[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                     REVISITING THE IMPLICATIONS OF
                              THE FACE ACT

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                 SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION AND 
                            LIMITED GOVERNMENT

                                 OF THE

                       COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

                     U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________

                         TUESDAY, MAY 16, 2023

                               __________

                           Serial No. 118-19

                               __________

         Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
         
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               Available via: http://judiciary.house.gov
               
                               __________

                                
                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
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                       COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

                        JIM JORDAN, Ohio, Chair

DARRELL ISSA, California             JERROLD NADLER, New York, Ranking 
KEN BUCK, Colorado                       Member
MATT GAETZ, Florida                  ZOE LOFGREN, California
MIKE JOHNSON, Louisiana              SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
ANDY BIGGS, Arizona                  STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
TOM McCLINTOCK, California           HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr., 
TOM TIFFANY, Wisconsin                   Georgia
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky              ADAM SCHIFF, California
CHIP ROY, Texas                      DAVID N. CICILLINE, Rhode Island
DAN BISHOP, North Carolina           ERIC SWALWELL, California
VICTORIA SPARTZ, Indiana             TED LIEU, California
SCOTT FITZGERALD, Wisconsin          PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
CLIFF BENTZ, Oregon                  J. LUIS CORREA, California
BEN CLINE, Virginia                  MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania
LANCE GOODEN, Texas                  JOE NEGUSE, Colorado
JEFF VAN DREW, New Jersey            LUCY McBATH, Georgia
TROY NEHLS, Texas                    MADELEINE DEAN, Pennsylvania
BARRY MOORE, Alabama                 VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas
KEVIN KILEY, California              DEBORAH ROSS, North Carolina
HARRIET HAGEMAN, Wyoming             CORI BUSH, Missouri
NATHANIEL MORAN, Texas               GLENN IVEY, Maryland
LAUREL LEE, Florida
WESLEY HUNT, Texas
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina

                                 ------                                

        SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION AND LIMITED GOVERNMENT

                     MIKE JOHNSON, Louisiana, Chair
TOM McCLINTOCK, California           MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania, 
CHIP ROY, Texas                          Ranking Member
DAN BISHOP, North Carolina           STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
KEVIN KILEY, California              VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas
HARRIET HAGEMAN, Wyoming             CORI BUSH, Missouri
WESLEY HUNT, Texas                   SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina          HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr., 
                                         Georgia

               CHRISTOPHER HIXON, Majority Staff Director
          AMY RUTKIN, Minority Staff Director & Chief of Staff
                           
                           C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                         Tuesday, May 16, 2023

                                                                   Page

                           OPENING STATEMENTS

The Honorable Mike Johnson, Chair of the Subcommittee on the 
  Constitution and Limited Government from the State of Louisiana     1
The Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, Ranking Member of the 
  Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from 
  the State of Pennsylvania......................................     3
The Honorable Jim Jordan, Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary 
  from the State of Ohio.........................................     5
The Honorable Jerrold Nadler, Ranking Member of the Committee on 
  the Judiciary from the State of New York.......................     5

                               WITNESSES

Mark Houck, President, The King's Men
  Oral Testimony.................................................     9
Tammy Kocher, Executive Director, New Life Family Services
  Oral Testimony.................................................    10
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    13
Talcott Camp, Chief Legal Strategy Officer, National Abortion 
  Federation
  Oral Testimony.................................................    17
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    19
Jeremy Dys, Senior Counsel, First Liberty Institute
  Oral Testimony.................................................    22
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    24
  Supplemental Material..........................................    33
Arielle Del Turco, Director, Center for Religious Liberty, Family 
  Research Council
  Oral Testimony.................................................    34
  Prepared Testimony.............................................    36
  Supplemental Material..........................................    39

          LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC. SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING

All materials submitted for the record by the Subcommittee on the 
  Constitution and Limited Government are listed below...........    66

A report entitled, ``2022 Violence & Disruption Statistics,'' 
  National Abortion Federation, 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
A report entitled, ``Appendix A--Attacks on Pro-Life Facilities 
  in the Last Year,'' submitted by the Honorable Jim Jordan, 
  Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary from the State of Ohio, 
  for the record
Two reports entitled, ``Hostility Against Churches: Supplemental 
  Report--First Quarter 2023, Issue Brief,'' April 2023, and 
  ``Hostility Against Churches Is on the Rise in the United 
  States, Issue Analysis,'' December 2022, Family Research 
  Counsil, submitted by the Honorable Mike Johnson, Chair of the 
  Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government from 
  the State of Louisiana, for the record
A report entitled, ``Designed to Deceive: A Study of the Crisis 
  Pregnancy Center Industry in Nine States: A Study of the Crisis 
  Pregnancy Center Industry in Nine States,'' Alliance, 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

 
                     REVISITING THE IMPLICATIONS OF.
                              THE FACE ACT

                              ----------                              


                         Tuesday, May 16, 2023

                        House of Representatives

        Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government

                       Committee on the Judiciary

                             Washington, DC

    The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:12 a.m., in 
Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Mike Johnson 
[Chair of the Subcommittee] presiding.
    Members present: Representatives Johnson of Louisiana, 
Jordan, Roy, Bishop, Kiley, Hageman, Hunt, Fry, Scanlon, 
Nadler, Cohen, Escobar, Jackson Lee, and Johnson of Georgia.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The Subcommittee 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. It 
is a really important issue. I now recognize myself for an 
opening statement.
    We want to thank our witnesses for being here this morning. 
Some of you came a long way, and we really appreciate your 
time. Today is our Committee's first hearing regarding the 
Biden Administration's use of the Freedom of Access to Clinic 
Entrances Act, or the FACE Act, as we call it.
    Since the Dobbs decision was leaked over a year ago now, 
there have been more than 100 attacks on pregnancy resource 
centers and churches across America, more than 100.
    These attacks have included fire bombings and vandalism 
that includes phrases written in graffiti like, ``If abortions 
aren't safe, neither are you.'' Including smashing of windows, 
targeted online harassment, protesters threatening violence 
outside pregnancy resource centers and churches, and many other 
acts.
    Federal law obviously prohibits all this conduct. The FACE 
Act states that,

           threats of force, obstruction, and property damage 
        intended to interfere with pregnancy resource centers are 
        illegal.

It also states that,

            force or threat of force to intentionally injure, 
        intimidate, or interfere with any person lawfully exercising or 
        seeking to exercise the First Amendment right of religious 
        freedom at a place of religious worship is prohibited.

    However, here is the problem. The Biden Administration has 
rarely enforced the statute to protect these organizations that 
are covered. For example, on June 7, 2022, last summer, vandals 
associated with a group called Jane's Revenge firebombed the 
CompassCare Pregnancy Services in Buffalo, New York.
    Half a million dollars in damages were done to that 
facility. To this moment, the FBI has done nothing to bring 
charges in the CompassCare case.
    That is just one example among many. The Justice Department 
to date has brought only four indictments against pro-abortion 
activists, all of which were related to a single Jane's Revenge 
attack in Florida.
    Four indictments, just four indictments are not even a drop 
in the bucket when you compare the hundreds of attacks that 
have occurred against pro-life organizations and churches since 
this law's inception.
    Here is the worst part, and this is a glaring fact, and it 
is impossible to overlook. While these radical left-wing groups 
go unpunished, the Justice Department at the same time has 
unleashed Federal law enforcement on pro-life advocates.
    Here's just a couple of examples. In October 2022, Eva Edl, 
an 87-year-old pro-life advocate and survivor of a communist 
concentration camp, was charged with a FACE Act violation for 
singing and praying near an abortion clinic. In February, Ms. 
Edl was again charged under the FACE Act for ``standing in 
front of a door'' of a Michigan abortion clinic in August 2020.
    Ms. Edl was confined to a wheelchair at that time. The 
Justice Department claimed that the 87-year-old woman was 
charged because she ``intimidated patients and employees.''
    Then, there is Mark Houck, who we will hear from shortly. 
He will share his testimony today. His home was raided at dawn 
by more than 20 FBI agents with guns drawn in front of his wife 
and seven young children for an alleged FACE Act violation.
    Thankfully, despite the FBI's brazen and unwarranted and 
tactics, a 12-person jury unanimously and very quickly 
acquitted him of those Federal charges that were brought 
against him.
    The targeting of advocates like Ms. Edl and Mr. Houck 
compared to the lack of enforcement against those who attack 
pregnancy resource centers and churches are striking. Pregnancy 
resource centers serve millions of women annually across this 
country with a multitude of services virtually free of charge. 
Most of them are nonprofits, of course, and they should be able 
to operate without fear.
    They provide care to pregnant women and distribute 
necessary items like clothing and diapers to mothers, and the 
women that seek these services should not be able--should be 
able to do so obviously without facing any danger. Churchgoers 
should be able to exercise their First Amendment right to 
religious freedom at places of worship without being 
terrorized.
    Unfortunately, this has not been the case under Attorney 
General Garland's Justice Department. This Committee is 
concerned with the apparent unequal application of the FACE Act 
by the Biden Administration. It is our job to monitor this.
    The application and enforcement of this act is an important 
matter of Congressional oversight, and this hearing will 
provide Members of our Committee and our Full Committee in the 
Judiciary with the opportunity to reexamine the FACE Act and 
explore ways that Congress might reform the statute.
    We believe in justice for all, and the FACE Act should be 
used to prosecute crimes committed against all entities covered 
by the law. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today, 
and I yield back.
    I now recognize our Ranking Member, the gentlewoman from 
Pennsylvania, Ms. Scanlon, for her opening statement.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Today's hearing on revisiting the implications of the FACE 
Act, that is the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, 
gives us an opportunity to consider the deeply troubling, 
decades-long history of violence, threats, and intimidation of 
people providing or accessing reproductive health services.
    The FACE Act was passed in 1994 in response to a decades-
long campaign of threats and violence by anti-abortion forces 
against facilities and providers of abortion services, and 
shortly after a doctor who provided such services was murdered 
by these extremists in 1993. The bill had bipartisan support in 
both houses, passing by voice vote in the House, and with 
bipartisan support in the Senate.
    In the past few years, we have seen a disturbing rise in 
political violence in this country, particularly, from right-
wing extremists. Just yesterday, we learned of an attempt to 
attack one of our House colleagues, which resulted in injuries 
and hospitalization for two of his staff members.
    This attack occurs amid a tenfold rise in threats of 
violence against Members of Congress since 2016. Also, a rise 
in threats and attacks against public officials, law 
enforcement, school board members, and other elected officials.
    Therefore, against the background of rising political 
violence, it might make sense to hold a hearing to examine how 
Congress can reduce political violence, particularly in the 
wake of the Dobbs decision, which overruled 50 years of 
precedent in Roe v. Wade.
    That is not the purpose of this hearing. This majority has 
stacked the hearing with witnesses to testify about only 
threats and violence impacting anti-abortion facilities, while 
ignoring the far more numerous and ongoing threats against 
individuals and facilities that provide abortion care and other 
reproductive health services.
    Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, since the 
start of this Congress, the extremist Members of the House 
majority have sought to highlight only the reprehensible 
attacks against pro-life organizations and to suppress evidence 
of far greater and more longstanding attacks against abortion 
providers.
    This false equivalency and disinformation feeds into the 
division and chaos afflicting our country and encourages more 
violence. This hearing continues the narrative pushed by the 
House majority since the start of this Congress, a narrative of 
manufactured outrage to stigmatize and distract from the deeply 
unpopular efforts of an extremist minority to enact or enforce 
a nationwide abortion ban.
    One of the first bills passed by this Congress was H. Con. 
Res. 3, rammed through in the first week with no regular order, 
no process. That resolution condemned the recent attacks on 
pro-life facilities while conspicuously failing to condemn any 
of the thousands of acts of violence, threats, and intimidation 
faced by abortion providers and patients, whether in the 
aftermath of the Dobbs decision or over the course of preceding 
decades.
    Violence, threats, and intimidation tactics should have no 
place in our political discourse, including in our Nation's 
ongoing debate over abortion access. We must condemn all 
political violence and threats of violence, whatever the 
beliefs or motivations of those who engage in it, and 
regardless of who the target may be.
    Experts on political violence and threat it poses to our 
democracy say that one of the primary things that must happen 
is leaders must condemn such political violence. Just as 
pernicious as normalizing or advocating for such violence is 
those who twist the facts to excuse or minimize such violence 
when it supports their cause.
    So, yes, the FACE Act's scope does include anti-abortion 
facilities, but let's be clear. The overwhelming majority of 
such violence, threats, and intimidation has been and continues 
to be directed against abortion providers and patients by anti-
abortion extremists. So, any attempt to revisit the 
implications of the FACE Act have to consider that history and 
the ongoing facts of such violence.
    Now, we have just heard that the Republican majority is 
trying to show that there is some kind of selective enforcement 
by the Biden Administration in enforcing the FACE Act to target 
anti-abortion activists, but I think the facts speak for 
themselves.
    FBI Director Wray testified to the Senate last summer that 
when it was reported the Supreme Court intended to reverse Roe 
v. Wade, the FBI put out a directive to its field offices to be 
actively looking for potential threats. He said that the Joint 
Terrorism Task Forces were specifically focused on attacks and 
threats against churches, pro-life organizations, pregnancy 
resources centers, and similar organizations.
    Wray went on to say there's too many people that seem to 
think that passions running high justifies engaging in violence 
and destruction of property. Sorry, I had an extended quote, I 
don't think we need to go into all of it, but it says,

        On abortion or anything else, you don't get to use violence or 
        threats of violence to act on it. And we are going to go after 
        that contact aggressively. I feel very strongly about that. I 
        have communicated that very strongly to all of our field 
        offices and our workforce.

