[House Hearing, 119 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FROM TOOL TO WEAPON: THE FACE ACT AND
THE DANGERS OF FEDERALIZING CRIMINAL LAW
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION AND
LIMITED GOVERNMENT
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 2026
__________
Serial No. 119-65
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via: http://judiciary.house.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
63-601 WASHINGTON : 2026
=======================================================================
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
JIM JORDAN, Ohio, Chair
DARRELL ISSA, California JAMIE RASKIN, Maryland, Ranking
ANDY BIGGS, Arizona Member
TOM McCLINTOCK, California JERROLD NADLER, New York
THOMAS P. TIFFANY, Wisconsin ZOE LOFGREN, California
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
CHIP ROY, Texas HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
SCOTT FITZGERALD, Wisconsin Georgia
BEN CLINE, Virginia TED LIEU, California
LANCE GOODEN, Texas PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
JEFFERSON VAN DREW, New Jersey J. LUIS CORREA, California
TROY E. NEHLS, Texas MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania
BARRY MOORE, Alabama JOE NEGUSE, Colorado
HARRIET M. HAGEMAN, Wyoming LUCY McBATH, Georgia
LAUREL M. LEE, Florida DEBORAH K. ROSS, North Carolina
WESLEY HUNT, Texas BECCA BALINT, Vermont
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina JESUS G. ``CHUY'' GARCIA, Illinois
KEVIN KILEY, California SYDNEY KAMLAGER-DOVE, California
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin JARED MOSKOWITZ, Florida
BRAD KNOTT, North Carolina DANIEL S. GOLDMAN, New York
MARK HARRIS, North Carolina JASMINE CROCKETT, Texas
ROBERT F. ONDER, Jr., Missouri Vacancy
DEREK SCHMIDT, Kansas
BRANDON GILL, Texas
MICHAEL BAUMGARTNER, Washington
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION AND LIMITED GOVERNMENT
CHIP ROY, Texas, Chair
TOM McCLINTOCK, California MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania,
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky Ranking Member
HARRIET HAGEMAN, Wyoming STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
WESLEY HUNT, Texas PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin JOE NEGUSE, Colorado
MARK HARRIS, North Carolina BECCA BALINT, Vermont
ROBERT F. ONDER, Jr., Missouri SYDNEY KAMLAGER-DOVE, California
BRANDON GILL, Texas DANIEL S. GOLDMAN, New York
CHRISTOPHER HIXON, Majority Staff Director
ARTHUR EWENCZYK, Minority Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
----------
TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 2026
OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
The Honorable Chip Roy, Chair of the Subcommittee on the
Constitution and Limited Government from the State of Texas.... 1
The Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, Ranking Member of the
Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from
the State of Pennsylvania...................................... 4
The Honorable Jim Jordan, Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary
from the State of Ohio......................................... 6
The Honorable Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the Committee on
the Judiciary from the State of Maryland....................... 7
WITNESSES
Eva Edl, Yugoslavian communist concentration camp survivor, Pro-
life Advocate
Oral Testimony................................................. 10
Prepared Testimony............................................. 12
Christopher A. Ferrara, Senior Counsel,Thomas More Society
Oral Testimony................................................. 14
Prepared Testimony............................................. 16
Roger T. Severino, Vice President, Economic and Domestic Policy,
Joseph C. and Elizabeth A. Anderlik Fellow, The Heritage
Foundation
Oral Testimony................................................. 27
Prepared Testimony............................................. 29
Jessica L. Waters, Senior Scholar in Residence, Justice, Law &
Criminology, American University
Oral Testimony................................................. 71
Prepared Testimony............................................. 73
LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC. SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING
All materials submitted by the Subcommittee on the Constitution
and Limited Government, for the record......................... 107
A statement from Sterling Heights clinic, submitted by the
Honorable the Honorable Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the
Committee on the Judiciary from the State of Maryland, for the
record
Materials submitted by the Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, Ranking
Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited
Government from the State of Pennsylvania, for the record
An article entitled, ``DOJ's First `Weaponization' Report Is
a Bust,'' Apr. 20, 2026, The Atlantic
A press release entitled, ``Ohio Woman Pleads Guilty to
Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act
Violation for Damaging Pregnancy Center,'' Dec. 8, 2023,
Office of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of Justice
A press release entitled, ``Wisconsin Man Sentenced to Prison
for 2022 Firebombing of Madison Building,'' Apr. 10,
2024, Office of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of
Justice
A press release entitled, ``Florida Woman Convicted of Civil
Rights Conspiracy Targeting Pregnancy Resource Centers,''
Dec. 20, 2024, Office of Public Affairs, U.S. Department
of Justice
A press release entitled, ``FBI Offering $25,000 Rewards for
Information in Series of Attacks Against Reproductive
Health Service Facilities,'' Jan. 19, 2023, Federal
Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
An article entitled, ``Separating Fact from Fiction in FACE
Act Enforcement,'' Apr. 14, 2026, Just Security
A press release entitled, ``Seven Defendants Convicted of
Federal Civil Rights Conspiracy and Freedom of Access to
Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act Offenses for Obstructing
Access to Reproductive Health Services in Michigan,''
Aug. 20, 2024, Office of Public Affairs, U.S. Department
of Justice
A statement from Reproductive Freedom For All, Apr. 28, 2026
A statement from The American College of Obstetricians &
Gynecologists, Apr. 28, 2026
A statement from the National Abortion Federation (NAF), Apr.
28, 2026
A statement the Center for Reproductive Rights, Apr. 28, 2026
A statement from David Gunn, Jr. and Wendy Gunn, Apr. 28,
2026
Pages from the 2025 Presidential Transition Project, pp. 557-
558, Apr. 28, 2026
A statement from Judith C. Appelbaum, Apr. 28, 2026
An article entitled, ``I testified before Congress on the
FACE Act--and became a target,'' May 8, 2026, MS Now
An article entitled, ``Arrests in Memphis as Antiabortion
Training Camp Sparks New Era of Clinic Blockades,'' Nov. 26,
2025, Ms. Magazine, submitted by the Honorable Steve Cohen,
Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited
Government from the State of Tennessee, for the record
Materials submitted by the Honorable Chip Roy, Chair of the
Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from
the State of Texas, for the record
A report entitled,``Fact Sheet: Planned Parenthood's 2024-25
Annual Report,'' Apr. 7, 2026, Lozier Institute
The Executive Summary report entitled, ``The Biden
Administration's Weaponization of the Freedom of Access
to Clinic Entrances Act,'' Apr. 14, 2026, Office of Legal
Policy, U.S. Department of Justice
Materials submitted by the Honorable Sydney Kamlager-Dove, a
Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited
Government from the State of California, for the record
A statement for the record from Renee Chelian, Founder, CEO,
Northland Family Planning, Apr. 28, 2026
An article entitled, ``Trump pardons abortion clinic
protesters ahead of March for Life,'' Jan. 23, 2025,
Politico
An article entitled, ``Fertility clinic bombing suspect was
`nihilistic' 25-year-old, FBI says,'' May 18, 2025, The
Washington Post
A press release entitled, ``More Men Using Family Planning
Services,'' Jun. 16, 2016, U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services
A letter to the Honorable Chip Roy, Chair of the Subcommittee
on the Constitution and Limited Government from the State
of Texas, and the Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, Ranking
Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and
Limited Government from the State of Pennsylvania, from
Amnesty International, Apr. 28, 2026
FROM TOOL TO WEAPON: THE FACE ACT
AND THE DANGERS OF FEDERALIZING CRIMINAL LAW
----------
Tuesday, April 28, 2026
House of Representatives
Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government
Committee on the Judiciary
Washington, DC
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in Room
2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Hon. Chip Roy [Chair
of the Subcommittee] presiding.
Members present: Representatives Roy, Jordan, Hageman,
Grothman, Harris, Onder, Gill, Scanlon, Raskin, Cohen, Jayapal,
Balint, and Kamlager-Dove.
Mr. Roy. [Presiding.] The Committee will come to order.
Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a recess
at any time. We welcome everybody to today's hearing on the
FACE Act and the dangers of Federalizing criminal law.
Before I start, I just want to say thanks for everybody's
patience. I think there were some security line issues. Thanks
to the witnesses for navigating through those, and thanks to my
colleagues on the other side of the aisle. I apologize for
starting a little bit late, but we were trying to deal with
that issue.
I will now recognize myself for an opening statement.
Today, this Subcommittee confronts a fundamental question
about the proper role of the Federal Government in our
constitutional system, because the issue before us is not just
one statute; it is about a broader and more dangerous trend--
the steady expansion of Federal criminal law into areas the
Constitution traditionally reserves to the States. When
Washington creates these authorities and hands them to
unelected bureaucrats, these tools will inevitably be
weaponized.
The FACE Act is a case study into exactly that problem. It
was sold as a narrow, even-handed tool designed to equally
protect access to abortion clinics, pregnancy resource centers,
and places of worship by prohibiting threats of force,
obstruction, and property damage. Like so many Federal laws
before it, it has become a vehicle for selective enforcement, a
mechanism for political targeting, and ultimately, a weapon
used against conservatives and prolife Americans.
We don't need to speculate. We now have clear evidence from
the Department of Justice's own report that this law was
weaponized by the Biden Administration. That report shows how,
under the Biden Administration, enforcement of the FACE Act was
shaped, if not driven, by outside advocacy groups.
The Biden Department of Justice worked in close
coordination with extremist NGOs, particularly large, well-
funded pro-abortion groups, like the National Abortion
Federation, Planned Parenthood, and the Feminist Majority
Foundation. These groups weren't merely reporting crimes.
They were operating as de facto intelligence-gathering
arms, collecting and compiling detailed dossiers on the speech
and activities of American citizens for Federal authorities
mapping their movements, logging protests, and gathering deeply
personal information, including participation in religious
activity, home addresses, license data, even photos of their
families and minor children all of it fed into the prosecution
pipeline, even as DOJ officials themselves recognized much of
the underlying activity was protected under the First
Amendment.
The DOJ didn't just receive this information. It gave these
groups privileged access. On May 15, 2023, the National
Abortion Federation requested a full internal list of every
active FACE Act prosecution in the country. They got it in full
within one hour.
When this Subcommittee and I personally, as a Member of
Congress, asked for the exact same information, the DOJ didn't
just delay. They stonewalled for over three years from 2022-
2024.
In October 2022, a formal request was ignored. December
2023, asked again under oath: No answer. February 2024,
followup in writing: Nothing. May 2024, response finally comes
16 months later.
It wasn't just Congress; defense counsel and active FACE
prosecutors were denied the data outright. In one case, a DOJ
official explicitly wrote that providing the information would,
quote, ``open gates we will struggle to close,'' implicitly
acknowledging that the records would reveal unequal enforcement
targeting only prolifers. They refused and claiming the records
didn't exist, even though the same information had been handed
to the National Abortion Federation on demand.
Why does an outside abortion advocacy group get immediate
access to internal Department of Justice enforcement data,
while Congress, prolife defendants, and the American people are
forced to wait years or are denied altogether? That is not
equal justice under the law. That is a two-tiered system where
political allies are treated as partners and dissenters as
targets.
It didn't stop there. The bias we are seeing didn't just
shape who was investigated. It shaped how these cases were
prosecuted in court. In FACE Act trials, we have evidence that
DOJ attorneys probed prospective jurors on their religious
beliefs and prolife views, treating constitutionally protected
convictions as potential disqualifications for service.
In one instance, a DOJ prosecutor even complained when a
judge took care to protect the defendant's First Amendment's
rights. This is what happens when Washington takes power it was
never meant to have, using it to target, instead of to serve,
while treating constitutional protections as obstacles rather
than guarantees.
We don't have to imagine what that looks like. We see it
sitting here before us today. Ms. Eva Edl is not a violent
criminal. She is a 91-year-old survivor of a communist labor
camp, someone who has lived through the horrors of unchecked
government power. Yet, in Biden's America, she was not met with
freedom, but with the full force of Federal prosecution for a
nonviolent protest. Having survived the abuses of a 20th
century regime built on centralized power, she now faces the
consequences of that same dangerous principle right here on
American soil decades later.
Her case is not an outlier. It is a warning about what
happens when the Federal Government takes jurisdiction over
local conduct, and then, applies that power selectively guided
not by equal justice, but by political priorities.
This should concern every American, regardless of their
views on the underlying issue. Because the real problem isn't
just how this law has been used. It is the permanent expansion
of Federal power it represents. When Congress Federalizes
criminal law, we are not just addressing a single issue in a
single moment. We are creating authorities that do not
disappear when political control changes hands, authorities
that will be used again and again by whoever sits in the White
House, controls the DOJ, or directs Federal law enforcement.
That is why this hearing isn't just about the FACE Act. It
is about what happens when Washington takes power it was never
meant to have.
We are seeing the same impulse in proposals to Federalize
other areas of criminal law. New Federal penalties layered on
top of existing State crimes and efforts to nationalize deeply
contested social issues through criminal statutes. Because the
real question isn't whether this power delivers you the outcome
you want today. It is whether you are willing to hand that same
power to your political opponents tomorrow. The answer should
be obvious. It isn't to fight over who controls these powers.
The answer is to stop creating them in the first place.
Criminal law enforcement, particularly for conduct that is
local in nature, has historically and constitutionally belonged
to the States. That division of authority was not accidental.
It was designed as a safeguard against centralized power. When
we ignore that structure, we don't just make a policy mistake;
we create a system ripe for abuse, a playground for
bureaucrats, a lever for political agendas, and a direct threat
to the liberties we are sworn to protect.
