Nancy Pelosi Confronted by Reporter on Abortion Views

— -- House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi defended her position on abortion Thursday, responding forcefully to a confrontational question about whether a fetus is a human being at her weekly news conference.

"Leader Pelosi, in reference to funding of Planned Parenthood, is an unborn baby with a human heart and a human liver a human being?" asked the reporter, who did not identify himself.

"I am a devout, practicing Catholic," Pelosi replied. "A mother of five children. When my baby was born, my fifth child, my oldest child was six years old.

"I think I know more about this subject than you, with all due respect," she continued. "I do not intend to respond to your question which has no basis in what public policy we do here."

Congress passed a spending bill yesterday to keep the government open through Dec. 11, averting a shutdown. A majority of Republicans in the House voted against the measure, over objections to funding Planned Parenthood.