    In fact, earlier this year, the Department of Justice 
successfully obtained indictments in the Middle District of 
Florida against two people for violating the FACE Act after 
they allegedly vandalized an anti-abortion crisis pregnancy 
center.
    The Department has also reached out to the United States 
Conference of Catholic Bishops, among other groups, to ask for 
their assistance to let the anti-abortion facilities know that 
the FACE Act protects them. Further, in December of last year, 
the FBI offered a $25,000 reward to obtain evidence concerning 
attacks against such facilities.
    So, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle continue 
to push a false narrative that the Federal government is out to 
get them, but the facts are not on their side. The clear 
majority of Americans believe we must protect access to 
abortion and the freedom to make such healthcare decisions in 
consultation with one's doctor, not politicians.
    At this point, I would seek unanimous consent to introduce 
a report from the National Abortion Foundation entitled, ``2022 
Violence and Disruption Statistics.''
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Without objection.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you. I now recognize the 
Chair of our Full Judiciary Committee, Mr. Jordan, for his 
opening statement.
    Chair Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Politics is driving the agenda in our Federal agencies. If 
you don't believe me, just read the Durham Report from 
yesterday. No probable cause, no predicate, no evidence 
whatsoever, and yet they used a fake dossier from the Clinton 
campaign to open an investigation into a Presidential campaign. 
They spied on American citizens.
    Here is what the Durham Report said, ``the FBI failed to 
uphold their mission of fidelity to the law. They didn't follow 
the law.''
    In 2020, we have just learned in the last couple weeks, it 
was the Biden campaign working with 51 former intelligence 
officials to put together a letter that was not accurate to 
interfere with a Presidential election.
    Politics is driving the agenda in far too many agencies in 
our government, and today it is not limited to Presidential 
campaigns. Today they come after American citizens. You could 
be a Catholic attending a Mass. You could be a parent showing 
up at a school board meeting.
    Or you can be like Mr. Houck, a pro-lifer praying at a 
clinic. You will be targeted; you could be targeted by our 
government. That is how scary the situation has become.
    So, I want to thank Mr. Houck and the other witnesses for 
being here today. God bless you, Mr. Houck, what you had to go 
through. Twenty agents showing up at your house in front of 
your wife and your seven children. Arresting you when you were 
willing to turn yourself--that is how ridiculous it has become 
in our country.
    So, Mr. Chair, thank you for this hearing. We are sick of 
the double standard. We are sick of politics driving who gets 
prosecuted, who gets pursued and who doesn't. It is wrong. It 
is not supposed to happen in the greatest Nation ever, where we 
have a Bill of Rights, where we have a Constitution and where 
we have the rule of law.
    It is. This hearing is going to help expose all the 
ridiculous things going on, and why frankly this Congress 
should look at the appropriations process and what we have to 
do there to begin to rein in these Federal agencies that are 
trampling on American citizens' rights.
    With that, I yield back to the Chair.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. Jordan. I now 
recognize the Ranking Member of the Full Committee, Mr. Nadler, 
for his opening statement.
    Mr. Nadler. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Mr. Chair, I should be astonished, but I am not, that the 
Chair of the Committee would quote from the discredited Durham 
Report and the discredited Mr. Durham, who filed I think a 300-
and-something report--
    Chair Jordan. Would the gentleman yield?
    Mr. Nadler. No. Who filed a something 300-page report 
giving his opinions, but whose two prosecutions both resulted 
in acquittals and jurors saying why did we ever even have to 
take this.
    Mr. Chair, I would like to begin by saying that I condemn 
violence in all its forms, including threats, vandalism, and 
property destruction against any person or organization, 
regardless of their position on abortion rights.
    I would also like to reiterate my condemnation of the 
attempted murder of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. I am 
grateful that law enforcement took Justice Kavanaugh's would-be 
assassin into custody before he could complete an act of 
violence.
    In a democracy, violence is never in a political dispute, 
and it should be roundly and unreservedly condemned. Yet, for 
decades, anti-abortion extremists have used violence, threats, 
and disruption to curb access to abortion.
    According to the National Abortion Federation, or NAF, 
since 1977, anti-abortion extremists have been responsible for 
11 murders, 42 bombings, 200 arsons, 531 assaults, and 
thousands of incidents of criminal activities directed at 
patients, providers, and volunteers.
    Nearly 30 years ago, in response to this disruptive 
violence, including the murder of Dr. David Gunn, Congress 
passed the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. I have 
been unequivocal in my support for the FACE Act, as well as for 
the First Amendment rights of anti-abortion protesters, with 
whom I deeply disagree, so long as that speech does not cross 
the line into violent conduct or disruption.
    As a cosponsor of the bill in 1993, which our former 
Judiciary Committee colleague and now-Senate majority leader 
Chuck Schumer introduced in the House, I remarked on the floor 
that,

        Anti-abortion protesters have an absolute right to say don't do 
        it or anything else they want to say. They do not have any 
        right to say by means of physical force or intimidation, we 
        won't let you do it.

    Today's Subcommittee hearing, however, is a lost 
opportunity to focus on the real, longstanding problem of 
violence and disruption that doctors, nurses, patients, and 
volunteers face in providing or accessing abortion, which 
appear have to have spiked follow the Supreme Court's decision 
in Dobbs.
    Instead, the apparent purpose of today's hearing is to 
provide yet another platform for the majority's inflammatory, 
anti-Federal law enforcement rhetoric, which I fear will only 
further contribute to a political climate where anti-abortion 
extremists believe their violent conduct is justified, 
particularly in States where abortion remains protected by law.
    According to NAF's latest report on the matter, in 2022, 
States that are protective of abortion rights saw a 
disproportionate increase in violence and disruption targeting 
doctors and their patients.
    This includes a 538 percent increase in obstructions, which 
NAF defines as causing a delay or attempting to cause a delay 
in the conduct of business or preventing people from entering 
or exiting an area, textbook examples of the conduct prohibited 
by the FACE Act.
    Despite this surge in incidents and the long history of 
violence and disruption perpetrated by anti-abortion 
extremists, which necessitated Congress to pass the FACE Act in 
the first place, today's hearing is designed to further 
majority's misleading political narrative that the Biden 
Administration is using Federal law enforcement to target 
conservatives.
    There is zero evidence that Federal prosecutors are 
selectively targeting anti-abortion protesters under the FACE 
Act. To the contrary, it appears that DOJ is enforcing the law 
without regard to defendants' viewpoints.
    At a recent bipartisan briefing provided to Judiciary 
Committee staff, FBI representatives stated that approximately 
75 percent of FACE Act investigations concern incidents against 
anti-abortion facilities.
    Yet, Republicans insist on devoting the Subcommittee's time 
to this manufactured controversy to placate a minority of anti-
abortion MAGA Republicans who would like this Congress to pass 
a total nationwide ban on abortion.
    Let me be clear. Democrats stand with the majority of the 
American public and will always oppose such a radical position. 
Regardless of your position on abortion rights, we must condemn 
all acts of violence, regardless of who is the ultimate target, 
make clear that any individual who violates the FACE Act should 
be subject to prosecution.
    Unfortunately, by refusing to acknowledge the problem of 
violence against providers and patients and focusing only on 
this false narrative of malevolent Federal law enforcement, 
today's hearing will inadvertently send the wrong message to 
anti-abortion extremists at a critical moment in our Nation 
where reproductive freedom and abortion access is in crisis.
    This hearing is in a sense a repeat of a resolution we 
passed the first week of this session, first week of 
Republicans' control of the House, when we passed a resolution 
condemning violence at anti-abortion facilities, pregnancy 
crisis centers, but rejected a Democratic Amendment to add a 
condemnation of violence at abortion providers also.
    So, they rejected an Amendment. They said we will condemn 
violence against anti-abortion clinics, but we will not 
condemn, maybe say OK to, could not condemn violence at 
abortion clinics.
    Mr. Chair, I believe today's hearing is a wasteful and 
ultimately irresponsible use of this Subcommittee's time. With 
that, I yield back.
    Chair Jordan. Mr. Chair, Mr. Chair?
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Yes, sir.
    Chair Jordan. I would ask unanimous consent to enter into 
the record in response to Mr. Nadler's quote and manufactured 
crisis the list of over 100 crisis pregnancy centers and 
churches that have been vandalized in the aftermath of the leak 
of the Dobbs opinion and the Dobbs decision.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Without objection.
    I will also offer into the record, seeking unanimous 
consent to include the Family Research Council Report and its 
Supplemental Report. It is entitled, ``Hostility Against 
Churches Is on the Rise in the United States,'' Analyzing 
Incidents from 2018-2022. It was prepared by Ms. Arielle Del 
Turco, who is going to testify here shortly.
    Just one headline, key point, at least 420 acts of 
hostility against occurred between January 1918-September 2022 
across 45 U.S. States and Washington, DC. Without objection, 
these will all be entered into the record.
    Without objection, all other opening statements will be 
included in the record as well.
    We now introduce today's witnesses.
    I will begin with Mr. Mark Houck. He is a father, husband, 
and pro-life advocate. In October 2021, he was standing on a 
street corner praying outside a Planned Parenthood facility. 
After Mr. Houck and his 12-year-old son were approached and 
harassed by a Planned Parenthood escort, Mr. Houck pushed the 
escort away from his young son.
    Nearly a year later, he was charged with violations of the 
FACE Act. Despite his lawyer offering to have him turn himself 
in, Mr. Houck's home was raided in the early morning by 
approximately 20 FBI agents and other law enforcement officers. 
Mr. Houck was unanimously acquitted of the charges by a jury.
    Ms. Tammy Kocher is the Executive Director of New Life 
Family Services in the Minneapolis--St. Paul area. In March 
2023, one of her facilities had its windows broken and its 
building was defaced by this group Jane's Revenge and their 
graffiti. One of those messages read, ``If abortions aren't 
safe, neither are you.''
    Ms. Talcott Camp is with us. She is Chief Legal and 
Strategy Officer at the National Abortion Federation. She 
oversees NAF's legal work and plays a major role in all NAF's 
strategic decisionmaking. Prior to joining the Federation, she 
was the Deputy Director of the ACLU's Reproductive Freedom 
Project.
    Mr. Jeremy Dys is a Senior Counsel at First Liberty 
Institute. First Liberty is the Nation's largest legal 
organization dedicated exclusively to defending religious 
liberty for all Americans. In his role, Mr. Dys litigates on 
behalf of clients in State and Federal courts, including FACE 
Act cases.
    Ms. Arielle Del Turco, referenced earlier, is the Director 
of the Center for Religious Liberty at the Family Research 
Council, where she is responsible for religious freedom policy 
and advocacy efforts, and her recent research includes tracking 
the number of attacks against churches across the country. We 
just entered that report in the record.
    We welcome our witnesses, and we thank you all again for 
appearing today. We will begin by swearing you in, so would you 
please rise and raise your right hand for us.
    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?
    Thank you. Let the record reflect that the witnesses have 
answered in the affirmative. Thank you, you can be seated.
    So, all of you know that your written testimony will be 
entered into the record in its entirety, but we ask you 
summarize that testimony in your five minutes that is allotted.
    You have a microphone in front of you. It has a clock and a 
series of lights. When the light turns yellow, you should begin 
to conclude your remarks. When the light turns red, that means 
your time has expired.
    So, Mr. Houck, we will begin with you. You can start now. 
Hit that button for us, there you go.

                    STATEMENT OF MARK HOUCK

    Mr. Houck. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Ranking Member, 
Madam Ranking Member, and Jim Jordan, thank you for inviting me 
to be here today, and all Committee Members, thank you.
    Twenty years ago, I began pro-life work in the city of 
Philadelphia. I did peaceful protests and prayer vigils in 
front of many abortuary facilities in the Philadelphia. I have 
always been peaceful.
    I want to bring you to October 13, 2021, where I was with 
my son, 12-year-old son, praying in front of an abortuary in 
Philadelphia. On that day, a couple women walked out of the 
facility. I began to offer them literature, as I always do, 
with compassion, love, and great respect. In fact, I was 50 
feet away from the entrance of the building.
    I proceeded to walk with these women across the street, 
making me about 100 feet away from the entrance to building, to 
a crisis pregnancy center, pregnancy resource center, which was 
about six feet away from me. At that time, an escort in the 
building decided to run over, impede my progress, and get in 
the way of me ministering and talking to the women that had 
left Planned Parenthood, 12th and Locust Streets in 
Philadelphia.
    At that point, we exchanged some words. We went back to 
where we were praying, and I continued to pray with my 12-year-
old son. About 20 minutes later, the escort, his name is Bruce 
Love, I have known him for years, I have known him for 20 
years, came out of the building.
    He made a direct line toward my son, stood right next to my 
son. Again, we are about 50 feet from the entrance to the 
building. He stood right next to my 12-year-old boy, who was a 
little intimidated and scared by this.
    I asked him if he could please give him some space. He did 
not. He has a right to be there. We just continued to pray. He 
continued to talk to me and offer insults to me, which of 
course he has done before, and it was never a problem for me. I 
just, I didn't listen to it.
    Then he started to begin to talk to my son. Now, he has 
talked to my son before. In fact, I believe he taught my son 
the ``F'' word. I am a home school dad, and that is the reality 
of it.
    Nonetheless, he begins to talk to my son and badger my son. 
Starts telling my son how evil his father is and how his father 
doesn't want to help women. I instructed him to step away, to 
go back to where he normally stands in front of the building, 
which he did not.
    He continued to badger my son. After repeated requests not 
to comply--not to stand next to my son, I escorted him back to 
where he normally stands, which he did comply. I turned around 
to face my son and go back to pray, and he turned around and 
began to badger my son again.
    At that point, I became a dad on the street concerned for 
my son. I did push the man. He did fall down. We went, we 
prayed for the man, we returned to the scene. I presented my 
information to the Civil Affairs Department that day, I gave my 
information.
    I want you to know that the Philadelphia PD and the DA in 
Philadelphia as well as the Civil Affairs Department did not 
intend to prosecute. They had no interest in that. I was put in 
a private criminal complaint, which was dismissed.
    I want to take you to April 22nd, when it was dismissed. 
Five days later, this is 2022, I was served a target letter on 
the same street corner with my 12-year-old boy. A target letter 
that I was a target of a Federal indictment.
    Fast forward to September 23rd. My attorneys reached 
initially at the target letter, stating that we would 
peacefully present ourselves to the district. There would be no 
need to come out to his house and disrupt his family and cause 
any trauma to them. That he is a peaceful man, he will come in. 
We said that.
    In August 2022, my attorney reached out to me and says have 
you heard from the Assistant U.S. Attorney. I said no. She 
won't return my phone calls, he says. I said, ``Well, maybe we 
will just let sleeping dogs lie.''
    On September 23rd, my home was raided by ten unmarked and 
marked units, State troopers, Federal law enforcement 
personnel. I had five Federal agents on my doorstep at 6:30 in 
the morning, with long guns pointed at me and my seven 
children.
    They banged on the door, and they said, ``open up.'' They 
did not even declare who they were that day. They didn't even 
asks me could you please open the door; we are the FBI. They 
just said, ``open up.'' I went to the door, I was up. I said, 
``who is it.'' They said, ``it's the FBI, open up.'' So, I 
opened up the door peacefully. I said, ``please stay calm, I 
have seven babies in here.'' They pointed M-16 guns at me and 
my wife. My wife comes down and says, ``Do you have a warrant 
for his arrest.'' They said, ``we're taking him with or without 
a warrant.'' My wife said, ``you can't do that, that is 
kidnaping.'' We proceeded to go into a 4\1/2\-month trial that, 
as you know and have said previously, that we were acquitted 
of. That I was facing 11 years in prison, and I had every 
prospect in my heart that I would be in Federal prison away 
from my seven children.
    Thankfully, we were able to be acquitted, and I am blessed 
to be able to share the story today. Thank you.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr, Houck. Ms. Kocher, 
you are next, you may begin.

