‘I knew that threats would increase': Clashes over abortion clinic safety intensify after Trump's pardons

Yahoo

19-03-2025

Abortion rights supporters across the country are scrambling to strengthen protections for clinics in response to moves by the Trump administration that they believe will put providers and patients in danger.
Democratic lawmakers have introduced bills in Illinois, Michigan, New York and elsewhere to restrict demonstrations outside of clinics, increase criminal penalties for people who harass doctors and patients, or allocate more funds for abortion providers to buy security cameras, bulletproof glass and other protections.
In recent weeks, a handful of Democratic governors have held phone calls to debate whether to push for new laws or ramp up enforcement of existing ones. And some Democratic attorneys general are visiting abortion clinics to hear their workers' fears and requests, and training law enforcement on how to respond when demonstrators break the law.
The moves come in response to President Donald Trump pardoning abortion protesters convicted of federal crimes and reducing enforcement of a decades-old law that prohibits interference with anyone seeking reproductive health services.
'Even though the federal administration is backing away from an important duty and obligation to enforce the law and protect access, we'll step in to that breach,' California Attorney General Rob Bonta told POLITICO. 'We will take up the mantle of safety and access that they are abandoning.'
The anti-abortion movement is ramping up as well. Activists are discussing which clinic protest tactics to deploy in the coming months and training the next generation on what they call 'rescues' — entering clinics by stealth or by force in order to shut down operations. The movement's legal arm is also working to eliminate state and city protections for clinics, and they're often winning.
Carbondale, Illinois, Westchester, New York and Minneapolis have all rolled back laws restricting protests outside abortion clinics after challenges from the Thomas More Society — the conservative legal powerhouse that successfully lobbied Trump to pardon nearly two dozen people who violated the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.
And while the Supreme Court recently declined to hear two more of the group's lawsuits challenging clinic protections in Illinois and New Jersey, it has several cases in the pipeline and believes it can eventually convince the high court to rule that activists have an unrestrained right to stand in front of clinic doors, hold up signs, and tell patients and doctors that the procedure is akin to murder.
'We do feel like we are, to some extent, playing Whack-a-Mole,' Peter Breen, the head of litigation for the Thomas More Society, said. 'But we're going to play Whack-a-Mole until we get a result.'
The Trump administration's pledge to only enforce the federal FACE Act in 'extraordinary circumstances' has, like the fall of Roe, created a national patchwork of laws protecting abortion providers and patients seeking care. In a March letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, 72 House Democrats demanded answers by the end of the month on exactly what the Department of Justice considers an 'extraordinary circumstance' and whether she will rescind what they see as a 'potentially illegal directive.' They have not received a response.
In the meantime, abortion-rights advocates warn the erosion of federal protections will leave clinics vulnerable in Missouri, Montana and other states where courts have ruled that abortion is legal but Republicans control all levers of power. And even in states where Democrats hold key offices, advocates say officials are not doing enough, and warn that legal protections for abortion will become meaningless if protesters harass and intimidate doctors and patients without consequences.
'That's not enough if there aren't providers that are safe and have the support and resources they need to keep their practices open,' said Melissa Fowler, the chief program officer for the National Abortion Federation. 'There's definitely more that needs to be done.'
Renee Chelian, the founder of Northland Family Planning clinics in the Detroit and Ann Arbor suburbs, said she has dealt for decades with armed protesters, threats and 'rescues' that have temporarily shut operations and terrified patients and staff. Her clinics, which provide contraception, ultrasounds and other services in addition to abortion, have long had security cameras, panic buttons, bulletproof glass and armed private guards.
In August, she sat in a federal courtroom as seven anti-abortion activists received felony convictions for chaining themselves to the entrances of her clinics in 2020 and 2021. The Justice Department presented evidence that one of the pregnant women the activists prevented from accessing the clinic had a fatal fetal abnormality, and the 'coordinated campaign of physical obstruction posed a grave and real threat to her health and fertility.'
When Trump won in November and Democrats lost their majority in Lansing, Chelian immediately worried that protections for clinics like hers would be on the chopping block and urged her state lawmakers to act before Inauguration Day. But Michigan Democrats failed to pass a state-level FACE Act in their final months in power amid the defection of one of their members and a revolt by Republicans that denied them the quorum needed to hold votes.
'Democrats really fell down on the job,' Chelian said. 'It felt like a blow.'
In January, Trump pardoned all of the people who had blockaded Northland Family Planning centers, raising Chelian's fears that they will make good on vows to return. In February, Michigan Democratic Rep. Laurie Pohutsky reintroduced her clinic-protection bill that floundered in the lame duck, but it faces an uphill battle.
'There's probably going to be a significant challenge in getting state-level Republicans on board with enshrining those protections in state law,' Pohutsky said, even though the bill covers not just abortion clinics but anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers that have also been the target of vandalism and protests. 'So we have concerns of safety, concerns of patient access — being able to physically get into a clinic — concerns about the clinic's ability to continue providing care if people feel emboldened to intimidate and physically block and potentially even harm people.'
