A pro-life activist alleges Vice President Kamala Harris is playing politics with the law, weaponizing his undercover work exposing the abortion industry in California, the New York Post reports.
David Daleiden, who has been ensnared in a close to decadelong legal battle with Harris, claims the California Attorney General's office was used by the now-presidential candidate, to do her political bidding.
Daleiden was responsible for a series of undercover videos in 2015 that showed Planned Parenthood executives discussing selling fetal tissue.
California requires two-party consent for filming, and Daleiden now faces eight felony charges and possible jail time for creating the videos without permission.
Harris was the California attorney general from 2011 to 2017 — a position that Daleiden's attorneys allege was used to prop up Planned Parenthood in exchange for being a major donor to her campaign for office.
Daleiden's attorneys say the book is being thrown at him, as this is one of the first times the Attorney General's office has prosecuted someone solely for video-recording without consent.
Attorney Steve Cooley, Los Angeles's second-longest serving district attorney, is representing Daleiden and said what Harris did to his client was both unconstitutional and vindictive.
"It was a selective prosecution for huge donors. Kamala Harris opened this investigation at the behest of Planned Parenthood and the two AGs that followed her have kept it alive," Cooley told the Post.
After originally releasing the videos, Daleiden's apartment was raided by 11 armed state Department of Justice agents and K-9 dogs — a move that was authorized by Harris, who was running for Senate in 2016 and who was endorsed by Planned Parenthood. After she was elected, Harris hired Lily Adams, the daughter of Cecile Richards, CEO of Planned Parenthood, as a top aide.
Politico referred to Daleiden as the individual who "almost single-handedly ... reshaped the national conversation on abortion."
His videos became a national story after they showed Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Planned Parenthood's senior director of medical services, encouraging practitioners to retrieve fetal organs — including hearts, lungs, and livers — intact, rather than crushing them during the procedure.
Daleiden was charged with 15 felonies in 2017 as a result of his undercover work.
Two years later, the state reduced the charges, but not before the Los Angeles Times editorial board penned an editorial calling the charges a "disturbing overreach" by the Attorney General's office – helmed by Harris.
While Daleiden still awaits trial nine years later, his efforts remain impactful as more undercover footage has emerged after it was subpoenaed by Congress.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., showed some of the previously unseen footage on her website, calling it "the black market of baby organ harvesting."
One of the newly released videos features Dr. Stacy De-Lin, medical director for abortion services for Planned Parenthood New York City, appearing to confirm her employer would sell the livers of aborted fetuses.