2 days ago
Republicans Move A Step Closer To Repealing Protections For Abortion Clinics
The Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee advanced a bill on Tuesday that would repeal a 30-year-old federal law created to safeguard abortion clinics — even as violence against providers and clinics has skyrocketed since the Supreme Court ended federal abortion protections.
The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, also known as the FACE Act, was enacted in 1994 by President Bill Clinton in response to escalating violence against abortion clinics. The law made it a federal crime to use force or the threat of force to injure, intimidate or block any person trying to provide or access reproductive health care services. While the law has primarily been used to protect abortion clinics, it also protects fertility clinics, anti-abortion pregnancy centers, churches and other places of religious worship from similar violence.
Anti-abortion violence dropped by 30% when the FACE Act was first signed into law. The law is arguably now more important than ever, since federal abortion protections fell in 2022 and violence against providers and clinics have skyrocketed. The year the Supreme Court repealed Roe v. Wade, there was a 538% increase in people obstructing clinic entrances, a 913% increase in stalking of clinic staff and a 133% increase in bomb threats, according to a National Abortion Federation report.
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Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) introduced the FACE Act Repeal Act of 2025 earlier this year, claiming that President Joe Biden's administration weaponized the law to prosecute anti-abortion activists. The repeal is part of a yearslong push by the GOP to stoke a false narrative that Democrats are waging a war against the anti-abortion religious right. Republican support for the bill comes less than a month after a California fertility clinic was bombed and one person died.
After a heated debate on Tuesday, the repeal bill passed in a 13-10 vote along party lines. It now heads to the House for consideration.
'NAF has been tracking anti-abortion violence since 1977, and we know this for certain: when the FACE Act is being enforced, it is an effective and important tool to keep abortion providers and their patients safe,' Julie Gonen, chief legal officer at the National Abortion Federation (NAF), said in a Tuesday statement. 'It is unconscionable to see anti-abortion legislators trying to repeal a law that has been keeping people safe for decades.'
During Tuesday's debate, Roy claimed that he had little issue with the actual law and instead worried about overcriminalization and the Biden administration's 'one-sided enforcement of the law.' He noted that he's received pushback from within the Trump administration over his repeal bill because he said the administration is looking to use the FACE Act to protect churches.
'The previous administration weaponized the FACE Act to prosecute nonviolent pro-life Americans with the harshest sentences,' Roy said, routinely referring to abortion clinics and pro-choice advocates as 'anti-life.'
Republicans argued that the law has been disproportionately applied against anti-abortion advocates who protest at abortion clinics. Chairman of the Judiciary Committee Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) said there has 'most certainly been egregious abuse' from the Biden administration's 'selective enforcement' of the law.
Roy said in his opening statement that 8% of the FACE Act cases filed under Biden's Department of Justice were against protesters at anti-abortion centers and 92% were against anti-abortion activists at abortion clinics. Because of this there should be a full repeal of the federal law, Republicans argued.
But several Democrats pointed out that simply looking at the numbers does not prove selective enforcement of the law. Instead, it shows that abortion clinics face a disproportionate amount of harassment and violence from anti-abortion protesters.
'The FACE Act is completely viewpoint neutral in its textual scope and viewpoint neutral in its application,' ranking member Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said. 'If more people have been convicted of attacking pro-choice abortion clinics than have been convicted of attacking pro-life pregnancy centers, as my friend from Texas suggests, it is because there have been vastly more people attacking abortion clinics than attacking pregnancy centers.'
The only Republican on the committee who did not support a full repeal was Rep. Tom McClintock (Calif.), who said enforcement was abused but the law should instead be revised.
Days into his presidency, Donald Trump announced he would limit enforcement of the FACE Act. He dismissed a handful of current ongoing FACE investigations and instructed prosecutors to apply the law only in 'extraordinary circumstances' such as instances of death, extreme bodily harm or significant property damage.
Trump also pardoned 23 people for FACE convictions that ranged from harassing pregnant patients to breaking into clinics and stealing fetal tissue. Several of those pardoned, some of whom were serving prison time, have already said theyplan to return to targeting and invading abortion clinics.
Abortion providers, clinic staff and other experts working in the reproductive health field told HuffPost shortly after Trump's announcement that they were deeply demoralized by the administration's decision. Some had already seen an increase in aggression and hostility from protesters in the few weeks since Trump took office.
'Unless you have worked at an abortion clinic, you will never understand the terror we face on a daily basis,' Renee Chelian, founder and CEO of Michigan abortion clinic Northland Family Planning, said in a statement following the advancement of the bill to repeal the FACE Act.
Chelian and her staff have survived arson attacks and a chemical bomb, as well as bomb and death threats. Eight of the protesters who attacked Northland Family Planning were convicted under the FACE Act during the Biden administration, but were later pardoned by Trump.
'Our patients have been blockaded from entering while needing immediate medical attention. My own children were targeted and terrorized,' Chelian said. 'The FACE Act is one of the only tools to hold these criminals accountable … There is no explanation for repealing this law other than purposefully inspiring violence against patients and clinic staff.'
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