Following Trump's pardons and guidance urging reduced enforcement, Bonta urged Democrats around the country to copy his state's version of the FACE Act, arguing that it's even stronger than the federal version because it includes criminal penalties for actions like taking videos of patients going into abortion clinics without their consent.
'California provides not just a beacon of light and hope with respect to what can be done but also a blueprint for tangible action that can be taken,' he said. 'Other states can literally pull our state FACE act off the shelf and introduce it.'
Yet only a few states have done so since Trump took office, and in several of those that have, the bills face narrow prospects for becoming law.
Legislation drafted by Virginia Democratic Sen. Scott Surovell bars anyone from obstructing or delaying another person's entry to a health care facility. The bill specifically prohibits individuals from approaching someone within eight feet in the 40-foot radius of a facility's entrance to protest, leaflet or counsel a person without their consent. Surovell's legislation passed out of the General Assembly in late February through a mostly party-line vote.
But Surovell suspects Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin may veto it if it reaches his desk, and because Democrats hold a slim majority in the state's Legislature, an override of that potential veto is unlikely. Youngkin, who has pushed for a 15-week abortion ban, vetoed multiple bills last year that would have strengthened protections for reproductive health care providers. His office did not respond to a request for comment.
'I don't see the bill as expanding or limiting abortion,' said Surovell, who drafted the legislation after a reproductive health clinic in his district told him it was dealing with an uptick in aggressive protesters. 'It just says, 'If you want to get health care, people have to leave you alone.''
Similar legislation by Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Lindsay Powell also faces a challenging path. Pennsylvania has a Democratic majority in the state's House and a Republican-dominated Senate, meaning Powell's bill would need bipartisan backing to become law. Powell said she's still working to win that support from across the aisle.
'My biggest hope is that we prove to the American public that Democrats will stand up for what's right,' Powell said. 'That we're not just armchair politicians who are out there pontificating and thinking about the issue at hand — that we're doing the hard work on the ground to keep people safe.'
Other bills in states where Democrats hold majorities have rosier prospects.
Proposals in New York would enact a state-level FACE Act and create a new misdemeanor offense for photographing individuals entering or leaving reproductive health care facilities. An Illinois bill would designate attacks on abortion clinics as acts of terrorism. And legislation in New Jersey would set aside millions for clinics frequently targeted by protesters to beef up security, and prohibit interference or intimidation of patients and providers.
New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin, who visited Cherry Hill Women's Center in January, said staff there convinced him there's a growing danger that requires government action to protect both state residents and those traveling from states with strict abortion laws for the procedure.
'I knew that threats would increase when [Trump] pardoned extremists, and that's what we've seen,' Platkin said. 'While the Department of Justice is no longer apparently going to enforce federal law that protects people's ability to access reproductive health care clinics, states can still enforce that law, and we are absolutely going to in New Jersey.'
Democrats working on clinics' physical safety acknowledge that state officials' attention is divided by a myriad of other threats to abortion access — from the possibility that the Trump administration could reimpose restrictions on telemedicine prescription of abortion pills to a surge in digital tracking of people who visit abortion clinics to attempts by Louisiana and Texas to reach across state lines and prosecute a New York abortion provider.
'Those are really big threats, because medication abortion is really the method of choice across the country,' said Christina Chang, executive director of the Reproductive Freedom Alliance that Democratic governors created to better coordinate their efforts after the fall of Roe. 'Two thirds of abortions are medication abortions nationwide, and it's a critical access point for people who are living in rural communities or other care deserts.'
At the same time, some activists worry that the threat to brick-and-mortar clinics — which are the only option for people with pregnancies past the first trimester — is getting pushed to the backburner amid an overwhelming focus on protecting access to abortion pills. And others fear the shift from national to state and local protections will leave patients in GOP-controlled states that still have some abortion access, including Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina, at risk.
'The reliance on FACE, or at least the knowledge it was there and protective, was meaningful,' said Rosann Mariappuram, the senior policy counsel for the progressive group State Innovation Exchange. 'To know that there isn't going to be a federal path for protection is a really hard truth for clinics in that position.'
But the moment Democratic officials enact clinic protections, the Thomas More Society and other conservative groups are challenging them as infringements on the First Amendment rights of anti-abortion activists.
On March 10, the legal group defeated a contempt motion filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James against pro-life activists associated with Red Rose Rescue, an anti-abortion group. James had accused the group's members of violating a court order prohibiting them from coming within 15 feet of abortion care facilities in New York with the intent to engage in 'force, threat of force, or physical obstruction.'
The group is also awaiting a ruling out of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals after arguing in December against Clearwater, Florida's law creating a 'bubble zone' around abortion clinics that Breen sees as 'flagrantly unconstitutional.' He is also preparing to sue the city of Detroit for a similar law it adopted last year.
'It's a very dangerous road to go down, whatever your position on the issue,' he said of the state and local clinic protections. 'If you believe in the public's right to use the sidewalk to leaflet, to express ideas, you shouldn't want to restrict anybody's speech.'