Sam Brownback: “On S. 5, the central issue is, will we sanction the destruction of nascent human life with Federal taxpayer dollars?…”

“On S. 5, the central issue is, will we sanction the destruction of nascent human life with Federal taxpayer dollars? There is currently no prohibition against embryonic stem cell research in this country. Any private group in Illinois or Kansas or Pennsylvania that wants to develop an embryonic stem cell line can do so. There is no prohibition. The question is, will we use Federal taxpayer dollars to destroy human life to develop additional stem cell lines? That is what S. 5 is about. The second point is, if we want to talk about cures, which I believe that is what the debate should be centered on, is it appropriate to divert taxpayer dollars from adult stem cell research, from cord blood research, from placental research, from amniotic fluid research into these areas of highly speculative embryonic stem cell research that has not produced results to date and is unlikely to produce results in the near future, if at all. If it does produce results, it is going to lead us toward human cloning, because we are not going to have a genetic match on the embryonic stem cell line.”