That is why I have called for the repeal of the FACE Act,
not only because of who it has been used against, but because
of what is represented, an expansion of Federal power and a
breakdown of constitutional limited. The Federal Government
should not be in the business of policing local conduct through
expansive criminal statutes. If we are serious about protecting
liberty, then we must be serious about limiting power. Because
once Washington takes it, it doesn't give it back.
One final point, a point of personal privilege, is I have
tried to be consistent on this point to the extent of opposing
or raising questions about legislation that is supported by
people that are, shall I say, politically aligned typically, or
issues that I care passionately about issues such as
transgender surgeries or issues involving law enforcement who
are being targeted locally or cops who are killed, that are not
getting justice in one jurisdiction or another.
I believe that we need to have this debate and this
conversation about how much authority should be vested in the
Federal Government in the form of criminal laws. Because I
assure you that my colleagues who have concerns about this
administration and those of us who had concerns about the last,
the point that the Founders were making was that we should
leave those authorities and those powers to the people and to
the governments in the States closest to them, and not
centralize that power in such a way that it can, in fact, be
used against the people.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses.
I now yield to the Ranking Member for her opening
statement.
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Well, today is the third time in as many years that this
Subcommittee, under Republican leadership, is holding a hearing
to undermine the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or
the FACE Act, fourth, if you count the markup of the Chair's
FACE Act Repeal Act last year. Eliminating the FACE Act is a
Right-wing policy priority drawn directly from the extremist
Project 2025 manifesto, page 558, to be precise.
No matter how many times the enemies of reproductive rights
try to rewrite history or drum up new conspiracies about the
FACE Act, the facts stay the same. We continue to see criminal
obstruction of and threats, intimidation, and violence against
abortion providers and women seeking those services. The FACE
Act is needed now as much as it has ever been.
In 1994, Congress passed the FACE Act with bipartisan
support to address rising violence against abortion and
reproductive healthcare providers. Over the years, that
violence has included arsons, bombings, chemical attacks,
blockades, murders, and attempted murders of abortion providers
and bystanders.
Specifically, the FACE Act protects the people who work in
or seek care at facilities providing access to abortion and
other reproductive healthcare services, as well as places of
religious worship. It protects them from the use of force,
threats, intimidation, or physical obstruction.
For decades, the same coordinated extreme anti-choice
forces whose violent conduct created the need for the FACE Act
in the first place have tried to undermine the law as part of
their unpopular mission to gut access to reproductive
healthcare and, effectively, ban abortion in the United States.
Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022,
anti-abortion extremists have been emboldened, fueling a
resurgence of violence and harassment against abortion
providers. A report from the National Abortion Federation
documented 777 instances of obstruction of clinics in 2024. In
the last two years, there have been 296 incidents of death
threats and other threats of violence aimed at abortion
providers and their patients.
For years, our Republican colleagues have tried to warp
reality, and today's hearing is more of the same. They are
claiming that people were arrested under the FACE Act for
praying. That's just not true. Praying is not unlawful conduct,
but you can't mask unlawful conduct, including violent threats
or blockading entrances to clinics, with performative prayer.
Those threats and physical harassment are crimes, and they
jeopardize people's access to potentially lifesaving care.
Take, for example, one woman's story from Michigan. After
struggling with infertility, she finally got pregnant, but at
12 weeks she and her husband got devastating news. Their baby
had an extremely rare abnormality and he wouldn't survive
birth. If she continued the pregnancy, her ability to have
children in the future would be at risk and her life would be
at risk as well. She and her husband made the decision to
terminate the pregnancy.
On the morning of her appointment at a local reproductive
healthcare clinic, she arrived to find people blocking the
entrance. A group approached them, trying to force her to take
graphic pamphlets and telling her she could stop a murder from
happening. The harassment continued even after the couple moved
their car. She and her husband had to leave out of fear for
their safety, even though she needed immediate medical
attention. They were only able to return after police arrived,
arrested the disruptors, and removed them.
In another instance, five anti-abortion extremists forced
their way into a clinic in Virginia and attempted to grab a
patient. The patient's friend had to step in and help the
clinic staff usher the invaders out.
We are talking about women and their loved ones facing
terror, threats of injury, and having to physical fight people
off, just to receive legal healthcare for serious medical
needs. It shouldn't be that way. That is why we have the FACE
Act.
Republicans have seized on a false narrative that the Biden
Justice Department selectively enforced the law. That's not
true.
This month, as Chair Roy has related, Trump's Department of
Justice issued a report claiming that the former administration
used the FACE Act to go after allegedly peaceful prolife
protestors. I should note that this report has been variously
described across multiple outlets as cherry-picked, shoddy,
misleading, hypocritical, inaccurate, incomplete, and a
distortion of the truth that disregards multiple court rulings
and jury verdicts. It parrots longstanding anti-abortion
conspiracies, particularly those championed in the extremist
Project 2025 manifesto.
There is no credible evidence that prior administrations
selectively enforced the FACE Act against anti-abortion
protestors. To the extent that there is any disparity in FACE
Act prosecutions of attacks on abortion clinics versus prolife
facilities, it is simply a reflection of the facts. Abortion
providers and their patients face significantly higher threats
and levels of violence than other entities covered by the
statute.
The actions of the Trump Administration and its Right-wing
allies, including our Republican colleagues, to undermine the
FACE Act have invited anti-abortion extremists to carry out
even more dangerous and hostile acts against women seeking
healthcare and their medical providers.
The President's firing of lawyers who prosecuted FACE Act
violations, along with pardons for people who were convicted by
juries of harassing and attacking abortion providers and their
patients, only further emboldens people to commit these crimes.
In fact, we have already seen pardoned anti-abortion activists
go back to commit similar acts.
Last July, six people, two of whom received Trump pardons
for FACE Act violations, were arrested after invading a clinic
in my District in Delaware County, Pennsylvania. They have gone
on to be arrested again after their plea bargains were
affirmed. They lied to get into the Delaware County facility,
and then harassed patients and staff until the police removed
them.
If my Republican colleagues want to examine the real
dangers of an out-of-control executive using the government to
attack its political enemies, they should be holding hearings
to examine what the Trump Administration is doing right now.
How about deploying American troops and armed and masked
Federal agents to our city streets to shutdown opposition and
threatening assaulting and even killing people who would hold
them accountable?
How about using warrantless searches to arrest American
citizens in their own homes? Or labeling people who disagree
with the President's policies as domestic terrorists under
NSPM-7? Putting their names on secret government lists and
demanding that tech companies' hand over the identities of
Americans who organize or share their dissenting opinions
online? If we are talking about Federal intrusion into areas
reserved to the States, how about this administration's
attempts to Federalize our elections and seize State voter
rolls? Why aren't we holding hearings about that?
In politicizing a law meant to keep all Americans safe,
anti-abortion extremists are openly attempting to lay the
groundwork for a national abortion ban. Their goal is to scare,
threaten, and physically obstruct women from accessing
reproductive healthcare.
The Majority of Americans agree, all women deserve the
freedom to work with their doctors and their families to decide
on the healthcare that is right for them without the meddling
of radical politicians or religious extremists. No one should
be denied medical care because of someone else's religious or
political beliefs. I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I now recognize the Chair of the Full Committee,
Mr. Jordan, for his opening statement.
Chair Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I can't think of a better time to have this hearing. Last
week, we learned that the Southern Poverty Law Center was
running a scam. The Southern Poverty Law Center who said,
quote, ``The prolife movement is fundamentally antidemocratic,'
'' was running a scam, paying $3 million to, quote,
``informants'' to go foment the hate they told the world they
were actually supposed to be fighting. This is exactly the
right time to have this hearing, for goodness' sake.
The Southern Poverty Law Center that the Biden Justice
Department used to train lawyers to go deal with the FACE Act?
You've got to be kidding me. The Southern Poverty Law Center,
which was cited in the now famous memorandum--we have the
Thomas More Society here; they remember this--where they said
prolife Catholics were extremists, guess who they cited in that
memo? The Southern Poverty Law Center.
I remember when Rahm Emanuel said, ``Never let crisis go to
waste.'' Well, the SPLC took it further. They said: We're going
to create the crisis, so we can go after prolife groups using
the FACE Act, and whatever else.
The Ranking Member can talk about, oh, we have had three
hearings on this. Well, this one couldn't be better timed. This
is exactly what we need to be talking about, in light of the
fact they have been indicted for running a $3 million scam
against the people who were supporting them, and going out and
going after prolife people, like Eva Edl, the 90-year-old. The
Chair talked about her history and what she is doing, praying
at a clinic.
I'm glad you are all here and I look forward to hearing
your testimony. I thank the Chair for putting this hearing
together. With that, I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I thank the Chair. I will now recognize the
Ranking Member of the Full Committee, Mr. Raskin, for his
opening statement.
Mr. Raskin. Mr. Chair, thank you very much. I want to thank
all our witnesses for joining us today.
We are in a weird time warp groove with our friends across
the aisle. Most of their energy is now focused on pardoning
people who attacked the Capitol on January 6th, wounding and
injuring 150 of our police officers, disfiguring and disabling
some of them for life.
Their time is spent vacating the criminal convictions of
the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, who engaged in seditious
conspiracy against the U.S. Government, which means conspiring
to overthrow and put down the government. Now, the Department
of Justice wants to vacate those convictions that were handed
down by unanimous juries.
They want to give millions of dollars to convicted
criminals like Michael Flynn, for example, President Trump's
disgraced former National Security Advisor. They gave him $1.5
million for a lawsuit he brought against the government and
already lost. He lost it in court, and nonetheless, they wrote
him a check for $1.5 million.
They wrote a check for another $1.5 million, or $1.25
million, to Carter Page, who unsuccessfully sued the government
for damages and losing four different lawsuits. Nonetheless,
they just wrote him a check of the taxpayers' money, $1.25
million.
Now, they are all lining up at the trough. A lot of the
January 6th insurrectionists wanted their $1.25 million payout.
Donald Trump has sued the IRS for 10, no, forgive me, not
$10 million--$10 billion. He wants 80 percent of the IRS budget
that he is suing the government for. He is also suing for the
search warrants handed down by an independent, neutral
magistrate, where they executed a search on Mar-a-Lago and
found lots of classified documents and confidential and secret
documents he shouldn't have had. He is suing there for several
hundred million dollars as well. It is a big piggy bank for
them.
Now, we are having our third hearing about the claim, I'm
not sure I fully understand it, but I think the claim is that
the activists who forcibly blocked health clinic entrances and
prevented women from accessing lawful reproductive health
services were somehow unjustly prosecuted under the FACE Act,
which they intimate is unconstitutional, but eight different
Federal Circuit Courts have upheld its constitutionality as a
perfectly lawful exercise of Congress' powers under the
Commerce Clause and not in any way in violation of the First
Amendment. OK? They continue to want to pander to people who
think that they should never have been prosecuted for their
criminal conduct.
This hearing is an after-the-fact justification for
President Trump's antichoice pander pardons which took place
last year. As one of his first acts in office, he pardoned
nearly two dozen people convicted, again, by unanimous juries,
of FACE Act-related crimes, including one of the witnesses here
today, Ms. Edl. As with the January 6th rioters and
insurrectionists that he pardoned, Trump and his MAGA allies
are attempting to rewrite history to portray convicted criminal
conduct as peaceful protests and to cast the dedicated public
servants who sought to protect patient safety as the villains.
Let's discuss some of the facts of Ms. Edl's case. She was
pardoned by President Trump and invited as an example of the
so-called ``peaceful protestors.'' A jury convicted her, along
with six coconspirators of Federal civil rights offenses,
including a FACE Act violation arising out of their blockade of
a reproductive healthcare clinic in Sterling Heights, Michigan,
in August 2020.
A jury of her peers, not deep-State prosecutors, a jury of
her peers drawn from her community convicted her by unanimous
vote after a trial by an impartial Federal judge. She was one
of two defendants convicted of another FACE Act violation
arising out of their actions in yet another clinic blockade in
Saginaw, Michigan.
Now, I have no problems with the fact that Ms. Edl and
others like her have strong moral convictions about this, as
did Martin Luther King and John Lewis. They had strong moral
convictions about Jim Crow apartheid and segregation in
America, and they participated in civil disobedience. They
violated various trespass laws in different cases, and they
were arrested for it, and they were willing to accept their
punishment as the price for trying to get a law they considered
or actions by the government reversed and to dismantle racial
segregation.
What these protestors have a problem with is other people
accessing their own healthcare. The civil rights protestors
weren't trying to stop people from getting healthcare, and they
were willing to, nonetheless, accept the consequences of having
a sit-in, or whatever. Here, they don't seem to want to accept
the fact that they violated the law. In fact, they violated the
law precisely to prevent other people from exercising their
constitutionally protected rights to healthcare. That is
exactly what they were doing. I'm afraid there is a huge
difference between them and other people who have participated
in civil disobedience in the past.
We got a statement from the founder and operator of the
Sterling Heights clinic, who was present that day, which I'm
going to enter into the record in full, that described what
happened.
Mr. Raskin. She writes this:
Perhaps the most dangerous and appalling episode of clinic
violence I've ever experienced since the FACE Act became law
took place in August 2020. Our Sterling Heights clinic was
blockaded by extremists who prevented me and other staff from
entering the clinic. Patients were stuck in their cars,
including three women who were coming in for medical abortions
following the detection of fatal fetal anomalies.
