OPINION:
Pro-life supporter Paul Vaughn, father of 11, was sentenced on July 2 to three years of supervised release for his role in a protest at an abortion clinic in Nashville, Tennessee.
Judge Aleta Trauger’s lenient sentencing means Mr. Vaughn will avoid prison time and celebrate Independence Day with his family, rather than from the inside of a prison cell.
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Numerous other pro-life supporters haven’t been nearly as fortunate.
The U.S. Supreme Court courageously and correctly overturned Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022. In the intervening months, a weaponized Department of Justice deliberately and systematically prosecuted pro-life supporters under dubious pretenses.
On the very day the court overturned Roe, Attorney General Merrick Garland said the Justice Department “strongly disagreed” with the court’s decision and promised to “work tirelessly to protect and advance reproductive freedom.” Specifically, Mr. Garland said the DOJ would use the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act to “protect healthcare providers and individuals seeking reproductive health services.”
Attorney General Garland has since made good on that promise by throwing several pro-life supporters – including elderly grandmothers – in prison.
Ten pro-life supporters who participated in a “rescue and protest” action at a notorious abortion clinic in Washington, D.C., in 2020 have each been sentenced to months or years in prison by far-left U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. They were all charged with violating the FACE Act; nine of them faced an additional charge of “conspiracy against rights” — that “right” being the right to end a child’s life.
Paula Paulette Harlow, 75, was sentenced to two years in prison by Judge Kollar-Kotelly despite her ill health. When her husband purportedly asked the judge for leniency on his wife’s behalf, Judge Kollar-Kotelly remarked that Mrs. Harlow should “make an effort to remain alive” while in prison because it’s a “tenant of [her] religion.”
In addition to Mr. Vaughn, 10 more individuals were charged by the DOJ for violating the FACE Act due to their protest in 2021 outside an abortion clinic in Nashville, Tennessee. Seven of them were also charged with “conspiracy against rights,” facing up to 11 years in prison and fines of up to $250,000.
Six of them, including Mr. Vaughn, were found guilty earlier this year. Three more of them are expected to be sentenced this week.
Federal law enforcement agencies have used heavy-handed tactics to intimidate these pro-life supporters.
Mr. Vaughn, for example, was arrested in an early morning raid by heavily armed FBI agents with their guns drawn. The agents stormed the family’s farmhouse, frightening his wife and their 11 children (one of them 18 months old), and hauled Mr. Vaughn away in front of his family.
One day before Mr. Vaughn’s sentencing, approximately 200 pro-life supporters gathered at Christ Church Nashville to support him, to praise God, and read the Bible.
“It’s real easy for me. I can go and go to battle and go to jail as an individual, and it’s not a big loss,” Mr. Vaughn said before his sentencing. “The challenge comes when you’re leading your family through it when you’re talking to your 3-year-old and your 23-year-old and your other family.”
And who can forget Mark Houck, the pro-life father of seven whom the DOJ tried to send to prison for 10 years? His alleged crime? Defending his son from a verbally abusive abortion “escort” outside an abortion clinic.
Thankfully, Mr. Houck was found not guilty last year.
But the DOJ isn’t done yet.
On Thursday, June 20, the U.S. DOJ filed another lawsuit in Florida against five pro-life supporters who allegedly violated the FACE Act.
Make no mistake. The FBI and DOJ have been weaponized to intimidate pro-life Americans.
All the while, the DOJ has done next to nothing to crack down on the 82 attacks against pregnancy resource centers (PRCs) that occurred in just 10 months after Roe was overturned. An additional 300 Catholic churches were vandalized in that period.
PRCs, which exist to provide material, mental, and spiritual help to women in need, have been victimized by “arson and firebombing; smashed windows; graffiti with threatening messages; destruction of signage; gluing of locks to prevent staff from entering; keying of staff members’ cars; and other acts of violence and vandalism,” Catholic Vote documents.
Despite the dozens of violent attacks – far more destructive than any action perpetrated by these peaceful pro-life supporters – just four individuals have been charged for their actions against PRCs. Three of them have plead guilty.
Here’s another absurdity.
Pro-life supporters are being charged with “conspiracy against rights.” But as Justice Samuel Alito wrote in Dobbs, “The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion.”
How can pro-life supporters conspire against a right that the U.S. Supreme Court has declared does not exist? It’s even possible that the FACE Act is unconstitutional, a point Paul Vaughn’s lawyers are contending in court.
On July 4, 1776, our nation’s Founding Fathers approved the Declaration of Independence, proclaiming, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Paul Vaughn, Paula Harlow, and the many other pro-life supporters serving prison sentences have been convicted for defending the unalienable right to life of every person – both born and unborn.
This Independence Day, the DOJ should stop prosecuting pro-life supporters, end its double standard, and return to its promise to uphold the rule of law “without prejudice or improper influence.”
The American people should demand nothing less.
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Zachary Mettler works as a staff writer and communications liaison for The Daily Citizen at Focus on the Family. In his role, he writes about current political issues, U.S. history, political philosophy, and culture. Mettler earned his bachelor’s degree from William Jessup University and is an alumnus of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation.
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