House Committee To Take Up Bill That Would Repeal Federal Law Aimed at Protecting Abortion Providers From Harassment, Violence

A key House committee this week will consider legislation to repeal a federal statute that provides enhanced protections for abortion providers and reproductive health care centers. The lead Republican sponsor of the bill says the Biden administration deployed the statute too zealously over the course of four years to prosecute opponents of abortion rights. The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act was signed by President Clinton in 1994, and created enhanced criminal penalties for those who blocked entrances to clinics, vandalized clinics, threatened abortion providers, and stalked doctors, patients, or escorts, among other things. The legislation — which passed Congress by wide bipartisan margins — was introduced in response to a rising number of both violent and nonviolent crimes committed against abortion clinics and providers in the 1970s and through the 1990s. Congressman Chip Roy, a Texas lawmaker who serves in the Freedom Caucus, says it’s time for the statute to be repealed. “Americans just spent the last four years being targeted by a weaponized justice system,” Mr. Roy said in a press release when he introduced his repeal legislation back in January. “The FACE Act was one of the primary weapons of abuse — being used to politically target, arrest, and jail pro-life Americans for speaking out and standing up for life.” “Now that we have a Republican trifecta in the House, Senate, and White House, Congress should move quickly to repeal this law and ensure that no future president can weaponize it against pro-lifers ever again. No more excuses, let’s get it done,” Mr. Roy said. The Judiciary Committee will debate his legislation to fully repeal the statute on Tuesday. If it passes, it will then be permitted to come to the floor after it clears a Rules Committee vote — a panel on which Mr. Roy also sits. While the FACE Act is mostly used to protect clinics and doctors who provide abortions, the law also protects clinicians who oppose abortion rights as well as churches. The vast majority of charges, however, have been levied against those who protest, obstruct, or threaten clinics that provide abortions. President Trump’s administration has already limited enforcement of the FACE Act. According to a memo sent four days after the president’s inauguration, Attorney General Bondi’s chief of staff directed prosecutors to enforce the FACE Act only if death, serious bodily harm, or serious vandalism are involved. At a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing in December, Mr. Roy spoke about the need to repeal the FACE Act because of the disparity in prosecutions of opponents and advocates of abortion rights. He said that closing the disparity in prosecutions is not enough. “The American people deserve to know that their rights will not be violated regardless of which administration is in power,” Mr. Roy said at the time. “It is long [past] time for Congress to adjust this weaponization legislatively.”Some Republicans, however, have called for law enforcement to use the FACE Act to prosecute those supporters of abortion rights who protest at crisis pregnancy centers, which are clinics that try to dissuade women from having abortions by providing services to expecting mothers. In 2022, Senator Tillis was the lead author of a letter — signed by four House Republicans from North Carolina — that urged their state’s attorney general to seek penalties for those attacking crisis pregnancy centers in accordance with the FACE Act. The letter was sent after a crisis pregnancy center in western North Carolina was vandalized. “This law empowers state attorneys general such as yourself with the authority to seek civil relief for conduct that violates the FACE Act,” the North Carolina Republicans wrote to their then-state attorney general, Josh Stein, who now serves as the state’s governor. “Considering the seriousness of these crimes, law enforcement cannot play favorites when it comes to pursuing justice.”In response to their letter, Mr. Stein wrote that any victims should contact local law enforcement. Ultimately, no one was arrested for the vandalism.

House Committee To Take Up Bill That Would Repeal Federal Law Aimed at Protecting Abortion Providers From Harassment, Violence

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