One woman was actively losing amniotic fluid and was
scheduled for the second day of a two-day procedure. She needed
immediate medical attention. She huddled with her mother and
her husband trapped in the parking lot while extremists
plastered signs of fake fetuses on her car windows and shouted,
``God loves you. God loves your baby.'' The woman cried back,
``I know God loves me. I know God loves my baby, but my baby is
dying.'' Her baby was missing most of its brain and had no
kidneys. This woman later shared her powerful testimony at
trial.
As eight different Circuit Courts have found, Congress has
the power under the Commerce Clause to protect people against
being harassed and interfered with as they go to get medical
attention. The FACE Act is a legitimate exercise of
Congressional power, and they people were properly arrested and
prosecuted for perhaps their very morally, sincerely held
views, but they violated the law.
These politically motivated pardons of FACE Act violators,
as well as January 6ers and dozens of white-collar criminals
and fraudsters, are all part of a political strategy that has
got nothing to do with justice. Now, this is the equivalent of
the government giving people a green light to go out and break
the law. Indeed, there are numerous reports that President
Trump has been pardoning promises, has been promising pardons
rather, to everyone who works for him.
As President Trump continues to endanger public safety with
pardons like this, they are making threats against the Southern
Poverty Law Center, which is the main not-for-profit
organizational antagonist to the Ku Klux Klan and the neo-Nazi
and the White extremist groups. They are being investigated and
prosecuted for having sent people undercover to research what
is going on in those groups, to get the information to
government for prosecution.
Now, the administration, which has pardoned 1,600
extremists who attacked the U.S. Capitol, who violently
assaulted our police officers, and tried to overthrow a
Presidential election, which Joe Biden won by more than seven
million votes, 306-232 in the Electoral College, well, now,
after having pardoned all of those people, they want to attack
the Southern Poverty Law Center. That is an amazing attack on
the First Amendment for real.
I yield back to you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Roy. Without objection, all other opening statements
will be included in the record.
Mr. Roy. We will now introduce today's witnesses.
Ms. Eva Edl. Ms. Edl is a prolife advocate who came to the
United States after surviving a communist concentration camp
after the end of World War II. In 2023, she was prosecuted by
the Biden Administration under the FACE Act for protesting at
an abortion clinic. She was pardoned by President Trump in
January 2025.
Mr. Christopher Ferrara. Mr. Ferrara is a Senior Counsel at
the Thomas More Society, a public interest law firm. Mr.
Ferrara's practice focuses on cases involving the sanctity of
life, religious liberty, and parental rights. He founded the
American Catholic Lawyers Association in 1990.
Mr. Roger Severino. Mr. Severino is the Vice President of
Economic and Domestic Policy and the Joseph C. and Elizabeth A.
Anderlik Fellow at the Heritage Foundation. He previously
served as the Director of the Office of Civil Rights at the
Department of Health and Human Services.
Professor Jessica Waters. Ms. Waters is a Senior Scholar in
residence for Justice, Law, and Criminology at the American
University Washington College of Law. She previously served as
the American University Dean of Undergraduate Education and
Vice Provost for Academic Student Services.
We thank our witnesses for appearing today.
We will begin by swearing you in. Would you please rise and
raise your right hand?
Do you swear or affirm under penalty of perjury that the
testimony you are about to give is true and correct to the best
of your knowledge, information, and belief, so help you God?
Let the record reflect that the witnesses have answered in
the affirmative.
Thank you, and you may be seated.
Please know that your written testimony will be entered in
the record in its entirety. Accordingly, we ask that you
summarize your testimony in five minutes.
Ms. Edl, you may begin. I will just remind you to have your
microphone turned on, I believe it is, and to speak clearly
into the microphone.
STATEMENT OF EVA EDL
Ms. Edl. I'll try.
Mr. Roy. You might want to pull that microphone a little
closer, if that's possible. There we go. Thank you, Ms. Edl.
You may begin.
Ms. Edl. Chair Roy, Ranking Member Scanlon, and the Members
of the Subcommittee, my name, as I have said, is Eva Edl. Thank
you for inviting me to speak to you today.
As I say in my biography, as a young child, I was taken to
a communist death camp and survived only by the grace of God.
When I came to this country, I was so grateful to see that
the respect-that this country respected life. To my horror,
even this country lost its moral compass when abortion was
legalized in 1973.
I knew from basic biology that human life begins when an
ovum and sperm unite. I knew I could not remain silent, and I
knew I had to speak in defense of the preborn babies.
In 1988, I became aware of the existence of abortion
clinics, which I view as our American death camps. On TV, I
watched women take their babies inside to be killed, and it
reminded me of my ride in the cattle car that took me as a
young girl to the death camp.
While being locked up in that car, I wished that some
people would have put their bodies on those tracks to bring
that train to a stop and set us free.
I thought of the word of the Lord Jesus in Matthew 7,
``that I should do unto others as I would have them do unto
me.'' I knew I had to place my body between those victims and
the abortionists, no matter what the cost.
For the prolife movement, this is what we call ``rescue.''
We call it an interposing, putting ourselves in danger to save
someone else.
In 1988, I also learned of a rescue plan for October in
Atlanta. I decided to join them. People were peacefully sitting
in front of the door of the abortion clinic and not moving;
consequently, shutting the business down at least until
everyone was arrested.
When we are at clinics like that, it's like sitting in
front of the train tracks. While we are being arrested, our
sidewalk counselors have the opportunity to offer help to young
women, and hopefully, persuade them to give their life to their
children.
Then, in 1994, when I heard that Senator Ted Kennedy
introduced the FACE Act, I knew that things would change. I
knew that we rescuers would be targeted.
Prolifers who continue to put their bodies between the
abortionists and innocent victims today will continue to be
targeted by this unjust law until it is repealed.
Yet, despite knowing this, when the Lord asks you to do
something, you just simply do it, no matter the cost. After
all, he gave his life to save us.
There are many others who have answered this sacrificial
call. In my case, I was only charged with a first offense
misdemeanor in Tennessee, but in Michigan, I was convicted of
two separate violations of FACE and one violation of conspiracy
against rights and faced up to 13 years in prison and up to
$300,000 in fines.
I am before you today. I plead with our government to
repeal the FACE Act because it is targeting people who want to
do right. After all, we have enough laws that, if somebody does
something wrong, we have the means to punish them.
I plead with our government to stop the killing and go back
to the foundational principle that our forefathers built this
country on: That all human life has equal value before God.
If we do not have an awakening of our national conscious,
then we will exterminate our posterity. Indeed, our next
victims will be the elderly and the sick through the so-called
``assisted death.''
We are aborting those who would be our country's future,
who will take care of us when we are old. When we do not
respect human life, it becomes very disposable.
Yet, where there is life, there is hope. It is this hope
that has carried me over 90 years through World War II, a
genocide, and Tito's horrific camps, all the way to today.
While I may not see the end of abortion in my own lifetime,
I have the unshakeable hope that the truth will prevail and
that our Nation will soon recognize the value of all human
life.
Let us act by beginning to repeal the FACE Act. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Edl follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Roy. Thank you, Ms. Edl. Mr. Ferrara, you may begin.
STATEMENT OF CHRISTOPHER A. FERRARA
Mr. Ferrara. I thank the Committee for this opportunity to
argue in favor of repeal of the FACE Act.
The FACE Act was supposedly a viewpoint-neutral protection
of abortion clinic access. It contained a disclaimer that it
would not prohibit First Amendment protected conduct or create
new remedies for interference with that conduct.
We members of the prolife bar were not fooled. The FACE Act
targeted a particular social justice movement, the prolife
activist movement. It created a new category of Federal
offenses, civil and criminal, based on what were purely matters
of local law involving citizens and other minor offenses
committed in the context of nonviolent civil disobedience no
different from what Dr. Martin Luther King defended in his
Letter from a Birmingham Jail.
As for the acts of violence in the course of the movement,
there were acts of violence, and they were prosecuted
appropriately under local law. Consider Paul Hill, who was
executed under State law in Florida in 2003. No need of FACE to
bring him to justice.
I've had 25 years of experience defending FACE claims,
almost entirely in opposition to attorneys general, and I have
seen how, with dreary predictability, the terms ``force,''
``threat of force,'' and ``physical obstruction'' in FACE have
become so elastic as to reach even de minimis conduct that
would not even warrant a desk appearance ticket under local
law.
Even the most fleeting physical contact has been found to
constitute force. The most minimal impediments of clinic
workers or clients on the sidewalk have been found to
constitute physical obstruction. Mere references to God's
judgment on death have been found to constitute threats of
force.
The FACE Act has been used to impose ridiculous
injunctions; totally unheard of in any other context. Speech-
free buffer zones, bubble zones, and even floating bubble zones
around clinics have created for prolife advocates, and them
only, exactly what Justice Scalia described in McCullen v.
Coakley., quote: ``An entirely separate abridged edition of the
First Amendment applicable to speech against abortion.''
Consider, also, FACE's mode of requirement. If you stand in
front of an abortion clinic worker outside a clinic to demand
money that you are owed, delaying that person, no law is
violated. Stand in front of the same person to offer prolife
literature and discuss alternatives to abortion, and you've
just violated FACE.
Even worse, FACE is being combined with 18 U.S.C. 241,
prohibiting conspiracies against rights, which elevates
misdemeanor FACE violations into Federal felonies. The result
has been preposterous prison sentences.
Consider the clinic sit-in at a D.C. abortion clinic in
2020 called a ``blockade'' by the government. Because a clinic
staffer allegedly suffered from a sprained ankle, all the
participants were found guilty of a crime of violence, as
coconspirators, and were sent immediately to prison after the
verdict.
Joan Bell, 27 months in Federal prison for a 77-year-old
grandmother.
Jean Marshall, 24 months in Federal prison for a 77-year-
old retired nurse.
Heather Idoni, 24 months in Federal prison for a 61-year-
old grandmother.
Consider the case of Beverlyn-Bevelyn Beatty, 41 months in
Federal prison for the mother of a two-year-old girl, based on
uttering political hyperbole and allegedly causing a minor hand
injury.
Well, thank God Trump pardoned all these victims of FACE
and many more political prisoners that he rescued from the
Biden Administration's Gulag.
Now, we have the massive DOJ report on weaponization of
FACE by the Biden Justice Department. That report reveals a
comment by an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the case of U.S. v.
Jastrow, which says it all concerning the Biden
Administration's weaponization of FACE against religiously
motivated prolife activists. I quote,
Unfortunately, we ended up with a very Catholic magistrate on
duty this week and he was very particular about bond conditions
and not infringing on First Amendment rights. At the end, we
ended up with overly lawyered bond conditions that would be
difficult to enforce.
Well, there we have it anti-Catholic bigotry on full display in
a public record pertaining to the Biden Administration's
vindictive FACE Act prosecutions.
We have never seen anything like this pernicious law in
American history. For the sake of freedom and justice in
America, the FACE Act must be repealed.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ferrara follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Roy. Thank you, Mr. Ferrara. Mr. Severino, you may
begin.
STATEMENT OF ROGER T. SEVERINO
Mr. Severino. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to build off comments from your opening statement
and to consider a few different scenarios, and what could
actually be the common thread.
Scenario 1. You want to build a pool in your house, and the
people doing the construction move the dirt from the hole into
some soggy area of your land.
Scenario 2. You're cleaning a gutter from your house, and
you get up on top and you notice that there is a bird nest
there that you push off to the side to the ground.
Scenario 3. You go with your son to a National Park, and
you discover an Indian arrowhead that you keep as a souvenir.
Scenario 4. You're walking down the street, and you see a
protest going on. It could be in front of an abortion clinic.
It could be in front of a pregnancy resource center. You get
into a heated debate and there's an altercation that ensues.
The common thread among those four scenarios is that they
may be Federal crimes. The thing is, you're not really sure if
they are or they aren't. It really depends on the prosecution
and what their theory of the case is, and what facts they
cherry-pick, and worst of all, whether or not the identity of
the alleged perpetrator is perhaps of the same political party
or not of the prosecutor. All these things are a result of
overcriminalization. The FACE Act is a poster child of
overcriminalization. Now, whatever you think about the
underlying issue to be addressed in any of those cases, are the
wrongs to be addressed at the Federal level? Is everything
meant to be, literally, a Federal case?
Under our constitutional system, it was designed such that
the Federal Government is one of enumerated powers. It only has
the power that was given to it by the people specifically in
the Constitution. It cannot act unless Congress is authorized
by a specific provision in the Constitution.
Now, the problem is, Congress has used the Commerce Clause
as its catchall to cover every single aspect of American life,
such that we have 5,200 different crimes. My former colleague
at the Heritage Foundation, Giancarlo Canaparo, catalogued
these crimes, but his chilling finding was he couldn't be sure,
either.
Nobody knows how many Federal crimes there are. The
Department of Justice was tasked to actually try to figure this
out and they gave up. They did not know how many Federal crimes
there are.
When you add to this the fact that there are 300,000
regulatory crimes, let me repeat that, 300,000 regulatory
crimes, where some bureaucrat decided to amend a regulation
that then becomes a crime, well, are we really a Nation of laws
or not?
We have delegated far too much authority to Federal
bureaucrats, and that discretion has given unchecked power that
has been abused with the FACE Act and other cases. Let me give
you a few examples.
There was a person who was importing undersized lobsters
from Honduras, and unfortunately, didn't know the Honduran
regulations and packed them in plastic bags instead of boxes.
