On Wednesday, the House Judiciary's Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government held a hearing on "Revisiting the Implications of the FACE Act."
The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act criminalizes the obstruction of entrances to reproductive health clinics. It was originally written to protect both abortion clinics and pro-life centers that provide pregnancy services. Howevet the law has been weaponized to target pro-life advocates under the Biden administration.
The subcommittee hearing examined the Biden-Harris Department of Justice's unequal application of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. This is an aspect of partisan justice that I recently wrote about:
The Biden administration has indicted at least 37 individuals on charges under the Freedom of Access to Clinics (FACE) Act. In just over three years, the Biden Department of Justice (DOJ) has accounted for more than a quarter of all FACE Act charges in the law's 30-year history. Notably, this includes the frequent use of a novel sentence enhancement, signaling a weaponization in the application of this law under the current administration.
Pro-life activist Paul Vaughn, the president of Personhood Tennessee tested before the committee about his experience as a defendant changed by Biden's DOJ under the FACE Act.
Vaughn detailed the terrifying events of October 5, 2022 when his home was raided by the FBI for peacefully protesting an abortion facility:
My wife and children were terrorized, and I was kidnapped at gunpoint by four armed men. I had just sent three of my children to the car so I could take them to school when the house began to shake from loud banging near the front door. I heard men shouting on my porch, 'Open up, FBI.' The banging continued. As I looked out a side window to check the location of my children, I saw two unmarked SUVs with lights flashing, but I did not see my children.
The banging continued, and I heard more shouting. They opened the curtains on the front door to find three men with guns trained on the door. I asked who they were looking for, and they replied, 'We're here for you.' They did not identify me or provide identification for themselves. As I believed there was an imminent threat to the safety of my wife and seven children who were home that day, I determined to surrender myself to them, hoping that they were legitimate law enforcement.
They opened the door and stepped out onto the porch, staring down the barrels of both a pistol and an automatic weapon pointed at my head.
Pro-life advocate Paul Vaughn opened his front door to find 3 FBI agents with guns trained on him.
— House Judiciary GOP 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 (@JudiciaryGOP) December 18, 2024
He was arrested without a warrant for his efforts to protect the sanctity of life.
WATCH him recount his story of being victimized by Joe Biden's weaponized DOJ. pic.twitter.com/Rdur8G5jeJ
READ MORE:
Trump Should Pardon These Pro-Lifers and Repeal the FACE Act
Vaughn, a Chrstian father of eleven children, testified that three of his children were detained and that he was never presented with identification from law enforcement, nor a warrant:
As I did, I asked what authority they were operating under and if they had any identification. I later learned that, at the same time, three of my children, ages 12, 14, and 18, were being detained in the sideyard on the edge of the woods by a fourth armed man. I was taken without the presentation of a warrant or identification when requested.
Make no mistake, this was an armed conflict, and I was unarmed. Lethal force was abused to abridge my God-given and constitutionally secured rights. At the moment of being placed in handcuffs, I became a slave to ideological tyrants—either the ones holding the weapons or the ones they obeyed.
He described the event in the indictment, a sit-in by activists charged alongside Vaughn:
The event that brought this ill-fated drama to my front door took place 18 months prior, as has been noted. Pro-life Christians gathered at an abortion clinic in Mount Juliet to attempt to save unborn children that were scheduled to die that morning.
Of the people who attended that day, eight adults were arrested for non-violently sitting at the abortion clinic doors. We were doing a sit-in, like many of you have seen right here in your own buildings, with Antifa, BLM, or Hamas.
I wonder how many of those have faced 10 years in prison for those activities. But the fact remains that I did not do any of these things. I did nothing that was outside of constitutionally protected free speech and religious freedom.
I did nothing that day that I have not done many times since FACE was passed in 1994. I did not sit in, I broke no laws, federal or local, and I was not arrested the day of the event.
