Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Top pro-abortion group NARAL is honoring a late-term abortion practitioner who has put women's health at risk with its 2009 Hero award after its members voted for him for the honor. The award vote gave its members chance to vote on their favorite abortion advocate and the pro-life advocate they despised most.Carhart is the Omaha, Nebraska-based abortion practitioner who has attempted to step into the shoes of late-term abortion practitioner George Tiller of Kansas, who was shot and killed earlier this year.
NARAL announced the award this afternoon and said the pro-abortion activists were "united" in their choice of Carhart.
"All those nominated to the Hall of Fame are pro-choice champions, but one person rose to the top. We are honored to announce that the 2009 Hall of Fame designation goes to Dr. LeRoy Carhart," NARAL said.
"Even in the face of continued harassment and threats, Dr. LeRoy Carhart, an abortion provider in Nebraska, isn't giving up. While Operation Rescue and other anti-choice groups have increased their protests outside his health center, Dr. Carhart perseveres. We salute Dr. Carhart's steadfast commitment to women's health," the extreme pro-abortion activist group added.
Carhart beat other pro-abortion stalwarts like MSNBC talk show host Rachel Maddow and the Baltimore City Council, which recently passed a measure targeting pregnancy centers.
Troy Newman, the president of Operation Rescue, talked with LifeNews.com after NARAL announced the winner.
He NARAL had to do some serious "spin doctoring" to find anything but shame in Carhart's seedy abortion operation, which is currently under investigation by state officials.
"Carhart is under investigation by the attorney general for multiple criminal allegations, additionally the Dept. of Health and Human Services is reviewing whether they ought to revoke his medical license, so NARAL giving Carhart an award is like the Mob giving Al Capone the mobster of the year award," Newman said.
"It is hard to believe that even radical abortion proponents would do anything but slink away in shame from Carhart and his disreputable and shoddy abortion business," the group's president, Troy Newman, told LifeNews.com last month.
"It is shameful that NARAL would endanger women by misleading them about Carhart to advance their political agenda. If they truly cared about women, they should be warning women away from him," he added.
Events generated by Operation Rescue's campaign prompted several of Carhart's own employees to come forward to tell of illegal practices and dangerous conditions at Carhart's abortion center in the Bellevue suburb.
Newman says NARAL forgot to mention to its members how Carhart was caught by pro-lifers illegally operating his abortion clinic on a generator and extension cord after a fire caused by his own slovenly storage practices gutted the garage portion of his run-down abortion building.
It did not indicate how Wesley Medical Center in Wichita, Kansas said it would not extend hospital privileges or a transfer agreement to Carhart should he attempt to reopen a late-term abortion center in that city.
Nor did NARAL inform its membership how Carhart was responsible for most of the frequent abortion injuries that required emergency hospitalization in Kansas, including the third-trimester abortion death of 19-year old Christin Gilbert.
On the other side, NARAL activists thought Bart Stupak and Ben Nelson deserved the 2009 Hall of Shame award for trying to stop taxpayer funding of abortions.
Ironically, Nelson has come under fire from pro-life advocates for eventually compromising his position and backing the Senate bill and its abortion funding, but Stupak has stood his ground against Nelson's compromise.
"These anti-choice lawmakers led the charge in using health-reform legislation to attack choice. Their amendments, aimed at derailing the health-reform process, would make it virtually impossible" for insurance plans to pay for abortions, NARAL claimed.
However, Nelson backed the Senate health care bill, which includes the Mikulski amendment that could allow the Obama administration to force insurance companies to cover abortions.