What Federal crime was violated? Well, it was done--no Federal
crime actually. A Honduran crime perhaps was committed, but
because he violated a Honduran crime, that became a Federal
crime under the Lacey Act. Who knew that, if you don't follow
Honduras' laws for packing lobsters in plastic versus boxes,
you might be committing a Federal crime?
Now, sticking with Fish and Game, in Florida, a fisherman
was capturing some grouper, and they were, again, undersized. A
Fish and Game Warden came by and said, ``Wow, they look
undersized.'' When the warden left, the fisherman threw some of
the fish away to try to kind of hide the evidence.
Now, he was charged with a Federal crime under Sarbanes-
Oxley, an Enron-related bill that was designed to go after
people and accountants that were shredding evidence in an
investigation. All of a sudden, the Federal agent said, ``You
know what? A fish is a whole lot like a document.'' The Supreme
Court said, ``no, it's not; a fish is a fish; it's not a
document.''
On with one more example. I was the Nation's HIPAA
regulator, and I had the power to issue regulations which also
had the force and effect of law.
The case of Eithan Haim, a whistleblower doctor in Texas
who discovered that Texas Children's Hospital, despite what
they were saying, was still giving cross-sex sterilizing
treatments to minors possibly in violation of law.
He blew the whistle, and the Biden DOJ went after him, not
the hospital, for an alleged HIPAA violation 10 years potential
prison time for looking into files, not disclosing any
protected health information, but verified that, in fact, the
hospital was lying.
This shows that our laws have been weaponized, such that we
are no longer a Nation of laws, but a Nation of men with
unchecked authority to go after political enemies whenever they
like.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Severino follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Roy. Mr. Severino, thank you for your statement.
Professor Waters, you may begin.
STATEMENT OF JESSICA L. WATERS
Ms. Waters. Chair Roy, Ranking Member Scanlon, and the
Members of the Committee, and the Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for inviting me back to testify today. I appreciated
our conversation related to FACE during the December 2024
hearing before this Committee, and I look forward to additional
constructive dialog today.
The specific provisions of FACE are outlined in my written
testimony, but in brief, FACE created criminal penalties and
civil remedies against specific types of intentional violent,
threatening, or obstructive conduct directed at people
providing or obtaining reproductive health services or seeking
to exercise First Amendment religious rights at houses of
worship.
A few concepts are key there:
(1) FACE prohibits specific conduct, not speech.
(2) FACE requires that the conduct be intentional; that is,
directed at preventing the seeking or provision of reproductive
health-
care or the exercise of religious rights at houses of worship.
(3) FACE expressly excludes nonthreatening, nonobstructive
speech from its purview, as it must, as the First Amendment
demands that protection.
We have heard other witnesses opine today that FACE should
be repealed and that it is somehow unconstitutional. Let us be
clear: That is simply not what the law says.
Every Federal court to consider such arguments has
unequivocally held that FACE was a constitutional exercise of
Congress' authority. This is not an area where circuits are
split or where the laws are unclear. Whether the challenge has
been on Commerce Clause grounds, First Amendment speech
grounds, First Amendment free exercise grounds, or Tenth
Amendment grounds, the courts have said the same thing: FACE is
constitutionally sound and based on extensive legislative
findings about the need for a Federal remedy to combat a
nationwide campaign of violence.
Lest there be any confusion, this unanimity is true both
pre- and post-Dobbs. A few post-Dobbs cases illustrate this
point.
For example, in 2025, the Sixth Circuit confronted the
question squarely of whether FACE's long-affirmed
constitutionally constitutionality was impacted by the Dobbs
decision. The Sixth Circuit held that Dobbs had no effect on
FACE's constitutionality, finding that, quote,
The Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs provides no basis to
reconsider prior holdings that FACE is a constitutional
exercise of Congress' power under the Commerce Clause.
The Sixth Circuit also directly affirmed its prior decisions
holding that FACE did not run afoul of the First Amendment
speech or free exercise protections.
Notably, in the case in which Ms. Edl was a codefendant,
United States v. Gallagher, the Tennessee District Court
confronted this same question and flatly rejected any argument
that Dobbs undermined FACE--FACE's constitutionality or
protections. As the Court wrote, and I quote,
What did the holding and essential reasoning of Dobbs change
about the interstate nature of the reproductive health field?
Nothing. Those issues were not even remotely raised by the case
which involved a State statute.
Other courts to reach this question have found the exact
same thing. This includes a New York Court, the D.C. District
Court, and a Pennsylvania District Court.
Where I think Dobbs does matter in this equation is in two
areas that actually underscore the need for FACE.
First, Dobbs returned the abortion question to the States,
leaving us now in a patchwork of laws across the country. By
the end of 2025, 13 States had total abortion bans and six more
have 6-12-weeks abortion bans.
As has been well-documented, the number of abortions did
not decline nationwide after these bans went into effect.
Instead, what happened is people who lived in States with bans
traveled to other States that protected access to reproductive
healthcare. A hundred and seventy thousand patients traveled in
2023; 150,000 in 2024, and 140,000 in 2025. That is, patients
and clinics engaged in interstate commerce, the very basis on
which FACE left rests.
Finally, following Dobbs, there was an almost immediate
spike in major incidents targeting reproductive healthcare
providers, including arsons, burglaries, and death threats. In
2023 and 2024, the National Abortion Federation documented
three arsons, 13 invasions, 169 incidents of vandalism, 621
incidents of trespass, 296 death threats, 38 assaults and
battery, 777 counts of obstruction, and 12 bomb threats.
Though I wish it wasn't the case, the continued campaign of
nationwide intimidation and violence against reproductive
healthcare providers highlight the continued need for FACE. As
I said in 2024, the bottom line is this: People should be able
to seek medical care, and medical professionals should be able
to provide it, without fear of violence or intimidation. This
is an issue that warrants a Federal remedy.
I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Waters follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Roy. I thank the witness for her testimony. I will now
recognize the gentleman from North Carolina for five minutes.
Mr. Harris. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thanks to all the
witnesses for being a part of this today.
Mr. Ferrara, as a pastor, and now, a Congressman, I have
unequivocally stood firm on the importance of protecting the
sanctity of life. It is undeniable that every life is a
precious gift from God, created with inherent dignity and
purpose. This truth has encouraged prolifers across the country
to push back on the pro-abortion rhetoric by serving outside of
abortion clinic to pray, to counsel women who feel they have
run out of options, and to reaffirm the sacred truth that the
unborn have value.
The way in which the Biden Administration weaponized the
FACE Act against prolifers was indefensible and it makes me
fear that these actions have discouraged others from getting
involved in the fight for the unborn.
I would ask you, Mr. Ferrara, in your view, do FACE Act
prosecutions against prolifers create a chilling effect among
those in the prolive movement?
Mr. Roy. Mr. Ferrara, can you use your microphone?
Mr. Harris. Your mic, please.
Mr. Ferrara. They most certainly do. As I indicated during
my testimony, Justice Scalia rightly observed that we have,
through the application of the FACE Act, a separate and
distinct abridged version of the First Amendment for prolife
advocates.
The injunctions issued under the authority of FACE have no
precedent in American law. They are, as I said during my
testimony, ridiculous. Bubble zones, floating bubble zones,
speech-free areas to prevent even a discussion of alternatives
to abortion, all enacted in the name of protecting what turned
out to be the nonexistent right to abortion.
Yes, I think that this is a case of unprecedented
restrictions on activities, some of which do involve civil
disobedience. Civil disobedience, like it or not, is part of
the American tradition of social justice movements.
I'll tell you this: What I don't see in the prolife
movement, even at the height of the rescue movement in the
1990s, is cities burning; police officers being attacked;
Molotov cocktails being thrown into businesses; police officers
being pelted with bottles filled with ice, and not just death
threats, but actual acts of violence on a massive scale not the
isolated acts we saw in the prolife movement in the nineties,
which were punished appropriately under criminal law. As I
indicated, Paul Hill was put to death. You can't do better than
capital punishment for punishing lawless activity.
My testimony has made clear, that FACE has, for the first
time in American history, singled out a single protest movement
for treatment under the law that has never been meted out to
any other social justice movement in our Nation's history.
Mr. Harris. Let me ask you a followup to that. During
President Trump's first year in office, he took action to
correct the injustices that occurred during the Biden-Harris
Administration's enforcement of the FACE Act by issuing pardons
to several of the prolifers that were unjustly targeted. Would
you say what response have you seen from the prolife movement
and your clients regarding President Trump's actions?
Mr. Ferrara. Gratitude, and thanks to God for justice done.
The sentences handed out, some of which I mentioned in my
testimony, are absolutely absurd years in Federal prison for
nonviolent conduct, the worst of it being someone's hand was
injured or there was a sprained ankle. Then, with the
combination of Section 241, conspiracy against rights,
multiyear prison sentences for nonviolent conduct.
Again, these things could be handled, and had always been
handled, as matters of local law. By the way, the system is
capable of handling these matters. If you have repeat offenders
who are trespassing, sooner or later, they'll end up in a jail
cell, and that might be appropriate.
Mr. Harris. Correct. Unfortunately, what we are hearing
today is part of a larger pattern of an anti-Christian bias we
witnessed under the Biden-Harris Administration. Thanks to this
Committee's work in the past, we learned that the Biden-Harris
FBI used its resources to spy on Catholics in Richmond. On top
of that, in today's hearings, we are hearing stories of prolife
activists being unjustly targeted by the Biden-Harris DOJ,
while attacks on churches and prolife pregnancy centers went
largely ignored.
In the last 30 seconds, I just want to ask you, Mr.
Ferrara, is it fair to say that the Biden-Harris
Administration's DOJ displayed clear anti-Christian bias in its
actions, including its enforcement of the FACE Act?
Mr. Ferrara. Well, there's no question about it. Even FBI
Director Wray admitted that the report had been issued out of
the Richmond office, characterizing traditionalist Catholics
and I'm one of them, and I attend that parish in Richmond as,
basically, domestic terrorists. He professed to be embarrassed
by the memo and said it was only a localized product. It turned
out that this was false. This memo had been widely circulated
in FBI channels. Yes, the answer is yes.
Mr. Harris. Thank you, sir. Mr. Chair, I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from North Carolina. I will
recognize the Ranking Member first and the unanimous consent
request.
Ms. Scanlon. Thanks. First, I have an article from The
Atlantic, dated April 20, 2026, ``The DOJ's First
`Weaponization' Report Is a Bust. The document purports to show
bias under Biden Administration--and fails spectacularly.''
Second, I have a DOJ press release on an Ohio woman who was
prosecuted for attacking a pregnancy resource center, December
8, 2023.
Another one, DOJ press release about dated April 10, 2024,
concerning prosecution of someone who fire-bombed a Madison
building because of anti-abortion.
Next, I have a press release from the DOJ, December 20,
2024, ``Florida Woman Convicted of Civil Rights Conspiracy for
Targeting Pregnancy Resource Centers.''
Another DOJ press release from January 19, 2023, titled,
``FBI Offering $25,000 Reward for information on attacks
against reproductive health service facilities.''
Mr. Roy. Without objection.
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I now recognize the Ranking Member of the Full
Committee, Mr. Raskin.
Mr. Raskin. Mr. Chair, thank you very much.
I know our friends are desperate to change the subject from
President Trump's aggressive insults to the Pope, saying that
he is weak on nuclear weapons and weak on crime, and his online
impersonation of Jesus Christ, who he later claimed he was
actually he thought that was an image of him playing a doctor.
Of course, he is not a doctor, either. He is neither a doctor
nor Jesus Christ.
In any event, that doesn't make the FACE Act anti-
Christian, and if you think it is, then go ahead and bring
another failed lawsuit against the FACE Act and claim that it
violates the Free Exercise Clause. It does not.
In 2022, the Supreme Court in the Dobbs case reversed
itself in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, and Roe v. Wade. The
right to abortion was not legalized in 1973. It was legal in
most of the country. What the Supreme Court did was strike down
abortion bans criminalizing abortion.
In any event, since the Dobbs decision, 21 States now have
a total or a substantial ban on abortion affecting the rights
directly of 29 million American women. The 169,000 of them at
least, they have had to cross State lines in interstate
commerce to seek the medical attention that they need.
It is not enough for our friends now to allow State
legislatures to ban other people's medical decisions. They want
to repeal the FACE Act, so they can directly blockade hospitals
and medical clinics. That is the very clear implication of what
Mr. Ferrara was just saying that you should have a
constitutional right to do what has been made criminal by
Congress in the FACE Act, after nine or ten doctors and other
medical staff were killed in attacks on people working in
abortion clinics.
Now, Ms. Waters, I want to ask you, is there any reason to
think that there is a constitutional right to blockade other
people from obtaining medical attention?
Ms. Waters. There is no reason to think there's a
constitutional right to interfere with other people seeking
medical attention. FACE is very clear on this point and very
deliberate, and the legislative history is clear. This was very
deliberate.
What speech gets at, or what FACE gets at is conduct,
right? It's violence. It's threats. It's intimidation. It's
blockades. FACE expressly excludes pure speech that does not do
those things. Right?
What we're talking about here is I hear talk of these
crimes were minor and these things were insignificant. When I
look at the stats of what's actually happening on the ground,
11 abortion providers have been murdered. Right? There have
been 26 other attempted murders. There have been thousands of
blockades. There have been hundreds of arsons. We are not
talking about peaceful protests. We are talking about violence,
and we are talking about a nationwide campaign of violence.