But yes, Member Scanlon, I did pray that day. I had talked with the police chief and lead negotiating team. I helped the police and the pro-lifers by messaging back and forth. Police folks praised the peaceful nature of the event on the evening news. The lead negotiator testified for us in our federal trial.
Vaughn addressed the unspoken instances of violence surrounding the issue of abortion, telling the committee that the FACE Act codified this violence and gave it "the cover of law,":
There's a lot of talk about violence around the issue of abortion. Of course, all people of honor and character denounce acts of violence on either side of this issue. But the narrative has been projected against pro-life people and fails to take into account at least three other aspects of violence around this issue.
There is violence committed against every unborn child and every abortion. There is violence committed by aggravated fathers or other family members of aborted children. And there is violence being done to pro-lifers by our own government.
Any serious conversation about violence going forward needs to include these three facts. The FACE Act was ostensibly passed because of violence. But as my family knows very well, all it did was give violence the cover of law and place it in the hands of the government.
Vaughn reflected on the legal process he was dragged through while highlighting others that are currently incarcerated after being charged under the FACE Act:
The phrase 'the process is the punishment' and the weaponization of the FACE Act are not just words in our household. We are living the reality of those words. Since my arrest, I've been restricted to the middle district of Tennessee for over two years under the control and supervision of the federal government.
My family spent 20 months with the potential of a decade in prison hanging over the head of their lead provider—my head. We endured long, stressful days of the actual trial and lies and half-truths for the sake of the government winning a case with no regard for actually seeking justice.
The process is punishment. Government agents invaded and inspected our home, calling it to make sure I was obeying the rules. It involved giving up my rights as a U.S. citizen in spite of the novel use of the 1800 conspiracy law, as the appeal court refused to stay the order pending the appeal to determine if this is a legal right or application of the law.
All this process is a punishment, and I was the one who did not get jail time. There are those who are in jail today while we are discussing this abuse. Some of them for over a year at this point, with the overturning of Roe and the long train of abuse and the unequal application of the FACE Act.
Here are the 12 pro-life activists currently imprisoned under the FACE Act:
- Bevelyn Williams - Age 35; Sentence: 41 months
- Jean Marshall - Age 74; Sentence: 24 months
- Heather Idoni - Age 59; Sentence: 24 months
- Lauren Handy - Age 30; Sentence: 57 months
- Jonathan Darnel - Age 34; Sentence: 34 months
- William Goodman - Age 54; Sentence: 27 months
- John Hinshaw - Age 69; Sentence: 21 months
- Joan Bell - Age 76; Sentence: 27 months
- Herb Geraghty - Age 27; Sentence: 27 months
- Calvin Zastrow - Age 74; Sentence: 6 months
- Steven Lefemine - Age 68; Sentence: 60 days
- Paulette Harlow - Age 75; Sentence: 24 months
Vaughn told the committeemembers that FACE Act should be repealed, saying:
There is no legitimate reason for it to remain on the books. It is a tool whose sole purpose is to stifle free speech and abuse the rights of Christian conservatives. There is nothing that the FACE Act does that is not already accomplished by state laws across the land.
If abortion is returned to the States, so should the laws governing it.
I concluded the same, writing earlier this month:
The repeal of the FACE Act is equally imperative. This law has no place in a society that values free speech, assembly, and the right to protest without fear of reprisal. It's an outdated piece of legislation that no longer serves its intended purpose in a post-Roe v. Wade America, where states are reclaiming their authority over abortion laws. Its repeal would restore balance, ensuring that the application of the law does not target peaceful and religious activists.
While Vaughn and others have been victimized by a system of injustice, hope is on the horizon. Speaking to RedState ahead of her prison sentence, anti-BLM and pro-life activist Bevelyn Beatty Williams, who was convicted under the FACE Act this year, said, "Trump said that there is a persecution of Christians, and that the first thing he’s going to do is be there for Christians. So, yeah, I expect him to be there for Christians."
