal investigator for the pro-abortion Project SANA at the University of Texas at Austin—with an academic paper.
While the records used for the previous report contained an invoice, they did not contain records of whether payment was made. Texas Scorecard sent a follow-up open records request to UT-Austin for records related to this payment.
The university released those records on July 30. They include Gomperts’ contractor agreement with the university and detailed information about her wire transfer payment.
Gomperts entered into a three-year agreement with Project SANA in November 2018. As part of this agreement, Gomperts was expected to provide data to Aiken by November 2019.
For this data, Gomperts’ contractor agreement stated she would receive $6,000.
The agreement also outlined two additional pieces of work for Gomperts to perform for an additional $6,000. However, based on the two sets of records Texas Scorecard has examined, this second round of work does not appear to have been done.
Gomperts requested payment in the previously reported 2021 invoice.
UT-Austin authorized a payment to Gomperts, a resident of the Netherlands, of 4983.87 euros on May 7, 2021. The total amount in euros is based on that day’s exchange rate.
UT-Austin paid Gomperts 4983.71 euros by wire transfer on May 27, 2021. By that time, however, changes in the exchange rate meant that the amount paid in U.S. dollars had risen to $6,142.
Gomperts founded the group Aid Access, which sends abortion drugs through the mail. According to its website, the group has “facilitated over 200,000 online abortions to women in the USA since its start in 2018.”
Texas Right to Life has called the group an “illegal abortion cartel.”
Also affiliated with Aid Access, Dr. Margaret Carpenter of New Paltz, New York, is currently entangled in legal proceedings with Attorney General Ken Paxton due to her role in sending abortion drugs into Texas.
These discoveries come as state lawmakers are considering new restrictions on the interstate trafficking of abortion drugs.
Gov. Greg Abbott has placed “legislation further protecting unborn children and their mothers from the harm of abortion” on the call for the current special session of the Texas Legislature that started on July 21.