Mr. Raskin. Well, Mr. Ferrara makes one good point, it
seems to me; that if they are killing doctors who work at
reproductive health clinics and other staff and we know that
there have been many cases of that--they are already chargeable
and punishable under State laws.
There's a discrete injury here when people get together and
blockade a clinic. You might not have State legislatures that
are willing to enact laws to keep them, keep them open.
Obviously, there is a Federal interest here, which is why eight
Federal Circuit Courts have unanimously around the country
upheld the FACE Act against attack.
What happens, as in the case where Ms. Edl, again,
sincerely goes out to protest, but is part of a protest that
blockades people from getting healthcare? What is the effect on
the people who are trying to get in?
Ms. Waters. There are a couple of points there. The
legislative history is replete with references to why a Federal
remedy was needed.
FACE does not stop States from acting, and FACE does not
stop States or command that States do anything. What it says is
this is bigger than any individual State. This is a coordinated
nationwide campaign that deserves a remedy.
Mr. Raskin. You are proud of them that they travel around.
Ms. Waters. Absolutely.
Mr. Raskin. Yes.
Ms. Waters. I think that is important. Let's talk about
what is actually happening on the ground, right.
If you are a doctor going into a clinic and trying to do
your job, and what you are facing are death threats. What you
are facing are blockades.
What you are facing is fear that people are going to show
up at your home or at your children's school and engage in
campaigns and intimidation, no one should have to go to work
that way, and no medical professional should have to go to work
that way. That is not good care. That is not going to help your
health.
Mr. Raskin. No patient should have to try to scale--
Ms. Waters. No patient--
Mr. Raskin. All those obstacles just to get attention. Let
me ask you finely, this is the third time we have had a hearing
on this, but there is no vote.
It is because our colleagues know that the vast majority of
the American people reject this idea and want to make sure that
there is safety there. They keep throwing a bone to the prolife
movement.
I wonder if you agree with me that they are not willing to
put this to the floor.
Ms. Waters. I cannot speak to their intentions. What I can
say is, there is a difference of opinion in this room about
access to abortion care.
What there should not be a difference of opinion about, and
what there cannot be a difference of opinion about, is whether
we should use violence to advance those aims. We can't.
Mr. Raskin. Thank you. I yield back, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Roy. I thank the Ranking Member. I will now recognize
the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. Onder, for five minutes.
Mr. Onder. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for holding this important
hearing on the FACE Act abuse uncovered in the DOJ's recent
report.
The report explains how the Biden-Harris DOJ unevenly
enforced the FACE Act and coordinated with antilife advocacy
groups to target prolife Americans.
According to the report, just one month after the Supreme
Court overturned Roe v. Wade, then Attorney General Merrick
Garland, created a National Task Force that worked hand in
glove with Planned Parenthood, the Feminist Majority
Foundation, and the National Abortion Federation.
These groups compiled dossiers, headshots, and travel
information on prolife individuals that ultimately resulted in
search warrants, surveillance, and prosecutions.
In one instant, the National Abortion Federation prepared a
law enforcement guide for an upcoming Christian prolife
conference, complete with attendees' personal information.
Planned Parent provided a similar dossier labeled opposition
identified.
After receiving this intelligence, the Biden-Harris DOJ
even assisted these groups in securing private grant funding
when the Task Force Director volunteered as a reference for
NAF's application.
The Biden-Harris Administration's conduct during
prosecutions was probably most concerning in U.S. v. Houck. In
it, the Justice Department authorized an aggressive early
morning arrest rather than permitting a voluntary surrender.
In U.S. v. Gallagher, the prosecutors withheld evidence
from the defense, while sharing similar information with the
National Abortion Federation.
In United States v. Zastrow, internal emails show DOJ
attorneys strategizing about screening out religious jurors,
referring to prolife Christian activists as culty, and
expressing frustration that a Catholic magistrate was on duty.
The pattern continued through sentencing. Under the Biden-
Harris DOJ, prosecutors sought an average of 26.8 months for
prolife defendants, which is more than double the 12.3-month
average sought for violent antilife offenders.
One senior official in the administration even wrote that
they should ``make sure that extremists know we still have this
tool, the FACE Act, and we will use it.''
Mr. Ferrara, all of this is clearly weaponization of the
Federal Government. Do you believe any of the recently
uncovered activities by the Biden-Harris DOJ are criminal?
Mr. Ferrara. I would not go so far as to offer an opinion
on whether criminal prosecution is warranted. I would have to
be careful about that and evaluate the facts of the case.
Mr. Onder. Yes.
Mr. Ferrara. Let me take this opportunity to take exception
to something my adversary in this issue said, Ms. Waters.
Mr. Onder. Please do.
Mr. Ferrara. Regarding the predicate in the Commerce Clause
for the FACE Act.
I don't believe there is an adequate predicate. The Lopez
and Morrison cases really have eliminated any serious argument
for a Commerce Clause predicate.
In Lopez, the Supreme Court struck down the Gun Free School
Zones Act, finding that only economic activity that has a
substantial effect on interstate commerce can be regulated.
Citizens don't have that effect.
In the Morrison case, the Supreme Court said that there
cannot be a regulation of economic activity based on its
supposed aggregate effect on interstate commerce, and
therefore, struck down a provision of the Violence Against
Women Act.
Sit-ins and even what they call blockades of clinics don't
have a serious local effect.
Mr. Onder. They are local effects, yes. Mr. Severino, how
does the uneven application of the FACE Act on prolife versus
pro-abortion groups undermine the Constitution and civil rights
protections?
Mr. Severino. It is an example of the weaponization. We
believe in equal justice under the law, which means justice is
blind, right?
That is part of our American ethos. When you have this
rampant uneven enforcement where 97 percent of cases under the
FACE Act have been enforced against the prolife side, when in
fact the FACE Act also covers pregnancy resource centers and
houses of worship.
I was in the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division as
a career attorney under Obama for several years. There was not
a single case of a FACE Act prosecution brought for the
invasion of a church.
Mr. Onder. Were there no attacks against churches or
prolife pregnancy centers?
Mr. Severino. There were. Yes, during the Prop. 8 debate,
there was video of a storming of the Mormon Temple in Westwood.
That was brought to the attention of DOJ civil rights.
Mr. Onder. Prop. 8 in California.
Mr. Severino. In California, yes.
Mr. Onder. Yes, the marriage amendment.
Mr. Severino. Correct.
Mr. Onder. Yes. Again, the DOJ brought no prosecution in
that case?
Mr. Severino. They brought zero with respect to houses of
worship, up until very recently, in fact. Under the Trump
Administration, they finally did.
Mr. Onder. Thank you very much. I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from Missouri. I will now
recognize the gentlelady from Washington for five minutes.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Trump Administration
and Congressional Republicans have launched an all-out assault
on women.
They have advanced the SAVE Act to disenfranchise 69
million married women whose birth certificates don't match
their current last name. They have covered up the full Epstein
files and refused to meet with Epstein survivors.
They have made significant cuts to Medicaid, SNAP, and
health-
care, making it harder for women to take care of their
families. Nowhere is the assault on women more evident than in
reproductive health.
Donald Trump has cutoff abortion options in States that
protect those rights. This Administration has withdrawn Federal
guidance requiring hospitals to provide emergency abortion care
when life or health is at risk.
It has frozen tens of millions of dollars in Title X
funding for family planning. These unprecedented actions are
not only unlawful, but they also put women's lives in danger.
Now, Republicans want to repeal the FACE Act, a public
safety law that protects healthcare providers and patients from
physical intimidation, harassment, and violence.
Now, I am one of the one-in-four women in this country that
has had an abortion. I had to speak out publicly about it,
frankly, when I came to Congress after not speaking about it
for decades.
When I saw the attacks on reproductive care around the
country, I felt it was my responsibility to talk about it
publicly. I don't begrudge anyone, including you, Ms. Edl, from
making decisions about your own moral values, about the conduct
that you would choose for yourself.
I do not appreciate it when someone tries to block me from
making choices about my body, about my family, and about my
life. I certainly don't appreciate it when people try to block
other people from getting healthcare.
Professor Waters, at the core of this issue, is the basic
principle that no one should fear violence in the workplace
when seeking healthcare.
Given the misinformation on the issue, could you just give
us some details on what type of violent situations that
abortion providers, patients, and volunteers face?
Ms. Waters. If I may, I would like to quickly respond to
the Commerce Clause point that my colleague raised. Then, I
would love to get to your question.
On the point of Lopez and Morrison, it is true that the
Lopez and Morrison cases define what is covered by the bounds
of the Commerce Clause.
It is also true that most of the cases that we have cited
that have said that the FACE Act is upheld are post-Lopez and
some of them are post-Morrison. My colleague's point really
doesn't hold.
On the question of the type of violence, we were seeing on
the ground, and this is the point, right, this is why we have
FACE.
If we are looking, we are talking about things like
murders. We are talking about things like arson. We are talking
about things like asset attacks, right?
We are talking about, as we heard, women who are trying to
get into clinics, because their fetuses are incompatible with
life. They are having the worst days of their life, and they
are blockaded from getting into a clinic and can't get in
there.
We are talking about harm. We are talking about threats. We
are talking about violence. My colleagues keep raising
hypotheti-cals about lobsters and fish, right?
What we are talking about are real women. What we are
talking about are real doctors who are going into work every
day in fear of their life.
Ms. Jayapal. Instead of addressing the violence, one of the
first things that Donald Trump did when he took office was to
pardon 23 anti-abortion extremists criminally convicted under
the FACE Act. His Department of Justice released a memo
directing prosecutors to cease enforcement of the FACE Act
absent ``extraordinary ccircumstances.'' Based on your
research, how did these actions impact women's access to
reproductive care?
Ms. Waters. Yes, it is ironic to me that we are here
talking about some alleged weaponization, or some sort of
selective prosecution. in fact, the Biden Administration was
the first to actually bring cases to protect crisis pregnancy
centers. Right?
Ms. Jayapal. That is right.
Ms. Waters. That was the administration that actually was
applying this in a more even-handed way. When we are talking
about what President Trump's directives and pardons will do, it
declares open season, right?
Ms. Jayapal. Yes.
Ms. Waters. It says to abortion providers and patients, we
are not going to be there to protect you.
Ms. Jayapal. There is some confusion about all the services
that people get blocked from when this happens at reproductive
health clinics.
Just a quick yes or no, whether it is easier or harder for
women to get these services as a result of repealing the FACE
Act. Is it easier for women to get STD testing and treatment?
Ms. Waters. Harder.
Ms. Jayapal. Cancer screenings?
Ms. Waters. Harder. Ms. Jayapal Pregnancy testing?
Ms. Waters. Harder.
Ms. Jayapal. Birth control?
Ms. Waters. Harder.
Ms. Jayapal. Infertility services?
Ms. Waters. Harder.
Ms. Jayapal. Prenatal services?
Ms. Waters. Harder.
Ms. Jayapal. Postpartum services?
Ms. Waters. Harder.
Ms. Jayapal. Harder. All these things are harder. By the
way, don't make choices about my body. Let me make those
decisions for myself. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentlelady from Washington. I will now
recognize the Chair of the Full Committee, Mr. Jordan.
Chair Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Ferrara, how many
churches and crisis pregnancy centers were attacked in the
aftermath of the Dobbs leak in the Dobbs decision, do you
remember?
Mr. Roy. Mr. Ferraro, can you please use your microphone?
Mr. Ferrara. I don't have the exact number, but there were
many. I am involved in one particular case, the firebombing of
a prolife pregnancy center in Amherst, New York, causing
$500,000 in damage and injuring two of the firemen.
Chair Jordan. Well, I will tell you, there were hundreds. I
will just give you a little sampling, you talked about the
firebombing of that place.
There was another place firebombed in Madison, Wisconsin on
May 8, 2022. The next day, May 9th, three Catholic churches in
Texas were attacked. Two days later in Michigan, activists
vandalized the Family Life Services Pregnancy Center.
I have actually it is like ten pages. We did a list of this
back during the leak in the Dobbs opinion. I have ten pages
just listing churches, crisis pregnancy centers that were
attacked.
Do you remember some of the groups that were attacking
these churches and crisis pregnancy centers, Mr. Ferrara?
Mr. Ferrara. Jane was here.
Chair Jordan. Yes, Jane's Revenge, Ruth Sent Us. Do you
happen to know if any of those organizations made the Southern
Poverty Law Centers hate list?
Mr. Ferrara. Of course not.
Chair Jordan. No, they didn't, did they?
Mr. Ferrara. No. The Southern Poverty Law Center is not a
credible organization. In fact, if you, as a conservative
activist, are condemned by the Southern Poverty Law Center,
consider that a resume builder.
Chair Jordan. They condemned Moms for Liberty. They
condemned the Family Research Council. They condemned Alliance
Defending Freedom.
My guess, they may have gone after your group. I don't
know. Any prolife group, it seemed like they were going to
attack. Is that fair to say?
Mr. Ferrara. Yes, it is. I would like to make a point about
what Congresswoman Jayapal said, regarding public safety law.
``There is no Federal police power over the States.'' The idea
that you would like to have a public safety law that caters to
your particular interest in receiving reproductive health
services, is contrary to the whole principle of federalism.
That is the problem with FACE. That FACE purports to
exercise generalized Federal police power in one area and one
area only, and that being the activity of prolife activists.