                   STATEMENT OF TAMMY KOCHER

    Ms. Kocher. Thank you, Chair Johnson, Ranking Member 
Scanlon, and Members of the Committee. Thank you for the 
opportunity to join today.
    My name is Tammy Kocher, and I have the privilege of 
serving as the Executive Director of New Life Family Services 
in Minneapolis, Minnesota. For 50 years, New Life has served 
Minnesota families as one of the most comprehensive, faith-
based nonprofit organizations of its kind through its five 
pregnancy centers in the Minneapolis--St. Paul area, as well as 
Rochester.
    We provide professional, life-affirming care through no-
cost pregnancy, parenting, and post-abortion services, as well 
as licensed adoption services. Every year, we serve more than 
6,000 women, men, and children through our five centers.
    We are particularly proud of our newest center, a 12,600 
square foot building in the heart of urban Minneapolis. This 
facility houses our largest pregnancy center and a full-service 
nonprofit medical clinic started by African immigrants. It has 
been a decade-long vision that came to fruition in 2022.
    Our new building is located in the Phillips community of 
Minneapolis, which is one of the most beautifully diverse and 
resilient communities in our State. It is also a community 
filled with numerous challenges, including generational 
poverty, illegal drugs, and gang activity.
    As you may recall, in 2020, Minneapolis was literally on 
fire after the tragic death of George Floyd. Our new center is 
about one mile north of George Floyd Square.
    This community has endured so much over the past several 
years. While Minneapolis has struggled greatly since 2020, New 
Life's love and commitment to this city and to hard-hit 
communities in particular, has never wavered.
    My purpose today is to share about the increasing hostility 
that pregnancy centers like ours are facing across the country. 
There are more than 3,000 pregnancy centers in the U.S. that 
provide compassionate, quality, no-cost medical and social 
services to hundreds of thousands of women, children, and 
families every year.
    In New Life's 50-year history, we have never experienced 
the type of attacks as we have this past year. Since the Dobbs 
decision, there have been numerous false narratives and 
outright lies told about the work of pregnancy centers. 
Minnesota is sadly one of the many States that have quickly 
turned into a hostile environment for pro-women, life-affirming 
organizations like ours.
    On August 23rd of last year, Minnesota Attorney General 
Ellison issued a misleading consumer alert warning Minnesotans 
about pregnancy centers like ours, using the same false 
narratives perpetuated by abortion activists.
    Words are powerful, especially when spoken by people in 
position of authority. When those in authority regurgitate 
these false narratives, it can have devastating consequences 
for organizations like ours, and it has.
    The day after Attorney General Ellison released his 
consumer alert, we had threatening posters plastered all over 
the community surrounding our new clinic. You can see Exhibit B 
in my written testimony.
    We were warned, ``If abortions aren't safe, neither are 
you.'' A few months later, there was a protest outside our 
center near the University of Minnesota. Then on March 4th of 
this year, a little after 2 a.m., we were notified by law 
enforcement that our brand-new building in Minneapolis was 
badly vandalized.
    We had multiple windows smashed in; the front of our 
building was covered with threatening graffiti messages. Again, 
we were warned, ``If abortions aren't safe, then neither are 
you.'' Other graffiti stated, ``Jane was here.'' ``F-12,'' etc.
    The vandals caused more than $30,000 worth of damage in a 
matter of two minutes. To add insult to injury, there was a 
protest planned for later that day at the park across the 
street.
    The protesters, however, couldn't resist the backdrop of 
our damaged building. So, while we were literally in the midst 
of boarding up our broken windows, they moved their protest 
right in front of our center.
    We are the fifth organization in Minnesota that has been 
vandalized in these coordinated attacks. Many more pro-life 
centers across the country have endured the same threats and 
violence under the banner of Jane's Revenge.
    While these attacks are meant to intimidate and hurt us, 
the people who are ultimately hurt are our clients, single 
moms, families who are struggling to make ends meet, and young 
women who are being pressured into an abortion. They are the 
real victims here.
    The truth is not every woman facing an unplanned pregnancy 
wants an abortion. Many of the women we serve want to continue 
their pregnancy but lack the support and practical resources 
needed to do so. Without pregnancy centers and the important 
work that we do every day, the three million women who 
experience an unintended pregnancy each year will be left with 
fewer options and fewer resources.
    Whatever you believe about abortion, we should agree that 
nonprofit organizations like ours that contribute millions of 
dollars in free services to women, children, families, and 
their communities, should not be the targets of vandalism and 
terrorism.
    The people we serve should not feel threatened simply for 
walking through our doors. When pregnancy centers aren't safe, 
our patients aren't safe.
    Thank you for the opportunity to share about the important 
work of pregnancy centers like ours and the increasing 
hostility that we are enduring.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Kocher follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you, Ms. Kocher. I 
apologize for mispronouncing your name earlier.
    Ms. Kocher. That is OK.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Sorry for the chaos in the 
hallway, too. You performed like a pro there.
    Let's see, Ms. Camp, you are next, and you may begin.

                   STATEMENT OF TALCOTT CAMP

    Ms. Camp. Chair Johnson, Ranking Member Scanlon, and 
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, my name is Talcott 
Camp, and I am the Chief Legal and Strategy Officer of the 
National Abortion Federation, or NAF. I have worked to support 
providers of abortion care for decades, both in my previous 
role at the ACLU, and my current role at NAF.
    NAF is the professional association of abortion providers 
with a mission to unite, represent, serve, and support abortion 
providers in delivering patient-centered, evidence-based care. 
Since 1977, NAF has compiled an invaluable data base of 
statistics on anti-abortion extremist violence, allowing us to 
track patterns and trends.
    Last week, we released our 2022 violence and disruption 
statistics, a copy of which is attached to my written 
testimony, which I believe Ranking Member Scanlon has moved 
into the record.
    Since 1977, there have been 11 murders, 26 attempted 
murders, 42 bombings, 200 arsons, 531 assaults, 492 clinic 
invasions, 375 burglaries, and thousands of other criminal 
incidents targeting abortion patients, providers, and 
volunteers.
    Each of these incidents involves a real person with a real 
family and often real children. Every one of these incidents 
means that every provider of abortion care and every patient 
trying to access abortion care lives in terror.
    NAF's 2022 statistics show increases in major incidents. 
Comparing 2022 with 2021, the number of death threats or 
threats of harm rose from 182-218. Stalkings rose 229 percent, 
from 28-92. Burglaries rose 231 percent, and four clinic arsons 
occurred in 2022 alone.
    The statistics also show a sharp increase in violence and 
disruption in very specific States. The Supreme Court decision 
overturning Roe and the subsequent proliferation of State 
abortion bans emboldened anti-abortion extremists to travel 
specifically to States where abortion remains legal to target 
clinics, clinicians, and patients there.
    We must stand against violence at clinics providing 
abortion care in States where it remains legal and recognize 
that a national ban on abortion would be an even greater public 
health catastrophe. No one should fear violence in the 
workplace or when seeking healthcare.
    Abortion providers, patients, and volunteers face violence 
and harassment every day. Here are a couple examples from 2022. 
In that year, we saw a 100 percent increase in arsons, compared 
to 2021. One of those arsons was at a clinic set to open in 
Casper, Wyoming in June 2022.
    In May, shortly after reporting on the Supreme Court's 
expected decision in Dobbs, an arsonist broke into the clinic 
and set it on fire. The arson devastated staff, delayed the 
clinic's opening by nearly a year, and caused hundreds of 
thousands of dollars in repairs.
    A few months earlier, an anti-abortion extremist stood 
outside a NAF member clinic on the East Coast with a flaming 
torch, holding a photo of one of the clinic's abortion 
providers, including his full name, personal information, and 
the word ``wanted'' printed on it. Through a megaphone, they 
shouted details about his family, his wife's name, how many 
children he had.
    They then posted a video of these threats on a public 
social media page, ensuring that their menacing message reached 
a wide audience.
    The use of that wanted poster was not singular or new. That 
extremist tactic harkens back to the terrifying circumstances 
surrounding Congress's enactment of the FACE Act, the Freedom 
of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, in 1994 with bipartisan 
support.
    For many years, anti-abortion extremists had used clinic 
blockades to intimidate and prevent access to clinics. The 
first clinic arson was in 1976, followed by a series of 
bombings in 1978, and the attacks and threats escalated. In the 
1990's, extremists began using butyric acid attacks and anthrax 
threat letters.
    In 1993, Dr. David Gunn was murdered outside his clinic, 
the first abortion provider killed by anti-abortion extremists. 
He, too, was featured on a wanted-style poster before his 
murder, as were other now-slain abortion providers. Since Dr. 
Gunn's murder, there have been ten more murders and 26 
attempted murders, most recently in Colorado Springs in 2015.
    It was in response to this escalating violence that 
Congress passed the bipartisan FACE Act, which has been an 
important tool in addressing extremist violence over the last 
three decades. Every administration has enforced the FACE Act, 
Republican and Democratic alike. Nonetheless, abortion 
providers and their patients face unrelenting threats of 
violence and disruption to care.
    I am here today because no one should fear violence at 
their workplace or when they are trying to access healthcare. 
For decades, abortion providers and their patients have faced 
escalating harassment and violence. In the post-Dobbs world, 
that atmosphere had only intensified, making FACE and the 
protections it offers all the more critical.
    Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Camp follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you, Ms. Camp. Mr. Dys, you 
may begin now.

                    STATEMENT OF JEREMY DYS

    Mr. Dys. Thank you, Chair Johnson, Ranking Member Scanlon, 
and Members of the Committee. I am Jeremy Dys, and I serve as 
Senior Counsel for First Liberty Institute, a nationwide legal 
organization dedicated to defending religious liberty for all 
Americans. Thank you for your very kind invitation to testify 
here this morning.
    The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act promises to 
ensure access to the Nation's reproductive health facilities 
and accountability to those who would unlawfully restrict 
access to those facilities.
    The law is quite clear. If you attempt to injure, 
intimidate, or interfere with access to a reproductive health 
facility, then you may face both criminal charges and civil 
penalties.
    The FACE Act is intentionally broad in its scope, affording 
protection to facilities that provide services ``relating to 
the human reproductive system.'' Pam Hibbard provides 
reproductive counseling every day to women at her facility. She 
also lives there.
    One morning she woke to find shattered glass strewn about 
the ground. Her facility had red paint dripping down the 
outside walls as if it were blood. On the sidewalks, clients 
seeking access to reproductive services would have to walk over 
spray-painted threats. Pam did not know if she was safe, nor if 
her clients would be safe.
    Not far away, a Jill Jorgenson woke to a similar scene at 
her reproductive health facility. Vandals had shattered the 
glass front door of her facility. Clients would soon arrive to 
find spray-painted threats on the threshold.
    These scenes played out across the country more than 100 
different times following the decision of Dobbs v. Jackson 
Women's Health Organization just last year. Yet, despite these 
numerous attacks to life-affirming reproductive health 
facilities, the Department of Justice had indicted just four 
individuals under the FACE Act in the past year.
    More concerning is the response of State Attorneys General. 
The FACE Act explicitly authorizes State Attorneys General to 
seek civil penalties on behalf of the citizens of each State 
against those who engage in such unlawful acts of intimidation. 
Yet, in Massachusetts, rather than deploy the FACE Act in 
defense of Pam and Jill's facilities, former Attorney General 
Maura Healey threatened them with sanctions.
    Then the Massachusetts Attorney General issued a consumer 
advisory against the very centers who suffered broken windows, 
paint bombs, and spray-painted threats from Jane's Revenge.
    Florida tells a very different story. Martha Avila showed 
up to her reproductive health facility in Hialeah, Florida, on 
July 4, 2022, only to discover a threat from Jane's Revenge, 
``If abortion is not safe, neither are you.''
    Her experience, though, is different from Pam or Jill's. 
Once Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody knew the name of the 
vandals who had allegedly attacked Martha's facility, she filed 
a lawsuit under the FACE Act to impose the maximum civil 
penalties against them.
    The FACE Act and ought to be indifferent to ideology. It is 
meant to hold accountable those who use violence to express 
disagreement. Its application should not be withheld because a 
government official disagrees with a facility's religious 
beliefs.
    In Florida, the DOJ investigated and indicted the alleged 
vandals under the FACE Act. That allowed the Florida Attorney 
General to file her suit on behalf of the State, and it also 
allowed First Liberty to defend Martha and Heartbeat of Miami 
in a private legal action under the FACE Act.
    Had the DOJ and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts similarly 
identified potential FACE Act defendants, our clients there and 
perhaps elsewhere may have had recourse under the FACE Act as 
well.
    Violence is never an appropriate response to disagreement. 
Those who would so express their disagreement with life-
affirming reproductive health facilities must be held 
accountable under the law. Applying the FACE Act equitably 
simply ensures that our Nation will not tolerate violence as a 
means to political ends.
    Thank you again for this opportunity to testify here this 
morning. I am happy to answer your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Dys follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    The complete statement from Mr. Dys, Senior Counsel, First 
Liberty Institute, including the exhibits can be found at 
https://docs.house.gov/meetings/JU/JU10/20230516/115924/HHRG-
118-JU10-Wstate-DysJ-20230516.pdf.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. Dys. Ms. Del 
Turco, you may begin.

