In the summer of 2022, FBI agents armed with long guns and bulletproof vests raided the home of Paul Vaughn, president of Personhood Tennessee, who was the father of 11 children. He had participated 18 months earlier in a peaceful protest at an abortion clinic, the Carafem Health Center Clinic in Mount Juliet, Tennessee, where he and some 20 other pro-life activists prayed, sang hymns, read scripture, and counseled women.
Police arrested some of the activists on-site because they did not move away from the entrance when asked to do so. Vaughn remained on the sidewalk, and a police negotiator later testified that Vaughn was helpful, collaborative, and peaceful throughout the event. Nevertheless, agents with drawn assault weapons arrested Vaughn in front of his frightened wife and children.
The Department of Justice later indicted him for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a felony. A court convicted him and sentenced him to three years of supervised release.
The law was signed by former President Bill Clinton in 1994, and it criminalized actions that block access to or vandalize abortion clinics, places of worship, and pregnancy centers. But after the constitutional excresence of Roe v. Wade was excised in 2022, the DOJ in former President Joe Biden’s administration weaponized the law to target anti-abortion advocates almost exclusively.
Of the 25 FACE Act cases Biden’s DOJ brought to court, 23 were against pro-life campaigners — the other two involved abortion activists who vandalized pro-life pregnancy resource centers. The discrepancy is outrageous given the wave of attacks against Catholic churches and pro-life centers documented by the Family Research Council after the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision. The Family Research Council found 236 attacks on Catholic churches and 94 on pregnancy centers from May 2022 to September 2024. These included vandalism, firebombings, and graffiti by groups such as Jane’s Revenge. Examples include highly publicized events such as the June 2022 firebombing of a pregnancy resource center in Longmont, Colorado.
The FACE Act was not intended to be used, as it is, against people because they hold beliefs that most people in our civilization traditionally believed but happen to be out of favor with the Left. Congress created this problematic law and should repeal it.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) has emphasized the urgency of doing so while Republicans control the House, Senate, and White House. Now is the time to act to prevent future administrations from abusing it as a weapon against pro-lifers. In January, Roy, citing cases such as Vaughn’s, reintroduced legislation to repeal the law, arguing that the Biden DOJ had destroyed the case for keeping the bill. Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) introduced the Senate version of the bill soon after.
“Over the past four years, we have witnessed the weaponization of the justice system, using the FACE Act to jail Americans fighting for the right to life,” Roy said Monday. “It is not enough to merely end Biden-Harris era discrimination — we must act to reverse course, ensuring selective and unfair political prosecutions are never again possible under this statute.”
This week, the House promised to take steps toward repealing the FACE Act. On Wednesday, a coalition of pro-life leaders sent a joint letter to the Judiciary Committee to vote in favor of a bill that would repeal the act.
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“There is no question that future pro-abortion administrations will weaponize the law to target peaceful pro-life protesters. You must ensure that this does not happen,” the letter read.
We applaud President Donald Trump’s January decision to pardon 23 pro-life activists whom the DOJ prosecuted under the FACE Act. We encourage Republicans in both chambers to do everything necessary to pass legislation as a part of a broader effort to end the abusive weaponization of the Justice Department.