Chair Jordan. Yes. Mr. Severino, let me come to you. We
know that the Biden Justice Department, the Biden FBI was
actually paying confidential human sources to do all kinds of
things.
Well, we are trying to get some answers to that. I am just
curious, do you think maybe some of the same folks, so, the
Biden Justice Department was working with the Southern Poverty
Law Center to train prosecutors, as if they were going to get
some great wisdom from the SPLC, they were doing that.
We know they were paying the confidential human sources. Do
you think it is a fair question to say, I wonder if any of
these ``informants of the SPLC, were also being paid by the
Federal Government.''
Do you think that is a fair question?
Mr. Severino. Yes, absolutely.
Chair Jordan. Why wouldn't they double dip? It is like if,
oh, if the Southern Poverty Law Center is training the
prosecutors, and I know the FBI is going to pay confidential
human sources in the Southern Poverty Law Center, well, sugar,
I can get money from both of them.
Three million dollars from the SPLC and who knows what the
Federal Government is going to pay out. They got a pretty big
bank account too. That is a fair question that we would like to
get the answer to.
Mr. Severino. We should get to the bottom of it. What the
DOJ report on the FACE Act showed was that in fact, DOJ was in
cahoots with outside groups--
Chair Jordan. Exactly.
Mr. Severino. Similar to SPLC. The Left-wing groups, they
get together and they pretty much create their own little
branch offices within the DOJ whenever we have liberals in
power.
The SPLC has been talking to DOJ under Biden and certainly
Obama, Planned Parenthood Federation, National Abortion
Federation, all those folks, they pretty much open up their
branch offices in DOJ when the Left is in power.
Chair Jordan. Yes. You anticipated my next question,
because that is exactly where I wanted to go. Do you think any
of these informants actually were involved in the attacks on
the churches and crisis pregnancy centers? I think that is a
fair question as well.
Mr. Severino. It is a possibility. That would be terrible
if in fact, our own government was funding--
Chair Jordan. Well, maybe what the SPLC calls informants,
we might call instigators, based on what you saw in the
indictment last week.
Mr. Severino. Sure.
Chair Jordan. I don't know that it is out of the realm of
possibility if they are, we don't know, but I think it is a
fair guess to say they might have been double dipping, getting
paid by the government and the SPLC.
Maybe they were instigating some of these over ten pages,
100 different attacks on crisis pregnancy centers and churches
in the aftermath of the Dobbs decision.
Mr. Severino. Well, we know that a DOJ official actually
endorsed a grant application for one of these abortion activist
groups. Which is a clear ethical violation that the DOJ report
said, ``it is very likely to be investigated for an ethics
breach.''
This sort of too cozy relationship, is something that is
very common that we see in abortion and SPLC. Any of these hot
button issues from the Left, you see this sort of collusion.
Chair Jordan. Yes. Again, I want to thank our witnesses.
Ms. Edl, I am sorry I didn't to you. I listened to your
testimony, but I was in a meeting backstage.
When you came on, I turned on the TV to hear what you had
to say. God bless you. We appreciate your Christian witness and
your words.
With that, I yield back to the Chair.
Mr. Roy. I thank the Chair of the Committee, Mr. Jordan. I
now recognize the Ranking Member for some unanimous consent
requests.
Ms. Scanlon. Yes. I just seek unanimous consent for an
April 14, 2026, article from Justice Security, ``Separating
Fact From Fiction in FACE Act Enforcement.''
Mr. Roy. Without objection. All right. I too, have a
unanimous count request, an article from the Lozier Institute,
saying that Planned Parenthood performed more abortions than
pap tests, miscarriage care, preventative and primary care
tests, prenatal services, HPV examinations, diagnostic
procedures for cancer, combined. Without objection. I now
recognize the gentleman from Tennessee.
Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We are having this hearing
because it is a political issue of great importance to both
sides.
On the Republican side, it can have an effect on different
races that will be going on. I think we should have been having
hearings on Executive Orders.
Executive Orders that have gone way beyond the power that
Congress should give to the President, and which I discussed
with the Chair some time ago when we had a bill together on it.
It is not gone and we have let the President overstep his
bounds and take over Article I powers of the Congress. We have
just given them up and that is a shame.
That is a more important hearing than this. This does
demonstrate the differences in the parties. Democrats are
fighting to ensure that every American can access high quality
healthcare practice, their faith freely, practice their faith
freely, and rely on the rule of law.
The Majority, however, seeks to hand individual healthcare
decisions to a handful of radical activists, impose their
preferred religious views on everyone else, and give cover to
law breakers, even violent ones, when it benefits them
politically.
It was discussed earlier in a question to maybe Mr.
Ferrara, about pardons that were given out by the President
sometime after he pardoned everybody that participated in the
insurrection of January 2025, I guess it was.
He said that there were pardons given to these folks and
thank God. We all have our different theories about God, Mr.
Ferrara.
I don't think God has anything to do with President Biden's
pardons, particularly the ones that were paid, and bought, and
given out to fraudsters and criminals that then committed
crimes again. That is another issue.
We should be hearing pardon exemptions. We need to reform
the pardon power and give less power to the President to give
pardons. It should be restricted, as we should be looking at
emoluments as well.
Back to healthcare. Every American should have meaningful
access to high quality care. Too many barriers already exist.
High prices, healthcare deserts, biases, which is why I support
Medicare for all and have since I came to Congress. The last
thing we need is self-appointed monitors preventing people from
obtaining basic services.
In December, 17 people were arrested for blocking access to
the Planned Parenthood Clinic in Memphis, only a few blocks
from my home. It is the only remaining Planned Parenthood
clinic in Memphis. The other was closed because of the
administration's deep Medicaid cuts.
The protestors weren't stopping abortions. Abortion in
Tennessee is a felony at all stages of pregnancy with no
exceptions for rape or incest.
The people entering the clinic were seeking routine
preventative services like blood pressure checks, breast cancer
screenings, and STI treatment. It functions like any other
doctor's office, accepting insurance and serving patients whose
reasons for visiting vary and are private.
This wasn't about protecting life; it was about
intimidation and imposing one groups' beliefs on everyone else.
No one should be prevented from going to their doctor because
of what one assumes they are there for.
Here is the kicker, some of those arrested were antichoice
activists whom President Trump had recently pardoned for
earlier FACE Act violations. They don't stop.
These, just like the January 6th people didn't stop. I
think 30 of them have been arrested for everything from sex
with a child, to rape, and to other heinous offenses.
These individuals in Memphis had already been convicted of
obstructing access to reproductive healthcare. The FACE Act
plays a critical role in protecting the rights of patients and
providers.
This Administration and the MAGA movement want to dismantle
it. Repealing the FACE Act would give political and legal cover
to people who believe they can decide who should and should not
receive healthcare.
This is not about religion; it certainly is not about
religious freedom. The FACE Act explicitly protects religious
institutions.
Repealing it would make them more vulnerable, not less.
Even on the question of abortion, religion's perspectives vary
widely. Christian denominations do not speak with one voice.
Across Judaism, the prevailing view prioritizes the life
and health of the mother. Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu teachings
vary as well.
Repealing the FACE Act will elevate one narrow set of
beliefs at the expense of all others. That is the opposite of
religious liberty.
In the United States, everyone has a right to their
religious beliefs, but not the right to impose those beliefs on
others. That is why I am proud to work with Congressmen Scott,
Raskin, and Scanlon on the Do Not Harm Act.
Tomorrow, this Committee will hold a hearing on victim
services. The Majority argues that advancing policy in that
area would convey a strong message.
Apply that language here. Advancing FACE Act repeal would
send a clear message. Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans believe
they should control who gets access to healthcare, and that
those who physically block Americans from seeing a doctor will
be encouraged, protected, and empowered.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from Tennessee. I will now
recognize the gentle lady from Wyoming for five minutes.
Ms. Hageman. I find it very rich that any Democrat would
attempt to lecture us about violence in light of the fact that
it was yet another one of theirs who just three days ago sought
to assassinate our President and his cabinet.
Don't get me started on the Democrat's favorite KKK
supporter, the Southern Poverty Law Center. Spare me your faux
outrage about violence.
According to the DOJ's report on the Biden Administration's
weaponization of the FACE Act, ``in total, during the four-
years under President Biden, the DOJ charged more than 45
prolife defendants, in over 20 cases, with violating the FACE
Act in connection with prolife demonstrations.''
This is in stark contrast to largely ignoring attacks on
prolife pregnancy resource centers, as Chair Jordan just
pointed out, in which the DOJ, despite hundreds of cases and
hundreds of attacks against prolife medical centers for women,
the DOJ only charged a handful of them.
Again, spare me your faux outrage. The report further
reveals that the Biden DOJ prosecutors requested an average
sentence of 26.8 months for prolife defendants, compared to
12.3 months for prochoice defendants.
Mr. Severino, how do these average sentencing amounts
correlate to the applicable range in the sentencing guidelines?
Mr. Severino. It varies depending on whether it is a first
offense or not. It is a misdemeanor for a first offense, and
some of these cases where you get felony levels, are second
offenses.
What we see in the DOJ report is that it was effectively
double for the prolife charge parties, versus the very few on
the other side. There were only five that were brought recently
that attacked the pregnancy resource centers. The disparity was
essentially double.
Ms. Hageman. Well, then we also have the circumstance where
they raided, I think it was Mr. Houck's home, in the middle of
the night, drug him out the door in front of his family, simply
because he was trying to protect his son from a violent pro-
abortion demonstrator at a, I believe it was a Planned
Parenthood facility.
How do these, what they did under the Biden Administration,
how does that compare to other Administrations in terms of the
sentences that they sought as well as the number of
prosecutions?
Mr. Severino. Sure. In terms of the numbers, 97 percent of
the cases were against prolifers. It was about 26.8 months for
those convictions. About 12 months for the prochoice side.
You see with the Houck case you mentioned, that is a gross
abuse where you have armed FBA agents with long guns go into
this man's house where they were in contact with their
attorney.
Normally, under normal circumstances, if they are willing
to turn themselves in, which in this case they were, they
turned themselves in. Instead, they made this entire spectacle
and frightened their families out of their skin to make a
statement.
Ms. Hageman. I would argue a very violent spectacle of our
Federal Government, carried out by our Federal Government. In
fact, Mr. Houck just received, what was it, $1 million dollars?
The settlement for the way that he was treated, I believe.
Federal funds going to him because of the Biden's violation
of his civil rights. Isn't that correct?
Mr. Severino. I don't know the dollar amount. This was a
clear violation, because he was completely vindicated at trial.
It took the jury three hours to say not guilty. He was
defending his son from a bully and that was--
Ms. Hageman. A violent bully.
Mr. Severino. Right.
Ms. Hageman. A violent prochoice bully.
Mr. Severino. Yes. They got into, that is why my opening
statement says, look, these sorts of things, you have a
weaponized DOJ that says you have this dispute, and a father
defends his child from a bully, and that becomes a Federal
offense. Right?
This is rampant abuse. Then, they have armed a year later,
a year later, armed Federal agents raid his house in the
morning. It is just absolute abuse.
Ms. Hageman. Well, in the case of the United States v.
Gallagher, when one of the defense counsels contacted the
Assistant U.S. Attorney, requesting information on the number
of FACE Act criminal prosecutions in the last 10 years, the
Biden DOJ prosecutors refused to share it, despite the
information being readily available.
Sanjay Patel, the Director of the National Task Force on
Violence Against Reproductive Healthcare Providers, and a very
corrupt man, after receiving several requests stated, ``as the
National Clinic Violence Coordinator, I do not keep the kind of
records you requested, and as a result, I do not believe that
we will provide them to you.''
He was lying through his teeth. They did have those
records. Sanjay Patel, he referred to the defense counsel to
DOJ press releases. Then, it is also important to note, as what
was done by a predecessor, that he actually agreed to be a
reference on a National Abortion Federation third-party grant
application.
The point of this being, the report has demonstrated that
the Biden Administration violated the Equal Protection Clause
of the Constitution in the way that they have dealt with
prolife and prochoice prosecutions under the FACE Act.
The FACE Act either needs to be reformed or abolished,
because it has been abused by Democrat Administrations. With
that, I yield back.
Mr. Severino. May I answer, Mr. Chair?
Mr. Roy. Yes.
Mr. Severino. Yes. When I was at DOJ, if you had a FACE Act
case, you would actually enter it, there is a particular spot
in your tracking of time. DOJ knew exactly how many FACE Act
cases at all times they had opened.
Mr. Roy. I thank the witness. Thank the gentlelady from
Wyoming. I will now recognize the gentleman from Tennessee for
a unanimous consent request.
Mr. Cohen. Thank you, sir. A unanimous consent request is
an article written by Ms. Burton and Ms. Sanchez, and published
in Ms. Magazine, about the arrest in Memphis that the anti-
abortion training camp sparked. I would like to enter that for
the record.
Mr. Roy. Without objection.
Mr. Cohen. I would also like to correct an error in my
discussion. I think I said J6 was not, I didn't say 2021, which
is of course, was the first term, not the second term.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman for the correction. I will
now recognize the gentlelady from Vermont for her five minutes.
Ms. Balint. Thank you, Mr. Chair. As a former history
teacher, one of the things I always try to make sure that my
students understand is the importance of context.
I want to come back to thinking about how we got here, and
let's consider the history of the anti-abortion violence in the
United States.
Since 1977, there have been 11 murders, 26 attempted
murders, 42 bombings, 200 acts of arson, 100 acid attacks, four
kidnappings, and over 600 assaults against patients and workers
at reproductive health facilities.
