
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 23, 2025 / 16:35 pm (CNA).
President Donald Trump issued pardons for 23 pro-life activists on Thursday, fulfilling a promise he made during the presidential campaign.
Trump signed the pardons on Thursday in the Oval Office of the White House on the day before the March for Life to be held in Washington, D.C., according to the Thomas More Society.
Last week, the religious liberty law firm petitioned the incoming president to issue 21 individual pardons for pro-life advocates who were arrested for violating the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act and “Conspiracy Against Rights” statute while peacefully engaging in protests at abortion clinics.
Several of those convicted and imprisoned were elderly and in poor health.
At least two times during his 2024 campaign for the presidency, Trump said he intended to release pro-life activists who are currently imprisoned.
“These peaceful pro-life Americans mistreated by [President Joe] Biden include grandparents, pastors, a Holocaust survivor, and a Catholic priest — all are selfless, sincere patriots,” the petition from the Chicago-based law firm reads.
🚨 BREAKING: President Donald J. Trump grants pardons to peaceful pro-life protesters prosecuted by the Biden administration over exercising their First Amendment rights. pic.twitter.com/XwzU4dEJt8
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) January 23, 2025
During Biden’s four years in office, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) brought charges against more than 30 people who took part in pro-life demonstrations under the FACE Act, which was legislation in the 1990s to increase penalties for people who obstruct access to abortion clinics or pregnancy resource centers.
Although the FACE Act’s higher sentences also apply to people who obstruct or damage pro-life pregnancy centers, Biden’s DOJ only brought charges in two cases regarding attacks on those facilities despite more than 100 incidents occurring under his tenure.
“While Biden’s prosecutors almost entirely ignored the firebombing and vandalism of hundreds of pro-life churches and pregnancy centers, they viciously pursued pro-life Americans,” the petition adds.
The longest sentence was given last year to Lauren Handy, who received four years and nine months in prison for her role in a protest at an abortion clinic in Washington, D.C. The second longest was also given last year to Bevelyn Beatty Williams, who received three years and five months in prison for a protest inside an abortion clinic in New York City.
Several pro-life activists in their mid-to-late 70s also received multiyear sentences for their protests.
“These 21 peaceful pro-lifers, many of whom are currently imprisoned for bravely standing up for unborn life, are upstanding citizens and pillars of their communities,” Steve Crampton, who works as senior counsel for the Thomas More Society, said in a statement.
This is a developing story.
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Let’s now hear from the entire USCCB bishops applauding the President’s action in this instance.
(HINT: YOU WON’T)
Why not? I don’t understand. I pray for it. Well I must not pray for it, is (catholic) common sense. It is only applaud, say “well done”, something like that. Even they can say: “We are not agree with you in many things, but this one is honourable”.
Maybe is something more about the activists we do not know…
Every United States citizen who was born and survived, started out at the end of a lifeline.
Waiting for the USCCB laudatory press release……..Buhler……….Buhler……
I’m sure all of us just missed Pope Francis’s words of support and thanksgiving…right?
And the grateful response from the USCCB said….nothing.
Great News. President Trump followed thru on this campaign promise. Moreover they should have never been prosecuted to begin with.
It is hard to believe, after all this time, that the USCCB has not risen up to challenge this blatant atrocity. How does the law address these actions? Amendment one? In contrast, Trump wisely pardoned these peaceful protesters, but his blanket pardon of the criminal rioters at the US Capitol has caused havoc across the nation, is not. No president should have the power to refute the law.
“but his blanket pardon of the criminal rioters at the US Capitol has caused havoc across the nation.”
Maybe according to NPR, MSNBC, and the DNC talking points you receive, but not true for most thinking people. Things are great. Trump is taking necessary action to reverse what your fellow democrats have done to the country. Face it, your party lost. Elections have consequences, so deal with it like an adult.
Why?? Because you dont have a personal interest in it? An awful lot of people on J6 just walked into the Capitol building and looked around. The Dems chose to throw the book at them for doing so. Yet oddly, never seemed to have the time to investigate church vandalism. THIS in the face of far too many BLM RIOTS in which police were injured and police stations ( and whole towns) were burned down with nary a peep from the Dems. Disgusting. Its about time this charade was turned on its head. Insurrection? With no military support and no help from a foreign power?? Really? My cat could run a better “insurrection”. Calling a demonstration gone bad an “insurrection” is nothing more than partisan propaganda.
I believe Mr. Morgan that both protests involved simple trespass violations. The Capitol building is after all a public building owned by the people of the United States.
It’s not the first occasion Americans have dressed up in silly costumes and trespassed. At least they didn’t destroy any tea this time around.
🙂
As that great statesman and politician Barack Hussein Obama once stated so eloquently: “Elections have consequences.”
I wonder how much the bishops are acting on their own and how much this is at the Vatican’s direction? Pope Francis seems anti-US. ( a Marxist?). and anti Trump.
I just read a USCCB article on the Born Alive aAbortion Protection Act. It passed the House with republicans voting for it and democrats voting against. It failed the 60 vote requirement in the Senate as the democrats voted against it. No mention – not at all, of that fact in the article. The bishops have no problem mentioning Trump’s name.
It is wonderful that the President pardoned or commuted the sentences of the J6 hostages. That he pardoned the FACE hostages is icing on the cake!
The comments here seem to challenge the facts. I feel that I reflect on the facts. Probably the most egregious is the deflection of the truth about the denial of the invasion of the US Capitol by the Trump MAGA criminals. Republican officials and Trump family members Ivanka and Don Jr. plead to Trump to halt the riot. He refused and, instead reclined to the WH, for several hours, to finally arise to say “Please go home now. We understand your pain, we LOVE you.” We shoud remember when the following day Republican leader Mitch McConnell addressed Congress saying, “The president is directly and morally responsible for the Jaan. 6 invasion of the Capitol.”
The following URL contains the facts.
Article III: Treason. Protect and defend the constitution from all enemies, foreign and DOMESTIC.
https://law.justia.com/constitution/us/article-3/44-aid-and-comfort-to-the-enemy.html
I really like reading everyone’s comments. Please keep them free of disparagements.
God save the Union.