Congress passes resolution against border emergency

San Francisco, Calif., Jun 13, 2019 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- Pinterest, a social media site with 300 million active users, has banned pro-life activist group Live Action from its platform, just days after a whistleblower revealed documents that purport to show active suppression of pro-life and Christian content by Pinterest.

Alison Centofante, Live Action’s director of external affairs, posted a screenshot June 11 of an email from Pinterest informing Live Action that their account was “permanently suspended because its content went against our policies on misinformation.”

“We don’t allow advice on Pinterest that may have immediate and detrimental effects on a Pinner’s health or on public safety,” the communication read.

Live Action founder Lila Rose shared a second email from Pinterest support that said the account was suspended because of “medically inaccurate information and conspiracies that turn individuals and facilities into targets for harassment and violence.”

“What exactly is Pinterest attempting to block? Inspirational messages to pregnant mothers, ultrasound images showing the science of prenatal development, medically accurate information on the abortion procedure, and images saying women deserve better than abortion industry leader Planned Parenthood,” Rose said in a June 11 statement.

“Pinterest has targeted Live Action, I believe, because our message is so effective at educating millions about the humanity of the preborn child and the injustice of abortion…Pinterest users deserve to know the truth and our messages deserve to be treated fairly. If Planned Parenthood can promote their message on Pinterest, then Live Action should be able to as well.”

Despite Live Action’s suspension for purported “immediate and detrimental” health effects of their pro-life materials, pins linking to websites that offered “20 Best Ways to Induce a Miscarriage Naturally at Home” were still active and available on Pinterest June 13.

Before Live Action’s total ban, documents released Tuesday by former software engineer-turned whistleblower Eric Cochran show that Live Action was intentionally marked as a “pornographic” site, thus suppressing users’ ability to link to LiveAction.org’s content.

The documents also allege that Pinterest employees labeled Christianity-related terms like “christian easter” and “bible verses” as “sensitive” search terms, meaning those terms would not show up in autocomplete search results on the site.

Cochran released the documents via the activist group Project Veritas, and says he was subsequently fired from his job at Pinterest.

“Because ‘LiveAction.org’ was added to the list of pornographic sites, the [whistleblower] showed that users cannot create pins that link to ‘LiveAction.org.’ Live Action has received complaints from supporters over the last few months that they have had difficulty pinning content from ‘LiveAction.org,’” Live Action said in a June 11 statement.

“After testing the website, Live Action was unable to create pins from our own website but was able to create pins to other pro-life websites and create pins to pro-abortion websites like Planned Parenthood.”

The whistleblower at Pinterest also revealed, Live Action says, that Pinterest added “David Daleiden/Planned Parenthood” to a list of “conspiracy theories” it monitors.

David Daleidan is a journalist and activist who used hidden camera footage to reveal Planned Parenthood executives and staff negotiating the sale of fetal body parts in 2015.

In another June 11 email, also shared by Rose, a Pinterest spokesperson said Live Action’s account was suspended because of “misinformation related to conspiracies and anti-vaccination advice, not porn,” and that the platform’s “internal tools” were “named years ago to combat porn” and had not been updated.

A media inquiry from CNA to Pinterest, enquiring what specific pins posted by Live Action the platform flagged as containing “misinformation” and how they vetted the information in question, went unanswered as of press time.

Twitter has barred Live Action from purchasing paid advertisements on their site, and the pro-life group has also alleged detrimental treatment from Google and YouTube.

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Demonstrators on both sides of the abortion debate outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., after the court released its decision in Dobbs, June 24, 2022. / Katie Yoder/CNA

Denver Newsroom, Jun 25, 2022 / 11:32 am (CNA).
The U.S. Sup… […]

Washington D.C., Apr 13, 2020 / 10:00 am (CNA).- The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it will hear oral arguments by phone next month. Justices will hear arguments from lawyers remotely across six dates in the first two weeks of May in an effort to keep the business of the court moving during the coronavirus outbreak.

A statement from the Supreme Court, released April 13, said that ten cases would be assigned dates in the first two weeks of May.

“The Court will hear oral arguments by telephone conference on May 4, 5, 6, 11, 12 and 13,” the statement said. “The following cases will be assigned argument dates after the Clerk’s Office has confirmed the availibility of counsel.”

“In keeping with public heath guidance in response to COVID-19, the Justices and counsel will all participate remotely. The Court anticipates providing a live audio feed of these arguments to news media,” said the court’s release.

Among those cases included in the revised schedule are the Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania and Trump v. Pennsylvania.

Those cases were originally slated to be heard April 29, but the court announced April 3 that they would be postponed, along with the other cases due for hearings across a two week window, “in keeping with public health guidance in response to COVID-19.”

The cases concern action by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to end the religious order’s exemption to the Department of Health and Human Services so-called contraception mandate.

In 2017, the Trump administration issued a rule exempting the Little Sisters and other religious entities from the mandate. State attorneys general for Pennsylvania and California then challenged the exemption in court.

The Little Sisters lost their case against Pennsylvania at the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in July of 2019, and lost their case against California at the Ninth Circuit Court in October. They appealed to the Supreme Court, which agreed in January to hear their case.

The release from the Supreme Court on Monday said that live audio of the arguments would be made available to media. Dates for hearing arguments in individual cases have not yet been assigned, the court said, and would be announced after lawyers in different cases have confirmed their availability.

The Little Sisters of the Poor have spent years in litigation related to the mandate. The 2010 Affordable Care Act mandated certain preventive coverage in health care, and the Obama administration interpreted the mandate to include coverage for contraceptives and sterilizations.

Religious institutions, including the Little Sisters and Catholic dioceses, said that a government “accommodation” still forced them to violate their religious beliefs in the provision of morally-objectionable procedures in employee health plans.

The Little Sisters’ case has already been heard by the Supreme Court in in 2016, when justices sent the case back down to lower courts, instructing the religious entities and the government to come to an agreement whereby the wishes of both parties could be attained. The Trump administration issued the exemption following that instruction, resulting the lawsuits by Pennsylvania and other states.

On April 8, Mark Rienzi, president of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty which represents the sisters, said that religious order had been dragged through the courts for years.

“This, frankly silly, saga has gone on for eight or nine years with, at times, the federal government, and with, at times, state governments pretending that they need nuns in order to give people contraception, which has always been a whacky argument and a bad position for the government to take,” he said.

Also among the cases due to be heard remotely are Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru and St. James School v. Biel— both of which involve the “ministerial exception.” The cases focus on whether or not two Catholic schools in California are free to fire religion teachers without interference from the courts, due to the “ministerial exception” which exists under the First Amendment.

Becket, which also represents the schools, is arguing that the courts and government cannot “second-guess” the employment decisions of religious institutions on staff members who provide religious instruction to children.  

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