It has been nearly a five-decade long terrorist campaign.
We are talking about militant extremists willing to use deadly
violence to prevent women from seeking reproductive care and
from having control over their own bodies.
Congress passed the FACE Act in 1994, to protect doctors
and nurses and patients from violent threats, assaults, and
blockades. That is the history, and the context is important.
Professor Waters, thank you so much for being here today.
Can you describe the levels of violence against abortion
providers and patients at that time, and the reasons why
Congress had to come together to pass the FACE Act?
Ms. Waters. I think you just covered many of the reasons
very well. I will say on a personal note, one of the ways that
I came to do this work, is I have a vivid memory of the late
1990s, I was a college student, and I remember hearing that Dr.
Slepian had been murdered.
Ms. Balint. Yes.
Ms. Waters. He was an abortion provider who had just come
home from a memorial service for his father at his synagogue.
He was in his kitchen making soup and he was shot through his
window in front of his child and murdered.
Ms. Balint. Right.
Ms. Waters. That is what we are talking about.
Ms. Balint. Right.
Ms. Waters. That is the history.
Ms. Balint. I am so glad you brought that up, because we
are forgetting, as you said earlier, ``these are real people.''
Ms. Waters. These are humans.
Ms. Balint. These are human beings. Actually, I want to
bring into this conversation also, something that a clinic
worker said about the kind of environment she has to work in.
She said,
When I worked in Louisiana, someone threw a Molotov cocktail
at the clinic. After that, the clinic couldn't have any windows
anymore.
There were literally no windows in the building whatsoever.
You never knew what time of day it was at work, but it had to
be like that, because people would just throw Molotov cocktails
at the building.
None of this is peaceful, or prayerful, or in the interest of
not just public safety, but again, we are talking about
patients trying to seek healthcare.
Last year, as some of my colleagues have already said, I
just want to remind everybody, President Trump pardoned 20 FACE
Act violators. He pardoned people who got due process, and were
found guilty in our courts of law, beyond a reasonable doubt by
juries of their peers.
He pardoned people who blocked off clinics while women who
urgently needed care, were stuck bleeding and crying outside in
their cars. Along with the pardons, Trump's Justice Department
sent a clear message with their charging document.
I want to read from it. It reads,
Future abortion related FACE Act prosecutions and civil actions
will be permitted only in extraordinary circumstances until
further notice. No new abortion-related FACE Act actions,
criminal or civil, will be permitted without authorization.
What this sounds like to me, is a complicated way of
saying, ``we are not protecting anyone for criminal attacks
anymore.'' That is what we are talking about here. What kind of
message does that send, Professor Waters, to violent protestors
who are part of this movement?
Ms. Waters. I think it sends several messages. I think it
sends a message to providers that we will not enforce the
Federal law, and we will not protect you, and you are on your
own.
It sends a message to violent protestors. I want to be very
clear here we are not talking here about peaceful pickets,
right?
Ms. Balint. That is right.
Ms. Waters. Or praying, right? Peaceful protests, even
protests that we may disagree vehemently with. What we are
talking about is sending the message to people who blockade
clinics, who use violence, that you can get away with it.
Ms. Balint. I agree. The last thing, I want to take issue
with something that the Chair of the Full Committee said.
He seemed to imply that women were not actually seeking
full reproductive care from these clinics. As one of those
millions of women before the Affordable Care Act was passed,
and when I didn't have insurance, I got my reproductive care,
my full reproductive care from a Planned Parenthood facility.
The 2.2 million visits for birth control, 5.5 million
visits for STI testing and treatment, nearly 400,000 visits for
cancer screening, and no patient should have to walk through
this kind of gauntlet to get care.
I yield back.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentlelady for her questions. I will
now recognize the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Gill, for five
minutes.
Mr. Gill. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for hosting this
hearing. I certainly appreciate your leadership, especially on
this topic.
Ms. Waters, thanks for being here. I really appreciate it.
Do you believe that abortion should be safe, legal, and rare?
Ms. Waters. I believe the abortion decision should be left
to a patient, their doctor, their family, and their God.
Mr. Gill. Do you believe it should be safe, legal, and
rare?
Ms. Waters. I believe it should be safe, legal, and rare,
yes.
Mr. Gill. OK. Why should it be rare?
Ms. Waters. Because if we are engaging in public health
activities appropriately, we are able to prevent pregnancies
when people want to prevent pregnancies. I think a
conversation--
Mr. Gill. What is wrong with an abortion then?
Ms. Waters. May I finish my sentence?
Mr. Gill. Sure.
Ms. Waters. If we are actually talking about reproductive
health, and caring about maternal health, we should be talking
about, do people have adequate access to preventative care?
Right?
Do they have adequate access to contraception? Are they
able--
Mr. Gill. Do you support any limits on abortion? Ms. Waters
I am sorry, I didn't hear your question.
Mr. Gill. Do you support any limits on abortion?
Ms. Waters. This is a place where I suspect you and I will
fundamentally disagree. What I believe, is that the abortion
decision should fundamentally, because it is medical care--
Mr. Gill. Do you support any limits at all? It is just yes
or no.
Ms. Waters. If you would let me finish my answer.
Mr. Gill. It is just yes or no, do you think that there
should be any limits on abortion?
Ms. Waters. I came here with the goal of providing truthful
and accurate testimony. To truthfully and accurately answer
your question, what I would say is, I fundamentally believe
that the question of abortion should be left to a patient and
their doctor and their family. I don't want to interfere in
medical decisions.
Mr. Gill. OK. I will take that as a no. Is that a good
summary of your testimony?
Ms. Waters. I answered your question.
Mr. Gill. OK. I think that this is a no then. You are an
advocate for abortion, for abortion policy. What is your
favorite type of abortion?
Ms. Waters. I am an advocate for patients having access to
the full realm of reproductive healthcare.
Mr. Gill. Do you have a preferred method of abortion that
you like?
Ms. Waters. I do not.
Mr. Gill. Let me read through a couple different methods,
and I want to get your take on how much you like these.
The first type is called a suction abortion. This is when
the cervix is dilated, and a strong suction, 29 times the power
of a household vacuum cleaner, tears the baby's body apart and
sucks it through the hose into a container. Do you prefer that
method?
Ms. Waters. I stand by my former testimony.
Mr. Gill. That sounds kind of gross, doesn't it? It sounds
pretty gruesome. Do you agree? It does to me.
Ms. Waters. I stand by how I answered your question fully
and accurately.
Mr. Gill. OK. What about this one, this one is called
dilation and curettage. After dilation of the cervix, a sharp
looped knife is inserted into the uterus. The baby's body is
cut into pieces and extracted often by suction. Do you prefer
that method?
Ms. Waters. What I believe we are here to talk about today
is the FACE Act. We are not here to talk about the--
Mr. Gill. No, I am asking you, you are a pro-abortion
advocate, I am asking if you prefer the dilation and curettage
method?
Ms. Waters. I am an access to reproductive healthcare
advocate.
Mr. Gill. You don't want to talk about abortion itself. Why
is that?
Ms. Waters. I would prefer to talk about the reason that
the Committee called the hearing.
Mr. Gill. Is it because it is uncomfortable to talk about?
Ms. Waters. I would prefer to--
Mr. Gill. It should be uncomfortable.
Ms. Waters. I would prefer, if you would let me finish my
statement, to talk about the Freedom of Access to Clinic
Entrances Act, which is what I was asked to come here to talk
about.
Mr. Gill. We are talking about what that access--yes, how
about this one? It is called dilation and evacuation. Forceps
are inserted into the uterus, grabbing and twisting the baby's
body to dismember him or her. If the head is too large, it must
be crushed to remove it. Do you prefer that method?
Ms. Waters. I would prefer to talk about the reason the
hearing was called and the basis of my expert testimony.
Mr. Gill. It is uncomfortable to hear this, isn't it? It
is. It is, because it is barbaric and evil. How about this one,
it is called the saline injection. It is when a 20 percent salt
solution is injected through the mother's abdomen into the
baby's amniotic fluid. The baby's skin is burned off. The baby
ingests the solution and dies of salt poisoning, dehydration,
and hemorrhaging of the brain. Do you prefer that method?
Ms. Waters. I would prefer to talk about the subject of
hearing.
Mr. Gill. This is the subject of the hearing. This is about
protests outside of abortion clinics. I am asking you about
abortion.
Ms. Waters. I stand by my prior testimony.
Mr. Gill. OK. I wouldn't want to talk about this either if
I were you, because it is barbaric and evil.
With that, I yield the remaining time to the Chair. Thank
you.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from Texas. I will only note
in the remaining 10 seconds, is that a good deal of the efforts
by my Democratic colleagues to talk about this issue, has moved
to the core question of abortion and what is carried on, and
the activities that are carried out at Planned Parenthood and
other facilities.
That question by the gentleman from Texas is in line. I
will now recognize the gentlelady from California.
Ms. Kamlager-Dove. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The reality is,
this hearing is not really about the FACE Act, because that was
a bipartisan bill passed over 30 years ago that still has
standing.
It is a bill that is about protecting worshipers when they
go to pray, and patients when they are trying to access
healthcare.
This is about how laws are enforced and interpreted, and
how this Administration is cherry-picking and using selective
prosecution of cases to support their desired claims and
agenda.
The claims and the agenda are, to take away rights and to
silence groups with whom they dislike or disagree. Last month,
the DOJ released a highly flawed 900-page partisan report,
purporting to examine prosecutorial decisionmaking under the
FACE Act, and alleging bias and Federal law enforcement during
the Biden Administration.
However, many cases brought between 2020-2024, involved
serious crimes such as firebombing, arson, bomb threats, and
coordinated clinic blockades. All which resulted in indictments
by Federal grand juries and guilty verdicts at trial.
We are talking about violent and unlawful acts. Professor
Waters, even though I have answered my own question, but I will
ask you the question as well. Do those sound like peaceful
protests to you?
Ms. Waters. They do not sound like peaceful protests to me.
When we are talking about the incidents of obstruction and
violence at clinics, it is important to look at all the cases
that were not prosecuted, right?
For example, when I look at the National Abortion
Federation statistics, and I look at like, for example, the
number of pickets and protests outside of clinics, there were
tens of thousands, right?
What we are talking about under the Biden Administration,
is 25 prosecutions, not for that activity. The prosecutions are
for blockades. The prosecutions are for threats. The
prosecutions are for violence, not protected speech.
Ms. Kamlager-Dove. Thank you. I would say that this
Administration came into power with a real agenda against
women.
They have weaponized the DOJ to carry their agenda out,
because what they didn't include in this 900-page report were a
number of stories, like the woman who tried for years and years
and years to get pregnant, and I know what that feels like, and
miscarried.
Went to a clinic to help her medically manage the
miscarriage. She was blocked from seeing her doctor. She was in
her car sobbing and bleeding out.
The technical term when you have a miscarriage, and I know
about this personally, is the doctor will call it an abortion.
It is violent for anyone, especially a man, to suggest that
they know more about my body and how I am trying to protect
myself, in the hopes that I can get pregnant again, based on
their assumption of me and the kind of healthcare that I
deserve.
We should also remind folks and include the incident that
happened last year in a clinic in California, where the clinic
was set on fire. Last month a clinic in Ohio was set on fire.
These are about patients, doctors, and workers going to get
some healthcare. Let me tell you something, when you go to a
clinic, you are not wearing a sign that says, hey, I am getting
an abortion. You could go to a clinic to get a pap smear, to
get IVF, and a vasectomy.
In the few seconds that I have remaining, I would be remiss
if I didn't draw the Subcommittee's attention to the murders on
the streets of Minneapolis by ICE, and the use of the FACE Act
to charge two journalists, two black journalists, Ms. Fort and
Mr. Lemon.
These folks were documenting protest activities that the
church, was happening at a church because its pastor was a key
official in the ICE response to Minneapolis.
I know my time is running up, but I just want to say that
this Chair himself has said in other contexts, that free
Americans should never live in fear of their government
targeting them.
Yet, that is exactly what happened to these two journalists
and others. They were inappropriately charged under the FACE
Act. Meanwhile, a MAGA influencer, Ms. Gomez, who also
interrupted an LGBTQ friendly worship service, was neither
charged nor arrested.
I have receipts when I am saying that we are cherry-picking
and using selective prosecution to go after folks that we want
to sideline.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentlelady from California.
Ms. Kamlager-Dove. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentlelady from California.
Ms. Kamlager-Dove. I do also have some--
Mr. Roy. Consent requests?
Ms. Kamlager-Dove. Yes. A testimony of Renee Chelian,
founder and CEO of Northland Family Planning. Her testimony
before the House Judiciary Committee. I ask unanimous consent.
An article in Politico, ``Trump pardons abortion clinic
protestors ahead of March for Life.'' This was January 23,
2025.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. FBI investigating fertility clinic
bomb suspects, possible antinationalist manifesto. From May 18,
2025.
CDC archive, ``More men using family planning services.''
This is June 16, 2016.
Last, our letter to the Chair and the Ranking Member,
Amnesty International USA submits this letter to the House
Subcommittee on the Constitution for their upcoming hearing
from tool to weapon, the FACE Act--
Mr. Roy. Without objection. I will now recognize the
gentleman from Wisconsin for five minutes.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for having
this hearing. A very timely and always very interesting, kind
of an appropriate hearing to have in Wisconsin today.
