WASHINGTON Republicans in a US House hearing expressed frustration with the Justice Department this week over what they argued is the lack of enforcement of a Clinton-era law protecting access to reproductive health care in anti-abortion pregnancy centers and abortion clinics.
GOP lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee have expressed anger at the Federal Bureau of Investigation and US attorneys for not bringing more charges against people who vandalize, graffiti or burn anti-abortion facilities, often known as crisis pregnancy centers.
Democrats on the GOP-controlled subcommittee that held the hearing argued that health clinics providing abortion services face the greatest danger and that US lawmakers should condemn the acts of violence whether or not they target anti-pregnancy centers. -abortion or abortion facilities.
Violence, threats and intimidation tactics should have no place in our political discourse, including in our nations’ ongoing debate about abortion access, said Pennsylvania Democrat Mary Gay Scanlon, a senior juror .
We must condemn all political violence and threats of violence, whatever the beliefs or motivations of those who engage in it and regardless of who the targets may be, he added.
Scanlon chastised his GOP colleagues during the hearing for focusing their questions and inviting witnesses based on their belief that the Biden administration isn’t doing everything it can to prosecute people who attack anti-abortion pregnancy centers under a federal law known as the FACE Act.
By calling a hearing that inflames grievances and amplifies misinformation about the prevalence of violence against anti-abortion forces, this hearing fails to advance our congressional duty to protect and preserve our democracy, Scanlon said.
law of 1994
The FACE Act, which stands for Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances, was enacted in 1994 and made it a federal crime to injure, intimidate, or interfere with someone seeking access to reproductive health care services or someone performing care services reproductive health.
Damaging or destroying a facility because it provides reproductive health care services, including abortion, has also become a federal crime.
THE law it defined reproductive healthcare services broadly meaning that today it protects abortion clinics, anti-abortion pregnancy centers and regular doctors offices where patients seek any form of reproductive healthcare.
The FACE Act passed Congress with bipartisan support and was signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton. While protecting access to all types of reproductive health care services, the bill was introduced following a surge in violence against abortion clinics and the murders of abortion providers in Florida and Kansas in 1993 .
The Department of Justice details the recent violence against reproductive health care centersincluding violations of the FACE Act, on its website, although it does not distinguish between crimes against abortion clinics and anti-abortion pregnancy centers there.
Talcott Camp, chief legal and strategy officer at the National Abortion Federation, the professional association of abortion providers, testified during the hearing that undoubtedly the vast majority of crimes are committed against reproductive health clinics that provide abortions.
National federations for abortion latest report on crimes committed against reproductive health care facilities in 2022 finds that violence and disruption against abortion clinics has sharply increased in states that retained legal access, following last summer’s Supreme Court decision to overturn the constitutional right to abortion.
From 2021 to 2022, death threats or threats of harm increased from 182 to 218, stalkings increased from 28 to 92, burglaries increased 231%, and four clinics suffered from arson, he testified.
Since 1977 there have been 11 homicides, 26 attempted murders, 42 bomb attacks, 200 arson attacks, 531 assaults, 492 clinic invasions, 375 burglaries and thousands of other criminal incidents targeting patients, staff and volunteers who have miscarried, Camp said.
New York Democrat Jerry Nadler asked Camp whether people living in states where access to abortion has been protected should be concerned that violence, threats and intimidation against abortion providers could actually ban abortion in their state, regardless of what their state law provides.
Camp testified that the Supreme Court’s ruling to end national protection for abortion encouraged anti-abortion extremists to specifically go to clinics in states that protect abortion rights.
During 2022, she testified, stalkings increased by 230% overall, but increased by 900% in states that protected abortion rights.
Republicans focus on pregnancy centers
Louisiana Republican Representative Mike Johnsonchair of the Judiciary Committees Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government, which held the hearing, said the Justice Department should prosecute more people for crimes against anti-abortion pregnancy centers.
Women seeking these services should be able to, of course, without facing any danger, Johnson said.
Since the Supreme Court decision to end the fundamental right to abortion was reported by Politico in May 2022 following a draft opinion leak, Johnson said, there have been more than 100 attacks on abortion centers. pregnancy and churches in crisis, also protected by the FACE law.
Johnson didn’t offer a breakdown of those numbers, or whether local or state law enforcement had filed suit in the cases. But the Catholic news agency tracker she says 63 were against pregnancy centers.
Johnson said the incidents included vandalism, graffiti, arson and online harassment, including one case in Florida where the Justice Department guaranteed indictments against four people for spray painting threats.
Johnson said it wasn’t enough, calling it a drop in the bucket.
Mark Houck, an abortion advocate who was charged by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in a violation of the FACE Act for pushing a 72-year-old clinic voluntary escort but pleaded not guiltyhe testified that he believes he was being persecuted.
Houck testified that he did not want the volunteer, who helps patients enter the building safely, by standing near or talking to his 12-year-old son, whom Houck brought with him to the Philadelphia abortion clinic.
That morning, Houck testified, he followed women leaving the clinic across the street offering them literature.
At that moment, an escort in the building decided to run over, hinder my progress and get in my way as I ministered and spoke to women who had left Planned Parenthood, Houck said.
After I got back to standing outside the health clinic, Houck testified, the clinic’s volunteer escort was right next to my 12-year-old boy, who was a little intimidated and scared by it.
He starts talking to my son and nagging my son and starts telling my son how evil his father is and how his father doesn’t want to help women, Houck said, adding that he then asked the clinic volunteer to go back to where he normally stays. .
Houck said he then escorted the volunteer to another area in front of the clinic.
I turned to face my son and went back to praying. He turned around and started harassing my son again, Houck testified. At that point, I became a dad on the street worried about my son. I pushed the man. He fell.
Houck and several Republican lawmakers on the subcommittee lambasted law enforcement for arresting Houck at his home, in front of his family, while they held guns.
Houck said he believes they arrested him at his home, instead of allowing him to turn himself in, humiliate me, scare my children, and instill fear in pro-life America.
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