                 STATEMENT OF ARIELLE DEL TURCO

    Ms. Del Turco. Chair Johnson, Ranking Member Scanlon, and 
Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to 
testify. My name is Arielle Del Turco, and I am the Director of 
the Center for Religious Liberty at Family Research Council.
    Our organization desires all people to have the freedom to 
exercise their faith. This freedom is significantly undermined 
whenever houses of worship are the targets of violent or 
destructive acts.
    It would be appropriate at this time to note that the FACE 
Act specifically includes protections for places of religious 
worship. It protects the faithful exercising their right of 
religious freedom in these places while also protecting such 
places from efforts to damage or destroy their property.
    In December 2022, FRC releases a report analyzing publicly 
documented acts of hostility against churches over the past 
five years. We identified 420 incidents that occurred in 45 
States and Washington, DC, between January 2018-September 2022.
    We noted a recognizable increase in frequency over the 
course of that reporting period. These acts include vandalism, 
arson, bomb threats, gun-related incidents, and interruption of 
worship services. All these are punishable under the FACE Act.
    FRC updated our report in April and found additional 
incidents in the final months of 2022 and 69 in the first 
quarter of 2023. If the trend continues, this year will be on 
track to have the highest number of church attacks over the 
last six years. All told, FRC has observed 565 attacks against 
churches from January 2018-April 2023.
    I would now like to highlight a few examples for you. In 
February 2023, vandals broke into the Delabrook Presbyterian 
Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. They sprayed a fire 
extinguished all over the church and into the ventilation 
system, causing $40,000 in damage.
    One church staff member told a local news station,

        I keep wondering why. It shows a great deal of anger. Are they 
        angry at us? Were they angry at churches? Were they angry at 
        God?

    In these attacks, many churches are defaced with obscene or 
hateful messages. In October 2021, vandals spray-painted anti-
Catholic messages on the front of Denver's Cathedral Basilica 
of the Immaculate Conception, including the words ``Satan lives 
here.''
    In March and April 2019, three historically Black Baptist 
churches in or near Port Barre, Louisiana, were set on fire by 
the same individual within a 10-day span.
    Following the leak of the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision 
last May, at least 57 acts of hostility against churches were 
directly related to abortion. On June 25th, the day after the 
Dobbs announcement, St. Patrick Catholic Church in Philadelphia 
was spray-painted outside with the phrase, ``Abort the 
church.''
    On June 26th, pro-abortion protesters interrupted Mass at 
St. Joseph Catholic Church in Chicago and began chanting 
slogans and distributing leaflets. At least one protester held 
up a sign that read, ``The Catholic Church has blood on its 
hands.''
    Not only Christian churches are subjected to such attacks. 
The Anti-Defamation League reported hundreds of antisemitic 
incidents against Jewish institutions in 2022, including 
synagogues and Jewish schools. The American Civil Liberties 
Union has tracked nearly 400 anti-mosque incidents since 2005.
    Violent attacks against places of worship are completely 
unacceptable, and it should concern those of all faiths and 
political persuasions. As long as the FACE Act is on the books, 
it should be used to go after perpetrators of attacks on places 
of worship. Antireligious hostility has no place in our society 
or any country that wants to call itself a land of freedom.
    This issue deserves the full attention of the American 
public and the full weight of law enforcement. We appreciate 
the Subcommittee's interest in learning about attacks on places 
of religious worship as it considers the effectiveness and 
application of the FACE Act.
    Thank you for your time and consideration.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Del Turco follows:]
    [GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
    
    The complete statement from Ms. Del Turco, Director, Center 
for Religious Liberty, Family Research Council, including the 
appendices is available at https://docs.house.gov/meetings/JU/
JU10/20230516/115924/HHRG-118-JU10-Wstate-DelTurcoA-20230516 
.pdf.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you, Ms. Del Turco.
    We will now proceed under the five-minute rule with 
questions, and I recognize myself first for five minutes.
    Look, I said in the opening, and I will reiterate here 
again as we begin the questioning period that we believe that 
the facts show that the Biden Administration has shown a clear 
double standard of enforcing the FACE Act in a way that 
protects pro-abortion activists and facilities while 
substantially ignoring attacks on pro-life advocates, 
facilities, and churches.
    It is a disgrace. The Justice Department would rather cater 
to the pro-abortion political movement than protect places that 
assist pregnant women in need.
    I am going to start just with a brief question of Mr. Dys. 
From your observation and first-hand experience in litigating 
these matters, do you agree with our assessment that the 
current Department of Justice is engaged in selective 
enforcement of Federal law based purely on political 
motivation?
    Mr. Dys. Thank you, Chair Johnson. Congress passed the 
Freedom to Access Clinic Entrances Act to uphold the rule of 
law in this country.
    After a year in which we have seen over 100 different 
instances of attacks on life-affirming reproductive health 
facilities, and as Ms. Del Turco just testified about, even 
more against houses of worship, it is incumbent upon our 
leadership to ensure that the full weight of the Federal 
government and the law is being applied.
    I think the American people would have no less expectation 
of this Committee than to insist that its laws be applied 
equitably and across the board. What we have--the problem that 
we have, if I may just wrap up, I am sorry, is that to 
prosecute these claims, the most difficult part of the entire 
process for us as lawyers is to have a name of someone to 
prosecute.
    That starts with General Garland. If his DOJ is able to 
provide to us a name after an investigation, we are happy to 
utilize the laws that you have passed to defend these 
reproductive health facilities from the noxious attacks that 
they have had to withstand over the past year.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Very good. Ms. Del Turco, thank 
you for researching and reporting on the rise of attacks 
against churches that we have seen in recent years. It is 
especially concerning that in the first three months of this 
year, there were approximately three times as many attacks on 
churches as in the same timeframe in 2022.
    Sadly, although many of these acts of violence could be 
charged under the FACE Act, they have gone unprosecuted. So, 
what do you think is spurring this increased violence against 
churches in America?
    Ms. Del Turco. Well, I think there are a lot of factors. We 
certainly see increasing secularism in the United States, an 
increasing lack of respect for religion, understanding for 
religion or religious traditions.
    In addition, I think it is motivated as well by these 
political battles that tend to fall along religious lines. When 
you see Catholic churches being blamed for the Dobbs decision 
and attacked, that is clearly a problem, right.
    It is very much a problem when, in our political system for 
democracy, when one side loses a political battle, and they go 
and attack churches. This is a horrendous problem.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Yes, I am going to ask for 
unanimous consent to enter into the record this letter that 
First Liberty, a correspondence with Senator Warren.
    In it is some photographs of some of these abuses. This is 
Jane's Revenge and other groups. They graffiti on the side of 
churches ``Abort the church,'' and ``If abortions aren't safe, 
neither are you.'' ``Jane's Revenge'' all over the place.
    Then they go to the pregnancy care centers and they 
vandalize them. Again, nothing is being done about this. I 
think every person watching this hearing should recognize that 
you could be next.
    Right now, it is churches and pro-life groups and people 
being targeted that are pro-life, but that doesn't mean that 
other Americans wouldn't be targeted tomorrow.
    It is a disturbing reality that the Federal government has 
gotten too big, too powerful, and it is improperly wielding 
that power against the American people to appease a political 
base.
    The Durham Report, as Mr. Jordan noted earlier, makes clear 
the FBI, for example, the FBI in the Durham Report, ``failed to 
uphold their important mission of strict fidelity to the law.'' 
My friends, that is a serious problem in a constitutional 
republic, and it is one that we aim to fix and will be about 
that.
    I have got less than a minute, but I wanted to turn to Mr. 
Houck really quick about speaking of disparate treatment, your 
story is so compelling and what the FBI did there to arrest you 
is astounding.
    Isn't it true that once you learned, get this clear for the 
record, once you learned that law enforcement was interested in 
questioning you, you offered to appear voluntarily, right?
    Mr. Houck. That is correct, Mr. Chair.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. So, they did this big raid with 
20 agents with long guns pointed at you and your seven young 
children and your wife, even though you offered to go in 
without issue, that is correct.
    Mr. Houck. That is correct.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. It was about a year after the 
event actually took place, right?
    Mr. Houck. That is right.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. It seemed to correspond, in our 
view, with the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade, and 
it was released there. It sent the pro-abortion allies into a 
frenzy. Do you have an opinion on the timing of why they came 
to your house and raided you that way?
    Mr. Houck. Sure. Well, really quick, my indictment target 
letter was--preceded the Dobbs leak. Then of course the Dobbs 
leak was early May. Then of course the Dobbs in June. Then we 
saw a series of arrests.
    Then of course I was not expecting that myself because my 
attorney said that we would--and I will read right from the 
letter,

         . . . rather than put Mr. Houck and his family through 
        needless disruption, we will accept a summons on my client's 
        behalf and bring him to you.

    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you. I am out of time. I 
yield.
    The Chair recognizes Mr. Nadler for five minutes.
    Mr. Nadler. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    We have heard examples of violence against anti-abortion 
clinics. Ms. Camp, what are some examples of violence and 
disruption that doctors and patients have faced in recent 
years?
    Ms. Camp. Thank you for the question, Congressman. If I 
may, I would like to just review some examples, quite recent 
examples from 2022 in fact. The first are essentially news 
reports. Again, every person here, real person, real family, 
and real kids.
    In Michigan 2022, this is from ABC News:

        Officials said the suspect breached the fence outside the 
        clinic then used a fuel to ignite bushes surrounding the 
        building before lighting a fireplace starter log that he threw 
        onto the building's roof.

    In California 2022, this is from the FBI:

        Two unknown suspects were captured on surveillance video 
        throwing a Molotov cocktail at the front door of a medical 
        building used by Planned Parenthood in Costa Mesa, California.

    Anthrax, letter leaking white powder reported to be anthrax 
in Ohio 2022. Inert ricin, according to the FBI, in New Mexico 
2022. A Texas clinic had all the wires cut, all the electrical 
wires going into the clinic, cut in 2022.
    In Michigan again, in March 2022, a large group of 
extremists entered the clinic, harassed patients and staff. 
Additional people outside were shouting through megaphones, 
making it very hard to provide medical care inside.
    In North Carolina, this is quite typical, extremists opened 
the car doors of patients driving into a clinic parking lot and 
got into their cars.
    If helpful, I could read just a couple of the personal, 
short personal testimonies of folks who have experienced 
violence in 2022.
    This is from California, in March,

        We experienced a clinic invasion where a group of anti-abortion 
        protesters posed as a patient. Once our door was open, three 
        other extremists rushed in past staff. It was terrifying. You 
        are trying to figure out are their weapons. What is going to 
        take place here, is it going to be a speech or is it going to 
        be physical violence?

    Just read one more, from Texas.

        This is Texas. People have guns. There are school shootings. 
        You have that fear because you don't know that this person is 
        just standing there waiting to pull a weapon, or if they are 
        standing there just praying for you.