I know in the last year, for the first time in many years,
we opened a third abortion clinic in the city of Milwaukee.
It is something that I hadn't seen before in Wisconsin. It
is something you hear about in other parts of the country.
The clinic was in a neighborhood clearly designed to deal
almost exclusively with customers or patients of color. I
thought that was kind of illuminating, because that gets to the
underlying goal of so many people in the pro-abortion movement.
In any event, we will start off with Mr. Severino. Thank
you for being here today. In light of your experience as a
trial attorney at Justice's Civil Rights division, how did the
Biden-Harris Administration's approach to prosecuting alleged
violators of the FACE Act comport with the standard practices
in this division?
Mr. Severino. It was all one-sided. I saw that directly in
the Obama administration.
Mr. Grothman. Oh, I am sorry, always what?
Mr. Severino. One-sided.
Mr. Grothman. Oh, OK.
Mr. Severino. The prosecutions were against the prolife
side. It was mentioned earlier by one of the Members on the
other side that now it is being enforced for churches.
Well, now it is the first time it is being enforced to
protect churches, because neither the Biden Administration nor
the Obama Administration lifted a finger when we had hundreds
of violations, including burnings and vandalizing of churches,
especially after the Dobbs decision.
Mr. Grothman. OK. How does this uneven application of the
FACE Act on prolife or pro-abortion groups undermine the
Constitution, in your opinion, and the civil rights protections
for all Americans?
Mr. Severino. Sure. It is the notion of equal justice under
the law, right? People should not get favor from the
government.
The political identity of a party should not matter. What
we saw with, especially the DOJ report that just came out, was
that you had Left-wing activists, pro-abortion groups, who were
surveilling American citizens and doing things that the Federal
Government could not do themselves.
They were outsourcing, DOJ was essentially outsourcing
their investigatory functions to activist groups. Those
activist groups, they don't care about the Constitution, right?
They are not Federal agents, so they could do whatever they
want to track people, get their licenses, see where they live,
and track their religious exercise. Then, they packaged that
and handed it over to DOJ, right?
They did the dirty work on the front end, then DOJ on the
back end, picked it up. By the way, the abortion clinics
themselves weren't the ones complaining.
These were the activist umbrella groups that were combining
dossiers on people and giving them to DOJ to prosecute.
Mr. Grothman. OK. Can you speak of your experience in the
civil rights division on how the Federal Government can play a
more responsible role in preventing the overfederalization of
criminal law?
Mr. Severino. Yes. The overfederalization is a horrific
problem, if we do not know what crimes we may be committing in
our everyday lives.
The examples I said earlier, why could it be a crime for
taking a nest off your roof? Well, there is a Migratory Bird
Treaty Act that covers 1,100 bird species, and if you mess with
their nests, you are committing a Federal crime.
The DOJ has to go through every statute, finely count
everyone, tell the American people, these are our crimes that
you could be liable for. Then, Congress needs to repeal every
one that doesn't have a constitutional basis.
The FACE Act is one of those that does not have a
sufficient constitutional basis. It is emblematic of the
overcriminalization that you are talking about.
Mr. Grothman. OK. A recent Justice Department report issued
by the Trump Administration stated that Biden-Harris
prosecutors withheld evidence that defense counsel requested to
prepare an affirmative defense.
In U.S. v. Gallagher, prosecutors had information readily
available that they did not share with the defendants, while
sharing substantially identical information with the National
Abortion Fund.
Mr. Ferrara, were there times you requested information
that the Biden-Harris DOJ prosecutors refused to provide?
Mr. Ferrara. I have operated on the civil side, not the
criminal side, so I can't really respond to that question.
I would note one thing; there have been a lot of references
to acts of violence. Let's talk about what happens in those
cases.
The killer of Dr. Gunn got life in prison. The killer of
Dr. Britton and his escort, death. The killer of Dr. Slepian,
life plus ten. The killer of Dr. Tiller, 25 years to life.
The criminal justice system under State law addresses acts
of violence. There was no need for FACE in any of those cases.
Which is the problem with FACE is that it usurps the role
that is properly assigned to local law under State and local
judicial systems, including the severest possible penalties for
people who commit violence. We don't need this statute and
never had needed it.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you.
Mr. Roy. I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for his
questions. I now recognize the Ranking Member, Ms. Scanlon, for
five minutes.
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. Given some of the prior questions
that we have heard, that it is important to note the importance
of Planned Parenthood and other reproductive healthcare
providers across our country.
Two of my colleagues have already mentioned that they have
sought services from Planned Parenthood at various times, as
did I.
When my husband and I were starting our family, we lived
three blocks from a Planned Parenthood clinic. Went there
frequently to get information, to consult books, and to buy
books on having a baby.
The attacks on Planned Parenthood are really, really
important to note, because as funding is attacked and
everything else, that it is often the only source of
reproductive healthcare in so many of our neighborhoods.
At any rate, we have heard a lot of really gross
misstatements of facts, et cetera. I would refer people back to
Ms. Waters' testimony and the articles I have submitted with
respect to the complete misrepresentations in the recent DOJ
report.
I wanted to focus on a couple things here, Ms. Waters. One
is we have heard a lot about disparities in prosecution and
sentencing.
I will give you two questions, and you can address as you
will, which are not supported by the evidence. Then, also, I
don't think there has been enough discussion of the fact that
this is a national campaign of violence by anti-abortion
activists.
I mentioned earlier that six people were arrested in my
district in July 2025, for trespassing at a clinic and
harassing patients and staff. These six people were not local
protestors.
They came from New Jersey, Wisconsin, Texas, Michigan,
Minnesota, and Ohio. Two had been pardoned by Trump for prior
offenses in other States, FACE Act violations.
At least one was arrested in D.C. just days after
submitting a plea bargain with respect to the incident in my
district. She was in D.C. to join other anti-abortion activists
to plan their next national activities.
If you can comment on the fact, comment on both the alleged
disparity in prosecution and sentencing, and why, again, a
national FACE Act is important?
Ms. Waters. I will start with the second. The need for the
National FACE Act was well documented in the legislative record
at the time, right?
What we saw, was local and State law enforcement saying, we
can't handle this, right? Hundreds of people show up, and if my
force goes to that clinic, we are not doing anything else in
the State, right?
We saw it as State law enforcement saying, this is very
needed. We also saw ample evidence that a lot of this violence
was cross State, right?
State's jurisdiction ends where its borders end, right?
They were having a hard time being able to prosecute this
multistate violence going across State lines.
That hasn't changed today. As I said in my testimony, we
are in a time that, thanks to Dobbs, the State laws differ
dramatically, and people are traveling at increased rates
across State lines to both provide and obtain reproductive
healthcare.
The interstate commerce and the multistate aspect here is
even more severe than it was at the time that FACE was enacted.
On the question of the disparities, I read the DOJ report
with interest. I am an academic, right? I looked at it and I
have a lot of questions. My first reaction was, this would not
pass peer review, right?
I have a lot of questions about, for example, if we look at
sentencing disparities, like yes, they are different. Because
people committed crimes more than once.
FACE specifically provides that each time you commit a
crime, the penalties go up, right? People committed different
crimes.
We would be remiss not to look at the fact that there are
at least four District courts that have, in the past two years,
looked at this question of was DOJ engaging in selective
prosecution.
They have squarely been asked that question, including in
the Gallagher case, which we have discussed quite a bit. Each
time the court has said no, right?
Some of the courts have said, look, like, if there is not a
disparity, if where we are seeing the violence is against
clinics that provide reproductive healthcare, that is not a
disparity.
The courts have also said there is no malfeasance if law
enforcement offices have priorities. People do that. The courts
have said post Dobbs, it makes some sense, given that we saw
the increase in violence of clinics, that we would see
prosecutions against people engaging in that violence.
Four District courts have looked at this, and a circuit
court actually, and have said there is not biased prosecution
here.
Ms. Scanlon. It is fair to say that if you look apples to
apples, instead of apples to oranges, any disparities can be
explained.
Ms. Waters. Yes. I think they--I have questions, like I
said, right?
Ms. Scanlon. Sure.
Ms. Waters. When I look at the report, I am not in the
particulars of every individual case.
Ms. Scanlon. Right.
Ms. Waters. Those are the types of questions I would ask.
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you for your thoughtful testimony. I
yield back.
Mr. Roy. Ms. Edl, you are a survivor, and I remind you to
turn your microphone on. You are a survivor of a communist
concentration camp in former Yugoslavia post-World War II. Is
that correct?
Ms. Edl. Correct.
Mr. Roy. You testified that you have, in significant part,
dedicated your life to the cause of defending the innocent
unborn since the Roe decision in the subsequent 50 years.
Ms. Edl. Correct.
Mr. Roy. When you were arrested and then convicted for your
actions in Michigan, did you assault anyone?
Ms. Edl. No.
Mr. Roy. You were present in a protest at this clinic, and
you were obstructing people's access?
Ms. Edl. Well, I stood in front of the door, yes.
Mr. Roy. Now, you were convicted and you faced a sentence
of up to 13 years. Is that correct?
Ms. Edl. That is correct.
Mr. Roy. You are, at the current time, 91?
Ms. Edl. I will be 91 on Sunday.
Mr. Roy. Well, happy birthday in advance.
Ms. Edl. Thank you.
Mr. Roy. At the time you were arrested, you were 89?
Ms. Edl. Yes.
Mr. Roy. Do you think that the use of the FACE Act, and
then conspiracy charge under the KKK statute, do you think that
is an appropriate sentence for someone, or the potential
sentence, because you were not sentenced yet, but up to 13
years, for being present and expressing your views that
abortion is in fact murder?
Along the lines of my friend from Texas' description of the
horrific and barbaric practices of abortion, do you think that
an individual should be charged federally with up to 13 years
in prison at the age of 89, or at all, for carrying out that
activity?
Ms. Edl. At any age, murder is taking place in those.
Nobody seems to mention that. Murder is taking place inside
those clinics. I am sorry, I--
Mr. Roy. No, go ahead.
Ms. Edl. It is no different than in Nazi Germany or
Yugoslavia, where I was. People would have probably, at that
time, protected the law to kill us.
Now, those that would have tried to save us would be called
heroes. Why? Because we finally recognized that even I, as a
child, was a human being then.
These babies are human beings from a moment of conception
on. Either in the process of growth or in the process of
decline.
Like I said, we are headed toward killing the elderly.
First, they will be identified, they will be vilified, they
will be dehumanized and then destroyed.
I am trying to do what God calls us to do, protect human
life. Not with violence, just placing my body in between the
victim and the perpetrator.
Mr. Roy. Ms. Edl, you witnessed, with respect to World War
II and post-World War II, in Yugoslavia and generally,
individuals who were being carried off to be murdered and
executed, correct?
Ms. Edl. Yes. I heard about it through my father when they
took the Jewish families from our town. He was livid.
Mr. Roy. You experienced the concentration camp yourself?
Ms. Edl. Yes, I did.
Mr. Roy. You equate, appropriately in my view, you equate
the murder of the innocent unborn, with the murder of those
people murdered at the hands of government authority, every bit
the same.
Ms. Edl. Exactly. Yes.
Mr. Roy. Because of that belief, without assaulting anyone,
the Federal Government was using the full power of its force to
prosecute you, and to put you in jail for up to 13 years, using
the full power of the Federal Government to do so. Is that
correct?
Ms. Edl. That is correct.
Mr. Roy. Well, I want to thank you for your life, your life
story, your dedication to life, and for fearlessly standing
against the power of government being used against your God-
given ability to try to stand up in defense of the innocent.
In the false name of healthcare, in the false name of
healthcare, the murder of the unborn. God bless you for
standing up for that.
God bless you for your courage. God will bless you when he
welcomes you home someday long in the future. I appreciate it
very much.
Ms. Edl. Thank you.
Mr. Roy. I appreciate all the witnesses. I appreciate your
testimony. I will recognize the gentlelady for a consent
request.
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. I ask unanimous consent to enter
into the record, a press release from the DOJ dated August 20,
2024, entitled, ``Seven defendants, including Ms. Edl,
convicted of Federal civil rights conspiracy and freedom of
access to clinical entrances.''
I also ask unanimous consent to enter into the record, the
following statements all dated April 28, 2026, from
Reproductive Freedom for All, the American College of
Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the National Abortion
Federation, and the Center for Reproductive Rights.
I also have a unanimous consent request to enter into the
record, a statement from David Gunn Jr. and Wendy Gunn, whose
father, Dr. David Gunn, was murdered by an anti-abortion
extremist and whose murder helped propel passage of the FACE
Act.
I would also enter into the record, pages 557 and 558 of
Project 2025, detailing the push to repeal the FACE Act.
Mr. Roy. Without objection. I would like unanimous consent
to enter into the record, I will only ask for the Executive
Summary portion of the Department of Justice Report, given the
length of the full report being 800 pages.
The Executive Summary of the Department of Justice Report
outlining the extent to which there was deep coordination
between the Department of Justice and abortion activists, and
the collusion between the two, as well as lack of reporting to
Congress.
Mr. Roy. I appreciate that. Anything else from the
gentlelady?
That concludes today's hearing. We thank the witnesses for
appearing before the Subcommittee today. Without objection, all
Members will have five legislative days to submit additional
written questions for the witnesses or additional materials for
the record.
Without objection, the hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:15 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
All materials submitted for the record by Members of the
Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government can
be found at: https://docs.house.gov/Committee/Calendar/ByEvent
.aspx?EventID=119234.
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