Biden’s ‘unjust weaponization’ against people of faith ‘belongs in the dustbin of history’
By Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell, The Daily Signal
Pro-lifers convicted under the FACE Act and released from prison after President Donald Trump pardoned them on Jan. 24 tell The Daily Signal they are grateful to God and to Trump for returning them to their families.
Trump pardoned 23 pro-lifers who were convicted for actions including praying outside abortion clinics and encouraging women in unplanned pregnancies to choose life.
“They should not have been prosecuted. Many of them are elderly people. They should not have been prosecuted,” the president said.
The Daily Signal spoke to several of the pardoned pro-life advocates, who thanked the president for setting them free.
The predecessor Biden-Harris administration’s Justice Department had brought criminal or civil cases under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act against at least 50 pro-life advocates. Twenty-three were convicted. Ten were released from prison after the pardons.
Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, are now leading the charge in Congress to repeal the FACE Act so it can’t be weaponized against pro-lifers in future Democratic presidents’ administrations. Ninety-seven percent of FACE Act prosecutions between the years of 1994 and 2024 were initiated against pro-life Americans.
“[President] Joe Biden’s unjust weaponization of the FACE Act against pro-life activists and people of faith belongs in the dustbin of history,” Lee told The Daily Signal. “While President Trump is stopping these outrageous prosecutions, we should ensure that no future administration has the ability to persecute Americans through unequal application of the law.”
Calvin Zastrow
Calvin Zastrow, 64, of Kawkalin, Michigan, was released from federal prison on Jan. 23, about halfway through his six-month sentence in a low-security facility in Thomson, Illinois. He’s thankful to be back with his wife and children in Saginaw, Michigan, after receiving the presidential pardon.
Zastrow has been doing pro-life “rescues” for 30 years and has been imprisoned many times.