    Folks providing and accessing abortion care never know. The 
violence has been so relentless. They just don't know when a 
gun is going to get pulled.
    Mr. Nadler. Thank you for those examples. Let me ask you 
this: Should Americans, even those who live in States that 
continued to protect reproductive freedom, should they be 
concerned that violence, threats, and intimidation against 
abortion providers could effectively ban abortion access in 
their States, regardless of what their State law provides?
    Ms. Camp. Absolutely, Congressman. Just as Dobbs left open 
the door for a nationwide ban on abortion, Dobbs also 
emboldened anti-abortion extremists to go specifically to 
clinics in States that protect abortion rights.
    So, NAF's 2022 violence and disruption statistics show a 
particular increase in those States. So, for example, stalkings 
went up overall, 230 percent in 2022. They went up 900 percent, 
a 900 percent increase in stalkings, at clinics providing 
abortion care in haven States. States that protect access to 
abortion care saw a 130 percent increase in bomb threats.
    Directly to your point, Congressman, clinics offering 
abortion care in States that protect access saw a 540 percent 
increase in obstructions. So, yes, we all need to fear the 
effect of violence on people's ability to access this 
fundamental care.
    Mr. Nadler. Finally, my last question now, just to be clear 
as to stakes, what impact would a total nationwide ban on 
abortion have on women's reproductive health and well-being?
    Ms. Camp. Congressman, a nationwide ban would be a 
catastrophe, a public health catastrophe, yes, for people's 
reproductive health, and for public health generally. It would 
add to the ongoing crisis of lack of access to healthcare in 
this country, which absolutely includes lack of access to 
appropriate high-quality pregnancy-related and labor and 
delivery care.
    We have an exceedingly high maternal mortality rate, 
pregnancy-related death rate, that is, for a wealthy, 
industrialized country. Let's drive that down, especially for 
the Black community, which suffers so disproportionately.
    Mr. Nadler. In States which have banned abortion, have we 
found a higher mortality rate for pregnant women?
    Ms. Camp. I am not a clinician and I think it is too soon 
to tell. We know internationally, yes, that banning abortion is 
associated with higher maternal mortality, of course.
    Mr. Nadler. Thank you. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentleman from California, 
Mr. Kiley, is recognized for five minutes.
    Mr. Kiley. I yield back to the Chair.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you for yielding. Ms. 
Kocher, you just heard testimony from Ms. Camp and her 
organization, the National Abortion Federation, recently issued 
a report that labels crisis pregnancy centers as, quote, ``fake 
clinics use deceptive practices to dissuade people from seeking 
abortions,'' unquote. The organization claims that pregnancy 
resource centers such as yours lie and trick patients and force 
them to carry unwanted pregnancies to term. How do you respond 
to the provocative claim by Ms. Camp's organization.
    Ms. Kocher. I would say that's ridiculous. We do not lie to 
women. We are very clear about the services we provide and what 
we don't provide.
    We have four registered nurses on staff. We have 
professional licensed staff. We are also a licensed adoption 
agency.
    We have eight social workers on staff, and we provide 
excellent quality healthcare for women, children, and their 
families. As a matter of fact, I think it's quite ironic that 
we are called fake clinics when the abortion clinics themselves 
in our area do not believe that. We receive referrals from 
abortion clinics in our area for medical--for health services.
    They refer their patients to us for health services. So, 
why would they do that if we are truly a fake clinic? So, I 
just think it's ridiculous. It's a false narrative that's been 
created. Any provider--any pregnancy center that provides 
medical services has licensed registered nurses on staff who 
are providing those services. They are absolutely bound by 
their medical license.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. I agree with you 100 percent. In 
my law practice many years ago, I represented a number of 
pregnancy resource centers in my State and others. I never knew 
one of them to force any woman to carry a pregnancy to term and 
give birth. Have you ever forced anyone to carry a pregnancy to 
term?
    Ms. Kocher. We have not ever.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Despite the valiant efforts of 
pregnancy resource centers under the Biden Administration as we 
noted, the Justice Department has selectively enforced the FACE 
Act in a manner that caters to the radical pro-abortion 
movement and fails to adequately protect facilities like yours. 
After the leak of the Dobbs opinion and overturning of Roe, 
what kind of threats and violence were directed at you in your 
pregnancy resource centers? I know you've addressed a little 
bit of this. How did the violence and the damage impact the 
ability of organizations like your to offer their services?
    Ms. Kocher. Sure. So, again, we are the fifth center in 
Minnesota. I am very well connected with the other pregnancy 
center directors in our area as well as across the country. All 
the centers that I know are having to increase security to 
purchase security cameras, to just take extra cautious measures 
with everything that we do.
    For us, our facility that was damaged, the windows are 
still boarded up because one of the things that we found 
important is to purchase intrusion-resistant film. Thank God 
that we have that because otherwise they would've gotten into 
our building and they would've done a lot more damage than what 
was done. So, that's very costly.
    For our building, in particular, it was 60,000 dollars to 
add the film. So, to fix our windows, not only did we have to 
order the windows, but we have to have the timing correct to 
apply the film as well. So, every center that I know and I have 
been connecting with needs to get this film on your windows or 
do bullet-resistant windows. It's a real threat.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. I know that organizations like 
yours operate on a very thin margin. You're a nonprofit. You 
have to raise the funds that use to serve women. Sixty-thousand 
dollars could go a long way in helping women in crisis 
pregnancies.
    Ms. Kocher. Exactly.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. To your knowledge, have the 
perpetrators that damage your pregnancy resource centers been 
prosecuted under the FACE Act or otherwise held accountable?
    Ms. Kocher. No, they have not. We have been in touch with 
the FBI. There have been no arrests. There have been--nobody 
has been identified to my knowledge.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Yes, and I want to point out 
because it's been mentioned here this morning. The FBI did 
absolutely nothing with regards to these more than 100 
documented attacks on pregnancy resource centers all the way 
through until the Republican majority took the House again. We 
passed a resolution authored on the floor.
    I guess it was in early February. Six days after that is 
when the FBI magically came to this conclusion that they might 
need to pay attention to some of this. They offered this 
supposed reward for information leading to the arrest or 
prosecution of people involved.
    It took them a long, long time to pay attention to that. It 
took a resolution of the House of Representatives to force the 
action. What would you like to see from the Justice Department 
to make pregnancy resource centers feel safe?
    Ms. Kocher. Well, I think the same thing we all want, 
right? We all want to feel like we can go to work and be safe 
and that our patients are protected. The same is true for all 
of us, no matter what side of the aisle you are on. I think if 
people are breaking the law and damaging buildings and 
threatening your safety, they should be prosecuted.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you very much. I am out of 
time, yield back. The Chair recognizes Ms. Scanlon for her 
five--no, I'm sorry, Ms. Jackson Lee. I apologize. The 
gentlelady from Texas is recognized.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Chair, I'm delighted to welcome you 
back to the Committee you love and we all love, the 
Constitutional Committee and you as Chair. I know that we have 
an abiding faith and love in the Constitution. Let me 
acknowledge Mark Houck, I hope I'm getting it almost right, 
Jeremy Dys, Tammy Kocher, and Arielle Del Turco. I just want to 
acknowledge them because there's nothing that I want to have 
associated with myself and I know my colleagues in opposition 
to the freedom of their positions or the work that their 
agencies are doing.
    I represent the Gulf Coast Catholic Diocese in my 
Congressional district. I have had bishops and cardinals in my 
Congressional district. We have a wonderful working 
relationship in actuality.
    I have had no encounters of the type that we seem to be 
presenting here. At the same time, I want to thank Ms. Camp for 
the work of the National Abortion Federation that all I can see 
is certainly attempting to do its work. So, my time is brief.
    I'm going to ask you to be meteoric in your answers. I must 
take a moment for my good friend, the Chair, to indicate that 
special prosecutor, Mr. Durham, was appointed by Attorney 
General Barr. He didn't have any critique on the actual results 
of that particular investigation of the FBI and the succeeding 
special counsel but commented on the basis on which the FBI 
proceeded, two different things.
    We wouldn't expect anything from Mr. Durham, but to walk in 
the tracks of who appointed him. That would be the likes of his 
work. So, we thank him for the service that he gave. Let me 
just--if you would take just a brief moment to respond to the 
comment about crisis clinics and anything that your 
organization would do inappropriately. Did you hear me?
    Ms. Camp. I'm sorry, Congresswoman.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. You have a moment to respond very quickly 
about the crisis clinics. Someone said you do something to 
crisis clinics? Can you just respond? Is that what--your 
organization attacks crisis clinics?
    Ms. Camp. Absolutely not, Congresswoman.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. All right. So, I want you to respond that 
you would be against them and that is not the case of your 
work. Is that correct?
    Ms. Camp. Congressman, thank you for the question. We are 
not against any particular facility. We are in support of 
providers of abortion care and patients trying to access it. 
Our 2022 report does not practice by some of the centers that 
have delayed and even obstructed care for patients.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. You do it in that context? You do not do 
it in an attempt to incite anyone to go against these clinics?
    Ms. Camp. Unequivocally not. We just know that patients 
need unbiased counseling and transparency when they're trying 
to access services.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. As a FACE Act in a lifesaving provision 
for many of the clinics--freestanding clinics that are familiar 
with dealing with the right to choose and reproductive rights?
    Ms. Camp. Absolutely, Congressman. The FACE Act has been a 
really important tool. There are so many acts of violence at 
clinics offering abortion care that so many of the acts of 
vandalism just don't even get reported even if they violate 
FACE because it's just so frequent. It requires herculean 
efforts on the part of clinic administrators and clinicians--
    Ms. Jackson Lee. I have a short period of time. So, let me 
just continue to ask you questions. I might put into the record 
that the FACE Act deals with any activity that blocks access to 
the interest or obstructs the exit from a facility, trespassing 
at a clinic, vandalizing reproductive healthcare facilities, or 
stalking a clinic employee.
    We know that the bill from Texas called the Dobbs Act arose 
from S.B. 8, the Texas six-week ban on abortion. It had a 
provision that allowed a civilian to stalk a provider and some 
woman, some young person that may be a college student and 
stalk them and get 10,000 dollars. Is that something that is 
outrageous in terms of denying and threatening someone who is 
attempting to make a decision with their God, their family, and 
their provider?
    So, the FACE Act would keep that kind of activity from 
occurring. Let me back up so you can answer it. Chair will give 
me just additional seconds, is that historically, do you 
remember the case in Alabama where the doctor was killed, the 
nurse was killed, and the bombing of an abortion clinic? That's 
how far back these abortion bombings go. You can go ahead, 
please, quickly.
    Ms. Camp. Texas S.B. 8 was an abomination, a threat to 
providers of care and those accessing it and absolute 
antithetical to the structure of our republic.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. The FACE Act that helps in other places to 
stop that stalking and threatening?
    Ms. Camp. FACE does make it illegal to stalk and threaten 
folks providing access to abortion care, yes.
    Ms. Jackson Lee. I thank you. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. I thank the gentlelady. Chair 
recognizes gentleman from Ohio for five minutes, the Chair of 
the Full Committee.
    Chair Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Houck, why do you 
think they did it? Local police saw this incident. They weren't 
going to prosecute you.
    My guess is they probably exercised some common sense and 
said, this guy has been praying in front of this clinic for 20 
years. This guy harassed his son. He did what a dad would do.
    They chose not to come after you. You volunteer to turn 
yourself in, and yet they show up at your house, 20 agents, 
guns drawn in front of your family. Why do you think they did 
it?
    Mr. Houck. Thank you, Congressman Jordan, for the question. 
I've been thinking about that for many months. I can only come 
up with that the intention was to humiliate me, to scare my 
children, and to instill fear in pro-life America.
    Chair Jordan. Yes, I think they want to make an example of 
you, right?
    Mr. Houck. I believe so.
    Chair Jordan. They told us why they did it. They actually 
put it in writing. All you go to do is look at the memorandum 
from the Richmond Field Office. I mean, you were, like, front 
and center. Look at this memorandum.
    Now, thank goodness they rescinded it. FBI has rescinded 
this memorandum. They call it a domain perspective. I don't 
know why they can't use normal terms. It's a memorandum.
    They rescinded it because a brave whistleblower came and 
gave us this information. If you look at page--I think at page 
4, has this sentence: ``Events in which extremists and radical 
traditional Catholics will remain''--excuse me,

        Events in which extremist and radical traditional Catholics 
        might have common cause include legislation or judicial 
        decisions in areas such as abortion rights, immigration, 
        affirmative action, and LGBTQ protections.

