Trump pardons peaceful pro-life activists targeted by Biden DOJ

On the eve of the 52nd annual March for Life demonstration on the National Mall, President Donald Trump issued pardons for 23 pro-life protesters whom the Biden Department of Justice worked strenuously to lock away.

"They should not have been prosecuted," said Trump. "Many of them are elderly people. They should not have been prosecuted. This is a great honor to sign this."

The president added that the fact some were still languishing in prison was "ridiculous."

Those who received pardons were apparently all convicted under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, which Texas Rep. Chip Roy (R) and other Republicans have long sought to repeal.

Roy told Blaze News in advance of the pardons that it was "tremendous news" that Trump was set to "pardon the brave pro-life Americans who were unjustly targeted by Biden's weaponized DOJ. These Americans are peaceful, pro-life Americans who were singled out and targeted by their government solely because of their beliefs."

'Get them out of the gulags.'

The pardons — which were urged by the Thomas More Society and Republican lawmakers, including Roy, Sen. Josh Hawley (Mo.) and Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (Fla.) — amount to another promise kept by the president, who suggested in a June 22 speech to the Faith and Freedom Coalition that he would pardon peaceful pro-life activists such as Paulette Harlow, who was sentenced to two years in prison by a Clinton-appointed judge despite suffering from a debilitating medical condition.

Trump vowed that upon taking office, he would "rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner who's unjustly victimized by the Biden regime, including Paulette, so we can get them out of the gulags and back to their families where they belong."

The FACE Act, ratified by President Bill Clinton in 1994, was supposed to protect access to churches and abortion facilities alike but ended up weaponized by the Biden Department of Justice to lock up peaceful pro-life protesters — protesters like Jean Marshall, 74; Joan Bell, 76; John Hinshaw, 69; Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising director of activism Lauren Handy; and concentration camp survivor Eva Edl.

The FACE Act law has almost exclusively been used in recent years against pro-life activists, even when the nation saw a massive uptick in attacks by abortion radicals on churches and pro-life pregnancy centers following the U.S. Supreme Court's Dobbs decision.

'I wish that somebody in my country would have loved Jesus enough to risk their own freedom or even their lives and gathered in front of that train.'

The Daily Caller reported in July that from 1994 to 2024, there were 205 cases brought under the FACE Act against pro-life activists and only six brought against abortion activists. Of the 55 cases prosecuted by that time under the Biden administration, only five reportedly concerned attacks on pregnancy resource centers.

Roy told Blaze News, "Ninety-seven percent of FACE Act prosecutions between the years of 1994-2024 were initiated against pro-life Americans; it is laughable to argue that the law hasn't been weaponized."

Since 2021, 21 pro-life advocates were convicted and 10 were thrown in prison.

Despite their disproportionate and zealous targeting by the DOJ, pro-life advocates appeared at peace with their decision.

Although ultimately sentenced to three years probation, Edl, convicted of a FACE Act violation in April 2024, told Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck in August that she was ready to die in prison for speaking out on behalf of the unborn.

'Congress must also take the step to repeal the FACE Act.'

"As a child, when I was pushed in that cattle car and nearly choked to death because we were so tightly put together — well, I wish that somebody in my country would have loved Jesus enough to risk their own freedom or even their lives and gathered in front of that train, stood on those railroad tracks to keep us from being shipped in there," said Edl.

"Well, this is basically what I'm doing," continued Edl. "When I stand in front of those clinic doors, I'm just buying time for our sidewalk counselors to reach women in a calm and quiet way and touch their hearts."

Rep. Roy, who introduced legislation in September 2023 that would repeal the law — legislation paralleled by Sen. Mike Lee's (R-Utah) companion bill in the Senate — stated at the time, "Free Americans should never live in fear of their government targeting them because of their beliefs. Yet Biden's Department of Justice has brazenly weaponized the FACE Act against normal, everyday Americans across the political spectrum, simply because they are pro-life."

Roy, who reintroduced his repeal bill Tuesday, told Blaze News the Thursday pardons were "a tremendous step towards righting the wrongs done under Biden" but noted that "Congress must also take the step to repeal the FACE Act to ensure it can never again be weaponized by a future administration."

Lee, who has another Senate companion bill ready, told the Daily Signal earlier this week, "While President Trump is stopping these outrageous prosecutions, we should ensure that no future administration has the ability to persecute Americans through unequal application of the law."

Kristan Hawkins, the president of Students for Life Action and Students for Life of America who previously claimed that Trump "clearly doesn’t want to be pro-life anymore," spoke to the need of the FACE Act Repeal Act reintroduced by Roy on Tuesday, stating, "In ignoring violent pro-abortion protestors to focus on peaceful pro-life prayer warriors the hypocrisy couldn't be clearer. The FACE Act represents viewpoint discrimination, as punishments are supersized because of the beliefs of those targeted by the government. This abuse of prosecutorial pro-abortion aggression must end."

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