As tensions over abortion reach a fever pitch in the post-Roe v. Wade era, concerns are mounting over allegations the Biden administration is weaponizing the Department of Justice against pro-life activists.
Since the U.S. Supreme Court turned abortion back to the states in 2022, Americans are increasingly hearing more about a federal law that protects clinics.
“The FACE Act stands for Freedom of Access to Clinics to Clinic Entrances Act,” Eireann Van Natta, a reporter with The Daily Caller,” recently told CBN News. “It was instituted in 1994, under the Clinton administration. And, if you go to the DOJ’s website, its stated purpose is to protect access to reproductive health, which is a euphemism for abortion.”
The law protects churches and clinics — including pro-life pregnancy centers — although critics clearly see its enforcement as one-sided.
“What pro-lifers and conservatives have long claimed is that, actually, this act is really just a cudgel that’s being used to target pro-life activists,” Van Natta said. “And, for the longest time, we didn’t have the data to really substantiate that — and now we do.”
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Attorney Erin Hawley, with Alliance Defending Freedom, calls this new data, unearthed at the Justice Department, troubling.
“After the fall of Roe, there’s no question that FACE Act prosecutions, FACE Act investigations, have ramped up exponentially,” Hawley said. “In 2022, alone, there were over 20 prosecutions of pro-life individuals.”
At the same time, records show a different approach toward dozens of arson cases at various churches and pregnancy centers.
“We see very few prosecutions at those sorts of individuals who are targeting pro-life facilities,” Hawley said. “Rather, the vast majority of them are targeting pro-life individuals who are protesting or praying at abortion centers.”
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Van Natta said DOJ data on FACE Act violations between 1994 and 2024 is jarring.
“There are approximately 211 cases,” she said. “And around 97% of those cases were targeted at pro-life or anti-abortion activists.”
She also pointed to a specific increase in prosecutions under the Biden administration.
“Biden’s DOJ is responsible for over a quarter of all FACE Act prosecutions in the law’s 30-year history, which is pretty significant,” Van Natta said. “And he’s also responsible for about 24% of the cases targeting pro-life activists.”
Martin Cannon of the Thomas More Society sees the same pattern.
“What has changed is the frequency of the prosecutions and also a tactic that the DOJ uses,” Cannon said. “Let’s talk about frequency first. I’ve been doing this for 35 years. I’ve handled a couple of face cases over the years and, you know, maybe two [in] over 30 years.”
He continued, “I’ve done about four in the last five years or so. The Biden administration literally pulled out all the stops.”
When reached by CBN News, the Justice Department did not respond to specific questions about the data.
“To think about just one individual, Lauren Handy, I believe her sentence was 57 months,” Hawley said. “That’s over four years, plus three years of supervised release. That’s an awful long time for a nonviolent … sort of protest.”
Cannon represents Handy and argues she didn’t even violate the FACE Act.
“She went into the clinic with her nine cohorts,” he said. “Two, maybe three of them, blocked doors — very peacefully, but blocked doors. The other seven or eight simply sat in chairs, singing, praying, handing out some pamphlets and things. There is no decent argument to be made that this was a FACE violation.”
These attorneys and others see a troubling pattern of heavy handedness that’s resulted in what they said is unfair sentencing.
“Now, under Biden’s DOJ, you have elderly women … who are being sentenced to two years in prison for peacefully praying in an abortion clinic, not making violent threats, certainly not making bomb threats,” Van Natta said. “So, the sentencing is wildly disproportionate.”
The Thomas More Society is appealing Handy’s case and seeking to challenge the constitutionality of the FACE Act. We’ll continue to cover the story as it unfolds.
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