    So, if you're pro-family, pro-life and you want a border, 
you're a target. Your family fit all of that. You're a pro-
life, pro-family Catholic for goodness sake. They're going to 
come--you got seven kids.
    You're not allowed to have seven kids today. We're trying 
to save the planet. You can't do that in America today 
according to--you were the example.
    That is how pervasive this political attitude is at the 
highest levels of our agencies. In this case, it was the FBI so 
much so, they put together a memo and said, we want to put 
informants and snitches inside the Catholic Church, inside the 
parish to go rat out people like Mark Houck and his family. 
Think that's what was going on here?
    Mr. Houck. I would agree with you 100 percent that my 
family was targeted, that I've been on a watch list. I am a 
Novus Ordo Catholic. I'm not a traditional mass, Latin mass 
goer. None the less, I embrace our faith and I live it.
    Chair Jordan. Still thought you were radical. They still 
thought you were radical, right? You may not go to Latin mass, 
but they thought you were radical.
    Local police wouldn't investigate, but we're going after 
this guy because he's pro-life and he's Catholic and he prays. 
Man, he's got seven. We're coming after him.
    Mr. Houck. Right. Yes, my children were down range of many 
guns, and they screamed through the whole process. The 
Committee should know that they were traumatized. I proceeded 
to be shackled in front of them and chained to a table for six 
hours in the Federal building.
    Chair Jordan. They were wrong because you went in front of 
a jury and the jury said no, he didn't do anything wrong. Isn't 
that right?
    Mr. Houck. That's correct.
    Chair Jordan. They prosecuted this case after the local 
people said, no, we're not going to do it. Federal government 
says, we're going to. We're going to make this guy an example. 
He's an RTC, a radical traditional Catholic, and we're going to 
come after him.
    You did and you went through the process. God bless you for 
going through it. This should send a--this is what's so scary. 
Again, we've had a number of whistleblowers come forward and 
talk about this kind of attitude displayed in this memorandum 
existing in the Justice Department. This is as wrong as it 
gets.
    Mr. Houck. Yes, I would agree with you. Yes, my children, I 
see it on their face every day. I see it in my wife, the fear 
in their eyes. Certainly, they have fear of law enforcement 
now, because the law enforcement guys become the bad guys, not 
the good guys.
    Chair Jordan. Yes, some--
    Mr. Houck. So, my children are confounded by that.
    Chair Jordan. Some guy gets in your kid's face, you do what 
a dad does. That's scary enough. Then they find out, oh, your 
dad is going to get prosecuted for standing up and defending 
his son.
    It's wrong. Everyone knows it's wrong, and it needs to 
stop. Frankly, as I said in our opening statement, the only way 
we can actually begin to stop this, is we got to do what 
legislatures do. You got to look at the money.
    You got to look at the money. You got to say, look, if the 
FBI is going to do this kind of stuff to good people like you 
and your family, they may not be getting the funds that they've 
gotten before. They certainly won't be using funds in certain 
ways.
    That's something we have to--we have an obligation, a 
constitutional duty to do that. I know Chair Johnson is going 
to be working on that with us to try to make that happen. With 
that, I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you. The gentleman yields 
back, and the Chair recognizes the gentlelady from Texas, Ms. 
Escobar, for five minutes.
    Ms. Escobar. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Many thanks to our 
witnesses for being here today. I think it's really important 
for women in America to understand what's happening here.
    This is yet another example of how one of our parties in 
the two-party system, the Republican party, is hell-bent on 
making sure that women do not have access to reproductive 
healthcare and cannot make decisions about their own future. 
This is just yet another example of the messaging and the 
efforts to try to control women. Let me remind everyone again 
the different between the two sides.
    Our side believes that we've got to take care of families 
and that we've got to make sure that children have a good 
future. We did that by voting for paid family and medical 
leave. We voted for the expanded child tax credit.
    We voted for universal pre-K. We voted for affordable 
childcare. All of this was just last Congress.
    To a person, my Republican colleagues voted against all of 
that. So, this is--let's lift the--end the charade. In fact, 
right now part of the negotiations that are ongoing, both on 
the farm bill and in appropriations as well as in the efforts 
for my Republican colleagues to default on our debt involves 
taking SNAP away from families. In other words, taking food 
away from the mouths of children.
    As part--if they can't limit women legislatively, they will 
bully and threaten those providers who help women and the women 
who use services. In fact, last year because of the--and let me 
be clear. I don't believe anyone should be engaging in any 
violence or intimidation.
    All of us should reject all that. We're here really because 
we're chasing another conspiracy theory that is being put out 
there by my Republican colleagues. Last Congress and again this 
January, I introduced the Healthcare Providers' Safety Act 
which would amend the Public Health Service Act to authorized 
grants to healthcare providers to enhance the physical and 
cybersecurity of their facilities, personnel, and patients.
    This bill would give providers the needed resources to 
ensure patients and providers are safe and able to continue 
providing and receiving this essential reproductive healthcare. 
I'd like to ask Ms. Camp a question. Ms. Camp, in your view, 
has the FACE Act been effective in helping to mitigate some of 
the violence, threats, and intimidation faced by abortion 
providers and patients? Do you think that the FACE Act--do you 
think that FACE Act enforcement to protect abortion providers 
and patients could be stronger?
    Ms. Camp. Thank you for the question, Congresswomen. Yes 
and yes. FACE has been an important tool in addressing the 
relentless violence including murders and death threats against 
those who provide access to abortion care. Absolutely as I said 
before this violence is just relentless. It's so run of the 
mill. Plenty of things that violate FACE our members just 
simply don't report because it's so run of the mill for them.
    Ms. Escobar. It really has become run of the mill. I met 
with a provider in Texas, one of the last few before Texas 
passed its historic and awful ban in our State who talk to me 
about how routine the threats and the intimidation had gotten. 
I spoke with a mother who had to undergo an abortion because 
the fetus was not going to survive, and it threatened her life 
and would render her existing children motherless.
    She had to face intimidation as she walked into the clinic 
to receive care. I'm running out of time. I would just say that 
we need more programs to combat the kind of harassment and 
intimidation and violence that far too many clinicians and 
patients are seeing across America. Thank you for your 
testimony today. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentlelady yields back, and 
the chair now recognizes a gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. 
Bishop, for five minutes.
    Mr. Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Houck, I just want to 
see if we can sum up. It sounds like the facts out of which 
your prosecution by DOJ arose involved a squabble between 
activists. That part is correct, right?
    Mr. Houck. I would agree with that, Congressman.
    Mr. Bishop. OK. There was one shove that led to somebody 
falling down, correct?
    Mr. Houck. Correct.
    Mr. Bishop. That was proceeded by provocation and profanity 
focused on your child, correct?
    Mr. Houck. At other times. Not particularly on that day of 
the incident, but yes.
    Mr. Bishop. OK. Didn't you say that activist was engaging 
with your child right before you escorted them back and then 
you had the shove?
    Mr. Houck. Yes, I did say that.
    Mr. Bishop. Then authorities decided to indict you under 
the FACE Act, right?
    Mr. Houck. Correct.
    Mr. Bishop. Do I understand from the other testimony that 
there's a civil provision of the FACE Act? Somebody could've 
sued if they wanted to? Do you know that?
    Mr. Houck. I don't know about that. I can't answer that.
    Mr. Bishop. I believe that's what I heard. Nobody sued. 
They decided to indict you. They didn't indict you for a 
misdemeanor charge which is like one year. They indicted you 
for a felony, right?
    Mr. Houck. That's correct, two counts.
    Mr. Bishop. Two counts, one felony, maybe one misdemeanor. 
I think it was a total of 11 years imprisonment they sought?
    Mr. Houck. That's correct, Congressman.
    Mr. Bishop. Out of the squabble. Then they ignored your 
offer to surrender. Instead, they used a SWAT team to take you 
down, right?
    Mr. Houck. That's right.
    Mr. Bishop. Then they proceed to a jury trial. The only 
thing that stopped you from going to prison for 11 years is 
that a jury of Americans acquitted you in the face of that, 
correct?
    Mr. Houck. Unanimously, yes, correct.
    Mr. Bishop. So, that strikes me as--that's a data point. 
Now, I understand my colleagues on the other side who say, 
well, this sort of pass this away or say people who are shadow-
boxing here. That seems to me a data point that is confounding. 
Ms. Camp, I want to go to you. Does that seem like a 
disproportionate exercise of prosecutorial judgment to you?
    Ms. Camp. So, thank you for the question, Congressman.
    Mr. Bishop. Real quick because I don't have much time.
    Ms. Camp. I am not a prosecutor. I'm not--
    Mr. Bishop. You don't know? Let me ask you this. You spoke 
to an arson attack on an abortion facility or something in 
Texas. Did you talk about that during your testimony in your 
answers?
    Ms. Camp. I think it wasn't in Texas. Yes, arson, yes.
    Mr. Bishop. Did somebody get prosecuted for that because 
they damn well should have been.
    Ms. Camp. I agree, Congressman.
    Mr. Bishop. Were they?
    Ms. Camp. I believe not yet, but there's definitely a 
shortage of resources to prosecute.
    Mr. Bishop. Do you have any insight why they would 
prosecute Mr. Houck for a squabble with an activist and send 
the SWAT team and take him to a jury that acquits him if they 
haven't gotten the person who committed an arson attack on a 
clinic--on an abortion clinic? Any insight at all?
    Ms. Camp. Congressman, I'm not with the DOJ. I don't have 
that information.
    Mr. Bishop. Does anybody on the panel have any insight 
about why they would do that? I think that's the thing that's 
concerning. Then you hear about--
    Ms. Scanlon. Would the gentleman yield? I do have some 
insight on that.
    Mr. Bishop. If you have an answer, a quick answer, yield 
for an answer to that real quick.
    Ms. Scanlon. Sure. Mr. Houck was a well-known aggressive 
participant in demonstrations outside facilities in 
Philadelphia.
    Mr. Bishop. Oh, so they picked him--so they picked him 
because--
    Ms. Scanlon. He did not just push the guy once, 72-year-old 
man. He admitted he pushed him down twice.
    Mr. Bishop. It's my time, and--
    Ms. Scanlon. Oh, sorry. You asked for input on the panel.
    Mr. Bishop. I was giving you the answer--you gave me the 
answer. You gave me the answer a minute ago. Mr. Houck was an 
activist.
    He was opposed to the killing of children through abortion. 
He said that, so they made him a target. Let me tell you what 
that is.
    That is called selective prosecution in violation of the 
Constitution. You cannot make prosecutorial decisions because 
you want to make an example out of somebody who's a well-known 
anti-abortion or pro-life activist. You can't do that.
    That's unconstitutional. If that is the answer to the 
question that I posed to Ms. Camp, then it deepens the concern 
about the Justice Department and the FBI. If that is the 
answer, then it indicates that we have as the--Mr. Nadler 
denigrates the Durham Report. Ms. Jackson Lee says, well, 
``Durham, the special counsel, came to his conclusion just 
because of who appointed him.''
    No. We see institutional corruption. Despite for the First 
Amendment rights of Americans which is expressed through 
politicized prosecutorial activity is the most grievous crisis 
that I've ever seen in this country. I cannot believe that I 
have to be concerned about the FBI and the DOJ and then, 
frankly, Members of Congress sitting up here and saying, I have 
the explanation. We picked Mr. Houck because he's a zealous 
advocate for life.
    Ms. Scanlon. Would the gentleman yield? That's not what I 
said.
    Mr. Bishop. That's exactly what you said.
    Ms. Scanlon. No, it is not.
    Mr. Bishop. I think that's the answer that most Americans 
has regrettably come to the conclusion that's what happened. My 
time is expired.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you. The gentleman yields 
back, and the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. 
Johnson, for five minutes.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Thank you, Chair Johnson. The bull 
Durham Report was released yesterday. Trump has promised us 
that to look forward to that bull Durham Report. When it came 
out, it would prove that the Russia investigation was a witch 
hunt.
    Unfortunately, the bull Durham Report yesterday amounts to 
a crock of BS. Two prosecutions, two acquittals. We know how 
rare acquittals are in the Federal system. He's batting zero.
    No conclusion that Trump was the victim of a witch hunt, a 
four-year investigation that petered out as a waste of time and 
taxpayers money. That is the legacy of the bull Durham Report. 
Now, Ms. Turco, your testimony is that between January 2018-
September 2022 there had been over 420 acts of hostility 
against pro-life pregnancy centers. Is that correct?
    Ms. Del Turco. No, that was against churches.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Against churches? Not against pro-
life pregnancy centers? Is that right?
    Ms. Del Turco. Yes, because my report was focused on 
churches. I did, however--
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Are we here conflating hostility, 
acts of hostility against churches to acts of violence against 
these pregnancy centers that you all talk about? Is that what 
we're conflating today?
    Ms. Del Turco. No, these are both covered in the FACE Act.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. What relevance does acts of 
hostility against churches have when it comes to the assertions 
on this Committee that there have been acts of violence against 
these so-called pro-life pregnancy centers?
    Ms. Del Turco. Churches and houses of worship are also 
covered in the FACE Act as well as abortion clinics.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. OK. We're here today talking about 
pro-life pregnancy centers, not churches. You were not brought 
here to talk about churches. Maybe you were brought here to 
confuse the public.
    The confusion, we're not going to go for that. We're not 
going to have that. By the way, as far as the acts of hostility 
against churches, did you note any acts of murder?
    Ms. Del Turco. No, these were--
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Any acts of bombings?
    Ms. Del Turco. Yes, yes.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Bombings?
    Ms. Del Turco. Bomb threats.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Bomb threat.
    Ms. Del Turco. Yes.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. No actual bombings.
    Ms. Del Turco. This year in the supplemental report that 
covers--
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. No actions of bombings, right?
    Ms. Del Turco. --January through--there was a pipe bomb.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. No bombing, correct?
    Ms. Del Turco. I guess no.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. OK. No acts of physical assault 
against anybody. All these things that you're talking about, 
these 420 acts occurred at churches. Of those, looks like of 
the 420, it looks like only 62 of them were abortion-related. 
Is that correct?
    Ms. Del Turco. Fifty-seven from January 2018-September 2022
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Fifty-seven of the 420 was 
abortion-related. So, ma'am, I abhor violence against anyone 
and anything. My point is that perhaps your testimony would've 
been good for another hearing, not this hearing.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Would the gentleman yield for 
just a moment?
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Yes.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. So, the title of our hearing just 
for clarification revisiting the implications of the FACE Act 
which specifically covers--
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. I recognize that.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. --exercising the First Amendment 
right of religious freedom and place of religious worship.
    Mr. Johnson of Georgia. Reclaiming my time.
    Reclaiming my time. The tone and thrust of this hearing 
have been toward what is alleged to have been violence directed 
at these so-called pregnancy--pro-life pregnancy centers. The 
fact is there has not. The case has not been made that there 
have been acts of violence against these centers.
    On the other hand, there has been a need for the FACE Act 
because in the last 50 years, anti-abortion extremists have 
committed 11 murders, 42 bombings, over 500 incidents of 
assault and battery. Post-Dobbs, the threats and the violence 
are escalating.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentleman is out of time. I 
believe you had a schedule conflict and walked in a little bit 
late today. I just point out that Ms. Del Turco's report also 
includes reports of at least 57 pro-abortion acts of hostility 
against churches between January 2022-September 2022 and that 
this extends to pregnancy centers as well. It's all related. 
The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Roy, 
five minutes.
    Mr. Roy. I thank the Chair.
    Mr. Houck, after your family was raided in the early 
morning in front of your family, has the Biden Administration 
in any way, shape, or form apologized for what they did to you 
or your family?
    Mr. Houck. No, Congressman.
    Mr. Roy. No apology?
    Mr. Houck. No.
    Mr. Roy. None? As we have heard today, you were 
specifically targeted because you're an activist; you are a 
pro-life activist?
    Mr. Houck. Correct.
    Mr. Roy. Question for Ms. Camp. Earlier, you mentioned in 
your report--you were quoting articles in which the FBI made 
statements about attacks on abortion clinics. How many 
statements by the FBI have there been on attacks on crisis 
pregnancy centers?
    Ms. Camp. Thank you for the question, Congressman. I don't 
have that information.
    Mr. Roy. Right. Because I'm not aware of there being any.
    What percentage of abortion-related violence cases or 
threats cases, or cases of violence or threats against pro-life 
organizations?
    Ms. Camp. I'm sorry, could you repeat the question?
    Mr. Roy. What percentage of abortion-related violence cases 
or threats cases are cases of violence or threats against pro-
life organizations? The answer is 70 percent, according to FBI 
Director Wray, that well-known pro-life activist--70 percent, 
according to FBI Director Wray.
    Another question. You serve as the Chief Legal and Strategy 
Officer at the National Abortion Federation, correct?
    Ms. Camp. Yes.
    Mr. Roy. In this role, have you ever spoken with anyone in 
the Biden Department of Justice or Biden Administration 
specifically about FACE Act enforcement or abortion?
    Ms. Camp. I have not.
    Mr. Roy. OK. So, you, as the Chief Legal and Strategy 
Officer for the National Abortion Federation, you have had no 
contact with President Biden's Abortion Task Force?
    Ms. Camp. Let me be accurate. I believe I may have had 
contact. I don't think so, but I may have. On the issue of FACE 
enforcement, no, I have not.
    Mr. Roy. OK. In 2015, the Center for Medical Progress 
released a video on which you stated, quote,

        I'm like, oh, my God, I get it. When the skull is broken, 
        that's really sharp. I get it. I understand why people are 
        talking about getting that skull out, that calvarium.

``Calvarium'' being an incomplete skull.
    When abortion has crushed the skulls of babies to kill 
them, what physical risks are there for the baby?
    Ms. Camp. So, Congressman, thank you for the question. It 
allows me to clarify that the media products you're referring 
to stoked a massive uptick in violence. Those heavily edited, 
misleadingly edited media products caused three murders and 
nine woundings in Colorado Springs in 20--
    Mr. Roy. No, the question was about the baby and the skull 
crushing that is a direct quote attributed to you.
    Ms. Camp. Well, the folks who distributed those media 
products may have attributed something to me. I can't speak to 
what it--
    Mr. Roy. So, true or false, did you say that? ``I'm like, 
oh, my God, I get it. When the skull is broken, that's really 
sharp.'' Did you say that?
    Ms. Camp. It's impossible to know, Congressman.
    Mr. Roy. Would you have said that? Is that something you 
would have said?
    Ms. Camp. I don't know, Congressman.
    Mr. Roy. You don't know? You don't know if you talked about 
the crushing of the skull of a baby? You don't remember having 
said something like that?
    Ms. Camp. What I do--
    Mr. Roy. I'm pretty confident I've never said something 
like that. I'm quite confident my colleagues here have never 
said something like that. Have you ever said something about 
crushing the skull of the baby, particularly, in that kind of a 
setup?
    Ms. Camp. I believe, Congressman, that we all came here 
today to agree that violence is never an appropriate response 
to policy differences.
    Mr. Roy. That seems pretty violent, the crushing of the 
skull of a baby. I think that, actually, is the definition of 
``violence.'' I think the question here is whether or not we 
are going to acknowledge and recognize that reality, and the 
extent to which now the Federal government has been weaponized 
against the people who want to acknowledge that reality. That's 
the question.
    Mr. Houck has stood up and said, ``I'd like to recognize 
the reality of the violence against a baby.'' By the way, the 
violence against the mother who has been sold a myth by radical 
leftists in the name of baby-killing. They have been sold a 
myth that it is somehow healthy and good for them or better for 
them.
    If someone dares stand up like Mr. Houck, then, he's been 
targeted, as my colleague acknowledged from this very dais, 
targeted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which we saw 
was weaponized, specifically, against the President of the 
United States, as we just saw in the Durham Report; is 
weaponized against average citizens.
    Mr. Houck, do you think $38.5 billion is sufficient funds 
for the Department of Justice? Do you think maybe it's too many 
funds, if they are carrying out actions against people like 
you?
    Mr. Houck. I would think it was too many funds.
    Mr. Roy. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Thank you.
    The Chair now yields to the gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. 
Cohen, for five minutes.
    Mr. Cohen. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    A lot of discussion has been on the Durham Report this 
morning. People have commented on it, the weaponization of the 
Justice Department and the FBI--the same FBI that issued the 
incorrect and inappropriate and extraordinary statement about 
Hillary Clinton in the last 10 days of the 2016 election, that 
the Trump and the Clinton people agreed was the cause of Donald 
Trump winning what was otherwise an election that she would 
have won.
    So, if you want to talk about the FBI being weaponized, 
what Christopher Wray did in releasing--what Comey did in the 
last few days, the last 10 days or so, about Hillary Clinton 
and the questions about her, caused an election to be switched. 
I mean, there's no weaponization.
    What we've got is a weaponization of the political system 
to destroy a woman's choice, women's right to choose. I was in 
law school when Roe was passed. Roe was the law for almost 50 
years. It was established law.
    We have three Justices that were put on the Supreme Court 
because of The Federalist Society, and went to Donald Trump, a 
man who had been pro-choice, and proclaimed his idea of being 
pro-choice on some radio show, some shock jock guy in New York, 
but was susceptible to influence. When The Federalist Society 
came to him and said, ``We'll help you get the evangelical vote 
if you will appoint folks that we recommend to you for the 
Supreme Court,'' Trump did it--one of the most controversial 
decisions people have differences of opinion in this country.
    I'm pro-choice. I respect the people who are pro-choice, 
and I respect people who are pro-life. Each group has a 
position that they're wedded to because of their philosophy, 
their morality, or whatever. Trump had none of that. It was all 
about being President, and he gave up his position which he 
earlier had to become President.
    They gave him Gorsuch, and they gave him Kavanaugh, and 
they gave him Barrett. All of them in their hearings said they 
believed in precedent, established precedent, in the dealings 
with Roe v. Wade. Then, they got on the Court and they all 
changed their positions, decided to be activist judges and 
eradicate Roe v. Wade.
    They got on the Court through some very unusual and, I 
would say, should be illegal, but was permissive, actions of 
the Senate.
    First, you had a vacancy in Barack Obama's last term, 11 
months before he finished it. Senator McConnell said you 
shouldn't appoint anybody in the last year of a term, ``So, 
we're not going to even give a hearing to Merrick Garland,'' 
who was President Obama's nominee. I think that's the first 
time, or one of the very few times at least, but I thought the 
first time that a President had not been allowed to have a 
hearing, at least on a nominee for the Supreme Court, 11 months 
into his last year of his first term, or at any time. They did; 
they stopped him because,``Oh, no, you can't put anybody on in 
your last year. You let the voters decide at the election.''
    When a vacancy came up within a month or two of the 
election of Donald Trump, it was all OK to get Amy Coney 
Barrett put through, I think about three weeks before the 
election. So, hypocrisy? Maybe. Maybe just lying to the public 
and saying nobody should be appointed in the last year. Because 
they did it with Barrett, and that's how we got a couple of our 
appointees, Mr. Gorsuch and Ms. Barrett.
    Then, Mr. Kavanaugh, of course, the FBI did not follow 
through on all the questions about his alleged assaults, and 
they didn't do a complete investigation on his alleged assaults 
and a particular lady that testified against him. So, they 
weren't weaponized against the Republicans or weaponized 
against anything. In fact, their lack of action resulted in Mr. 
Kavanaugh being nominated and approved.
    Those three judges--Mr. Kavanaugh, who had a weak to 
nonexistent investigation of the sexual assault allegations; 
Gorsuch, who got on because they said you shouldn't put anybody 
on in the last year, and Barrett who got on, despite that 
fact--resulted in the repealing of Roe v. Wade.
    What we've had is a failure of the legislative process, a 
failure of the Constitution, and while within the parameters of 
legality, an abrupt act against the Constitution and what it 
suggests for President nominees to the Supreme Court.
    I yield back the balance of my time.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentleman yields back.
    The Chair recognizes the gentlelady from Wyoming, Ms. 
Hageman, for five minutes.
    Ms. Hageman. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Ms. Camp, are you familiar with the FBI's use of DVE, or 
domestic violent extremism, threat tags?
    Ms. Camp. Thank you, Congresswoman. Can you say that again?
    Ms. Hageman. Yes. Are you familiar with the FBI's use of 
DVE, or domestic violent extremism, threat tags?
    Ms. Camp. I am not.
    Ms. Hageman. OK. Ms. Camp, can you point to even one 
situation where the Department of Justice or FBI treated a pro-
abortion protestor, arsonist, vandalizer, rioter, or attacker 
similar to how they treated Mr. Houck?
    Ms. Camp. Thank you, Congressman.
    I want to say that I oppose violence in all--
    Ms. Hageman. I didn't ask that question. Can you point to 
even one circumstance where a pro-abortion attacker, protestor, 
arsonist, vandalizer, or rioter were treated by the DOJ or FBI 
similar to how they treated Mr. Houck?
    Ms. Camp. Well, I want to be responsive, but I want to 
reiterate that the National Abortion--
    Ms. Hageman. Do you know of even one person?
    Ms. Camp. Ma'am, the National Abortion Federation is a 
professional organization of abortion providers. We track 
violence against those who provide and access abortion care. We 
don't track other kinds of violence.
    Ms. Hageman. So, you can't point to even one incidence 
where a pro-abortion protestor, arsonist, vandalizer, or rioter 
was treated similar to how the DOJ and the FBI treated Mr. 
Houck, can you? Is that your testimony?
    Ms. Camp. Well, what I can tell you is that, when the DOJ 
put out a reward for information on 10 different incidents, 
nine of them were at anti-abortion--
    Ms. Hageman. Did they raid? Did they raid anyone's home and 
arrest someone in front of their seven children with guns 
drawn?
    Ms. Camp. Well, no, they're just looking for information.
    Ms. Hageman. OK. That's what I thought.
    Mr. Dys, I want to thank you for being here today, and your 
testimony is important, as someone who has firsthand experience 
working with the victims of these heinous crimes that have been 
described.
    Mr. Dys, are you familiar with the Committee's 
investigative work and findings about the DOJ and the FBI's 
weaponizing domestic extremism threat tags and statutes against 
Americans' constitutionally protected rights?
    Mr. Dys. Not beyond what you revealed this morning.
    Ms. Hageman. OK. You have represented clients whose 
clinics, employees, or patients have been subjected to 
vandalism and violence from pro-abortion groups, haven't you?
    Mr. Dys. Yes, ma'am.
    Ms. Hageman. How do you respond to the reality of a DOJ 
which is labeling parents using constitutionally protected 
speech as domestic violence extremists or padding crime stats 
to falsify the record about a rise in domestic extremism, but 
does little to nothing about politically motivated attacks on 
your clients, which could actually qualify as domestic 
extremism?
    Mr. Dys. It's certainly disconcerting, and I think that 
exemplifies precisely why the FACE Act is important. Because 
when we have a situation where speech reaches a tipping point 
into violence, that's where we find ourselves at with these 
situations, where we characterize speech as violence, instead 
of violence as violence.
    Violence has no place in our political dialog, and 
certainly, we should not express our political disagreements 
with a brick or a crowbar through a window. That's what our 
clients have had to endure, along with many other instances 
like that. Yet, there's only been the single indictment with 
four people indicted under that, in response to the 100-plus 
attacks in the past year.
    Ms. Hageman. Well, then, I was just going to get to that. 
As you mentioned in your testimony, the Department of Justice 
has returned just one indictment in response to the over 100 
acts of intimidation, injury, and interference toward those 
seeking service from pro-life organizations in the past year.
    Yet, even before the Dobbs decision, the DOJ announced the 
standing up of an abortion rights task force. So, not only is 
the DOJ, on the one hand, infringing on protected rights 
connected to peaceful actions, it is not enforcing the law when 
violations are targeted at the same political groups that the 
DOJ itself has been targeting. It is, instead, prioritizing the 
protection of law based on its preferred political narrative, 
which in this case is the pro-abortion movement.
    Are you aware of any task forces, memos, or priorities 
being set by the DOJ which would also focus attention to 
protecting pro-life and religious facilities under the FACT Act 
or any of its other authorities?
    Mr. Dys. I am not. My clients would welcome that.
    Ms. Hageman. OK. Thank you.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentlelady yields back.
    The Chair recognizes the gentlelady from Pennsylvania, Ms. 
Scanlon, for five minutes.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you.
    As I stated at the outset, violence and threats have no 
place in American political discourse, no matter what the cause 
or who the target. When leaders advocate for such violence or 
selectively condemn for political gain, they normalize such 
violence and undermine our democracy.
    Congress has an important role to play in protecting and 
defending our democracy from the corrosive impact of political 
violence. Those who have studied this issue recommend that we 
can make sure that anyone who promotes, condones, or turns a 
blind eye to political violence is held accountable, whether 
the former President of the United States, to Members of 
Congress, to those who actually commit such threats or acts of 
violence, no matter what their political objective.
    More importantly, Members of Congress can make sure that 
they take steps to prevent the normalization of political 
violence by refraining from using violent images and rhetoric 
and condemning it, no matter the source. By convening a hearing 
that inflames grievances and amplifies misinformation 
concerning the prevalence of violence against anti-abortion 
forces, this hearing does not advance our Congressional duty to 
protect and preserve our democracy from the corrosive forces of 
political disinformation and violence.
    My colleagues on the other side of the aisle continue to 
push a false narrative that the Federal government is out to 
get them, but the facts are not on their side. In fact, they 
don't have the evidence or the public support for their 
policies or narrative. The clear majority of Americans believe 
we must protect access to abortion care and the freedom to make 
reproductive healthcare decisions in consultation with one's 
doctor, not politicians.
    Ms. Camp, obviously, political vandalism and threats aren't 
acceptable, no matter to whom they are directed. At today's 
hearing, the majority has cited anecdotal evidence concerning 
vandalism at anti-abortion facilities, while refusing to 
acknowledge the far more pervasive and longstanding threats and 
violence directed at providers and facilities that offer 
reproductive healthcare, including abortion care.
    You've produced a report detailing the level of violence 
against facilities that provide such care over a period of 
years. Can you explain how instances of violence, threats, and 
intimidation that you've documented impact abortion access, 
even in States like Pennsylvania, where abortion access remains 
legally protected?
    Ms. Camp. Sure. Well, as we discussed previously, it is in 
States that have protected access to abortion care that we've 
seen a really pronounced uptick in violence in the last year--
sort of over 500 percent increase in obstructions; 130 percent 
increase in bomb threats; a 900 percent increase in stalkings. 
So, the terror that people suffer under in providing this 
fundamental healthcare holds true across the country.
    I'd also say that the stalking of patients and taking 
pictures of them and their license plates using sort of 
location data to try to determine their activities, is really 
terrifying for patients. We see that illustrated just this past 
weekend in the tragic murder of Gabriella Gonzalez by her 
boyfriend after she had to travel out of Texas for abortion 
care.
    Folks legitimately fear that, if they can't keep their 
abortion decision confidential, they'll be killed, leaving 
their existing children orphaned. So, the need for people now 
to travel hundreds of miles, or even more, to access abortion 
care makes it that much harder to maintain their 
confidentiality. So, folks are really scared.
    Ms. Scanlon. Can you speak to the danger of using 
misleading or inflammatory language where political violence is 
already a threat to healthcare providers providing abortion 
care?
    Ms. Camp. Sure. Thank you, Congressman--Congresswoman.
    Yes, we know that inflammatory rhetoric creates upticks in 
violence, threats of violence, all of these major incidents. 
The selective sort of outrage just normalizes violence against 
folks providing, and therefore, accessing abortion care. 
Inflammatory rhetoric I think is really antithetical to the 
goal, I would think, of all of us here at this hearing today, 
which is to rachet down violence.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you.
    We heard testimony about mounting public criticism of 
pregnancy crisis centers. Therefore, I'd seek unanimous consent 
to introduce a report by the Alliance entitled, ``Designed to 
Deceive: A Study of the Crisis Pregnancy Center Industry in 
Nine States.''
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Without objection.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentlelady yields back.
    The Chair recognizes the gentleman from South Carolina, Mr. 
Fry, for five minutes.
    Mr. Fry. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for having this 
hearing today.
    Radical Democrats have attempted all day to downplay 
coverup and ignore the reality that crisis pregnancy centers 
and churches are under attack. I guess their approach is not 
surprising. In my brief time in Congress every single hearing 
that we have heard we hear the same narrative that Republicans 
hearing today about blank is a fantasy, that it is a conspiracy 
theory. Well, 100 instances in the last couple years are not a 
fantasy. It is not a conspiracy theory.
    They have told us that the border is secure, of course. 
They have failed to acknowledge and indeed sneer at the 
weaponization of our Federal government against its own 
citizens despite most recently the Durham Report that was 
dropped yesterday. They failed to condemn labeling parents as 
domestic terrorists for just speaking out at their school board 
meeting.
    The Democrats' own witness today, Ms. Camp, said that every 
administration has enforced the FACE Act, Republican and 
Democrat alike. The only caveat that I will say to that, the 
only asterisk that I would provide is except this one. With 
over 100 attacks, threats, arsons, spray painting it is very 
clear that this administration has no intention of enforcing 
the laws unless it has a political benefit to them.
    The Chair talked about this earlier. Look at the dichotomy 
that we have here. On one hand we have Mr. Houck, right? We 
have Eva Edl from Aiken, South Carolina, an 87-year-old lady 
who survived a communist concentration camp in Yugoslavia. She 
comes to America and her egregious crime is singing hymns in a 
hallway. Over two years later, about two years later she is 
charged with a Federal crime with the full weight of the 
Federal government.
    We fast forward here to these instances that we outlined 
that are now in the record. Mother's Day last year. Suspects 
reportedly threw two Molotov cocktails into an Oregon Right to 
Life office. On June 27, 2022, two Molotov cocktails thrown 
into Two Hearts Pregnancy Center in Everett, Washington. On 
June 30, 2022, a Molotov cocktail was thrown into the Hope 
Clinic for Women in Nashville. Federal law enforcement did 
investigate the crime as attempted arson and vandalism, but not 
the FACE Act.
    Molotov cocktails are thrown repeatedly. Arsons happen 
repeatedly. The defacing of property, the vandalism of 
property, the threats against people and property happen 
repeatedly.
    Mr. Dys, can you describe what the FACE Act is supposed to 
protect?
    Mr. Dys. Well, the FACE Act clearly defines what it's 
supposed to protect by saying that any Service relating to the 
human reproductive system is protected by the FACE Act.
    Mr. Fry. Right. So, the intention of Congress at the time 
was that not only that they would do this for abortion 
providers, but also crisis pregnancy centers, churches, things 
like that on both sides of this equation, right? This is kind 
of what the intent of the law was supposed to be?
    Mr. Dys. Yes, the FACE Act knows no ideology. It simply 
seeks to protect reproductive health centers/facilities as well 
as, it should be pointed out, houses of worship.
    Mr. Fry. Right. We are not seeing that right now? We are 
not seeing that right now with the prosecution of these 100 
instances of violence against crisis pregnancy centers and 
churches?
    Mr. Dys. Yes, in the past year we have seen over 100 of 
those instances and yet only a single indictment in the Middle 
District of Florida.
    Mr. Fry. Ms. Camp, you stated in your written and oral 
testimony that, quote, ``no one should fear violence at the 
workplace or when seeking healthcare.'' Given these attacks on 
crisis pregnancy centers and churches would you agree that they 
should be entitled to the full protection of the law?
    Ms. Camp. Thank you for the question, Congressman. So, I 
want to make clear I condemn all acts of violence and--
    Mr. Fry. Well, that is great. I appreciate that, but are 
they entitled to the full protection of the law?
    Ms. Camp. Any entity facing actual real serious threats of 
harm should have protection.
    Mr. Fry. Right. So, Molotov cocktails, right, those would 
be entitled to protection under the law?
    Ms. Camp. Well, throwing a Molotov cocktail at a 
reproductive health facility would be a FACE violation, yes, 
but I'm not in a position as a representative of a professional 
organization of abortion providers to speak to what's happening 
at other kinds of entities. I just don't have that knowledge.
    Mr. Fry. Well, you don't have knowledge, but you would 
agree with me that they are entitled to protection and they are 
entitled to the zealous protection under the law by the DOJ, by 
the FBI in routing out and identifying the people who commit 
these acts of violence. Would you agree with that?
    Ms. Camp. Well, yes, DOJ should protect all of us from 
violence whether we're abortion providers or patients or 
others.
    Mr. Fry. So, in that case do you find it troubling--like in 
the case of Ms. Kocher here do you find it troubling that she 
has not received a fair adjudication of that violence against 
her facility?
    Ms. Camp. Congressman, as I think I've said before, I am 
just not with the DOJ. I believe there are complex--
    Mr. Fry. I am not asking that. What I am asking though is 
do you think--I mean in her case, in her testimony today there 
has been extremism lobbed at her and extremism lobbed at her 
employees, and the property in which she has. Do you think that 
this is troubling that years later that she has not received 
really any help from the DOJ?
    Ms. Camp. So, Congressman, I can give you two answers: One 
is I condemn acts of violence regardless of who may target. The 
other is I can tell you that acts of violence, intimidation, 
stalking, threats, murders at providers of abortion--targeting 
providers of abortion care are terribly under addressed. So, I 
am not in a position--I mean that I can tell you, but I cannot 
speak to the various decisions DOJ makes. I would think DOJ 
could.
    Mr. Fry. Before I yield back, just briefly, I just find it 
really troubling that you talk about these acts of violence 
against your facilities, but when--she is sitting right next to 
you. She just testified to this. This isn't an obscure theory 
in law that we are talking about or a fact pattern. This 
happened. So, I am a little bit surprised that you would not 
encourage the Biden Department of Justice and FBI to prosecute 
these cases.
    With that, Mr. Chair, I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentleman is out of time.
    Ms. Camp, did you want to respond to that?
    Ms. Camp. No, thank you, sir.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. OK. The Chair now recognizes the 
gentleman from Texas, Mr. Hunt, for five minutes.
    Mr. Hunt. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    I want to thank the witnesses for appearing here today. I 
really appreciate it.
    For the record I am pro-life, and I thank God that my mom 
was also pro-life because if not for her I wouldn't be sitting 
before you as a Congressman today. Since this past Sunday was 
Mother's Day, I want to thank my mother for choosing life. Good 
looking out, mom.
    If you are a member of the Pro-Life Movement, you will be 
targeted. If you are a pro-choice protestor, you will be 
protected. This is how the Biden Administration puts their 
thumbs on the scales of justice.
    What we are really talking about here today is a selective 
application in enforcement of Federal law. I have brought some 
receipts.
    Under this administration conservatives are being targeted. 
My first example is the ATF. The ATF has targeted lawful gun 
owners by crafting a rule that would make 40 million Americans 
felons overnight.
    Of course, there is the FBI. The FBI conducted an 
unprecedented raid at President Trump's home at Mar-a-Lago. 
They used FISA research warrants against conservatives. They 
have attempted to put moles in churches to spy on radical 
Christians. Of course, we have the recent results of this 
Durham Report.
    Of course, we cannot forget about the CIA. Just this last 
week this Committee published this report that former 
intelligence officials colluded with the Biden campaign to 
discredit the Hunter Biden laptop. This happened just days 
before the 2020 election, and I say to that, well, hot damn, 
that sounds like election interference to me. They call this 
Russian disinformation. That doesn't look like disinformation 
to me. This looks like Hunter Biden committing a felony.
    Now, we have heard a lot of talk on this Committee about 
crime guns, and I would call this a Biden crime gun. The day 
after this report was released there was no mention of this in 
mainstream publications. What did they talk about? George 
Santos. George Santos. Conveniently George Santos was indicted 
the day this report was released. Coincidence? Well, you 
decide. Unfortunately for Democrats there is only one George 
Santos to keep the Biden family off the front page of The 
Washington Post. So, buckle up.
    This is Hunter Biden's gun application. I would like to 
direct your attention to question 11 echo. It says,

        Are you an unlawful user of or addicted to marijuana or any 
        depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled 
        substance?

Now, in the words of the late, great Notorious B.I.G. when 
referring to the only way to get out of the hood, he famously 
said, ``Either you're slingin' crack rock or you got a wicked 
jump shot.''
    Now, Hunter Biden does not have a wicked jump shot, but he 
definitely slings crack rock. Out of respect for the President 
I am not going to show any photos of Hunter with prostitutes 
and grams of crack, but we all know he has a checkered past. 
Hunter Biden lied on this application about his history of 
illegal drug use. He obtained a gun anyway and was never 
prosecuted.
    If we saw this behavior from Donald Trump, Jr., he would 
have been in handcuffs a long time ago. The bottom line is 
this: The ATF is focused on making 40 million law-abiding 
citizens felons when they should be worried about Hunter Biden 
lying on a gun application, which is a felony, by the way.
    There is no wonder why the American people have lost faith 
and trust in the Federal government. If you want to restore 
trust, stop spying on Americans. Stop targeting conservatives 
and pro-life people and apply the law equally.
    To the FBI, the CIA, the ATF, please put Hunter Biden in 
jail. I yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. The gentleman yields back.
    Ms. Scanlon and I, the Ranking Member and I are going to do 
one more quick round of questions just to put a bow on this. I 
will recognize myself for five minutes.
    I just had a question for Ms. Camp, or a couple of 
questions: You are the Chief Legal and Strategy Officer for the 
National Abortion Federation. Before that you spent 20 years at 
the ACLU and I think you were in charge of their Reproductive 
Freedom Project, right?
    Ms. Camp. No, I was not the director. I was the deputy 
director.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Deputy director. OK. Just for the 
record, because we have talked a lot about violence here today 
and violence--I think in your words you said you tracked 
violence against people providing abortion services, but I have 
not heard you acknowledge at all the brutal violence committed 
against children in the womb, as Mr. Roy was asking, when their 
skulls are crushed and when their limbs are ripped apart to 
kill and abort them.
    I want to know for the record, are there any restrictions 
at all on abortion that you would support?
    Ms. Camp. So, thank you for the question, Congressman. The 
question you ask is one of profound moral dimension, one that 
only the person who's pregnant can answer in consultation with 
their own soul, their pastor, their God, their doctor, their 
spouse, and their nurse. That's where the moral authority 
rests, to answer the question you've asked.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. So, you have no position on--for 
example, would you support restrictions on sex-selection 
abortions, when someone chooses to abort a child just because 
of its sex?
    Ms. Camp. So, Congressman, I can only reiterate, the person 
with the moral authority to make a decision about a pregnancy 
is the pregnant person.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. I understood that, but on this 
specific issue would you or your organization support a legal 
restriction on sex-selection abortion?
    Ms. Camp. My organization supports abortion providers in 
providing patient-centered, evidence-based care, the care that 
the pregnant person decides is necessary.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. OK. Then if that person decides 
to have an abortion after 20 weeks' gestation, do you support 
that?
    Ms. Camp. So, Congressman--
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. It is a yes or no question. I 
understand the morality and the complexity, but do you support 
an abortion after 20 weeks' gestation, yes or no?
    Ms. Camp. Respectfully, Congressman, it's not a yes or no 
question. What I support is providers being able to offer the 
care that patients know they need.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. You support that in case of an 
unborn child that is after 20 weeks' gestation, correct?
    Ms. Camp. I support it in situations where the patient has 
decided in--
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. All right. Do you oppose parental 
consent laws before a teenager can obtain an abortion?
    Ms. Camp. So, I have to say, Congressman, these questions 
sound really far afield from the reason--
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. No, ma'am, wait a minute. Hold 
on. You are the Chief Legal and Strategy Officer for the 
National Abortion Federation. You are the perfect person to 
answer these questions. It is not afield. Everything is on the 
table, ma'am, for a hearing. You came here purporting to be an 
expert in the field and I am asking you a very simple question, 
and an important one.
    Ms. Camp. Sure. I just want to point out that I think we're 
here, all of us together to oppose violence at reproductive 
healthcare facilities.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. We are talking about violence to 
the unborn child now, directly related to the issue at hand. I 
want to know do you oppose parental consent laws before a 
teenager can obtain an abortion?
    Ms. Camp. So, the issue of minors' access is complicated. I 
do not think that--well, we all know that the vast majority of 
minors do involve at least one parent in their decision. 
Lawmakers coercing certain family dynamics is not helpful, is 
not--
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Is a parental consent law an 
example of a lawmaker coercing a decision?
    Ms. Camp. Sure. Well, we know from multiple cases that when 
minors don't involve a parent it's with very good reason.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. OK. Earlier Mr. Roy was asking 
you about the crushing of the skull of an unborn child. You 
acknowledged that this is part of an abortion procedure if it 
is a later term pregnancy, correct?
    Ms. Camp. I don't think I did do that. I'm not a clinician.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Ma'am, you are in charge of the 
National Abortion Federation. You know that they crush the 
skulls of unborn children. Come on. You are under oath. You are 
under oath. Is that true or not?
    Ms. Camp. I completely understand I'm under oath, 
Congressman, and I am trying to be accurate--
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. Is that the part of the abortion 
procedure for a late-term abortion, yes or no, crushing the 
skull?
    Ms. Camp. Well, I--
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. No, ma'am. It is a yes or no 
question. Is that part of it, yes or no? Under oath. You are 
under oath. Is that a part of the procedure?
    Ms. Camp. I understand I'm under oath and what I can tell 
you is that my background is in law and strategy, not medicine.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. How convenient. Ma'am, if it were 
true that they crush the skull of an unborn child to take the 
baby out and complete the abortion, would that be an act of 
violence to you?
    Ms. Camp. Congressman, the violence I see is the violence 
of forced abortion and forced birth.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. OK. All right. I think your 
nonresponses here speak volumes for the record. I yield back.
    I recognize the gentlelady from Pennsylvania for five 
minutes.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you and thank all your witnesses for 
coming today. I appreciate your insights on what we need to do 
across the country to combat violence, whether it is pro-
abortion or anti-abortion, or just pro-healthcare.
    There is certainly work to be done and Congress should do 
that work.
    Ms. Camp, the National Abortion Federation's report on 
``2022 Violence and Disruption'' notes that post-Dobbs anti-
abortion activists shifted their focus to States like 
Pennsylvania where abortion remains legal and protected and 
that as a result protective States saw a disproportionate 
increase in violence and disruption against abortion providers 
and patients. Can you elaborate on those findings?
    Ms. Camp. Sure. So, thank you for the question, 
Congresswoman. What we know is that the Dobbs decision and the 
proliferation of abortion bans throughout the State mandate 
pregnancy and childbirth against the will of pregnant folks. 
Those events emboldened anti-abortion extremists so that we saw 
a concentration of those extremist tactics at clinics 
continuing to offer abortion care in States that protect access 
to abortion care so that--whereas for stalking we saw an 
overall increase in stalking from--2022 of 230 percent. In 
States that protect access to abortion care the increase was 
900 percent--a 900 percent increase in stalking of providers 
and patients. In States protecting access to this fundamental 
healthcare, a 130 percent increase in bomb threats. In those 
States that are protecting access to this fundamental care a 
540 percent increase in obstructions, the core FACE violations.
    Ms. Scanlon. Am I correct that in the areas where you saw 
reduction in threats and obstructions and other harassment of 
patients and facilities that can be attributed, in part, to the 
fact that in many States with these post-Dobbs ruling--many of 
the clinics which regularly report issues to you have, in fact, 
closed and are no longer reporting?
    Ms. Camp. That's absolutely right, Congresswoman. So many 
of our member clinics have had to close because of bans on 
abortion care, bans that force people to remain pregnant and 
give birth against their will. Many of our member clinics have 
closed. Of those that closed many had reported numerous, 
voluminous instances of extremist violence, but they weren't 
open to report it to us at the time we collected the 2020-2022 
statistics.
    Ms. Scanlon. OK. We have seen some anecdotal reports 
referenced here. There doesn't appear to have been an actual 
study by a credible source concerning the incidence of violence 
and threats regarding anti-abortion facilities. Would you agree 
though that the bulk of violence, threats, and intimidation 
related to the provision or obtaining of reproductive health 
services including post-Dobbs have been directed against 
abortion providers and patients?
    Ms. Camp. Unequivocally. Unquestionably, Congresswoman. The 
vast majority of bombings, arsons, stalkings, threats, 
harassment, and death threats have been against providers of 
abortion care and folks seeking to access that care as 
patients.
    Ms. Scanlon. Thank you. I have no further questions. I 
yield back.
    Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. This concludes today's hearing. 
We thank the witnesses for appearing before the Committee 
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 12:23 p.m, the Committee 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=115924.

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