Chain of anti-abortion clinics sues state over campaign against anti-abortion clinics

A chain of "pregnancy resource centers" - including outlets in Revere and Brookline - that won't offer referrals for abortions for pregnant patients wants the state to leave it alone and stop warning people about them.

In a suit filed in US District Court yesterday, Your Options Medical, which runs clinics in Revere, Brookline and Fall River and a mobile van on the Cape, says the state campaign - which includes ads on the outside of MBTA buses - violates "its constitutional and civil rights to provide medical services without fear of retaliation and threat because of its political and religious views."

The suit formally names Gov. Healey and state Public Health Commissioner Robert Goldstein as well as the Reproductive Equity Now Foundation and its president, Rebecca Hart Holder, which has worked with the state on its campaign.

Defendants' retaliation and selective-enforcement campaign accuses YOM and other PRCs of being a public health threat, of carrying out false and misleading advertising, and of other falsehoods, while actively urging citizens to report PRCs to State law enforcement. Defendants' campaign is not isolated; in fact, it began when Governor Healey, as Attorney General, issued consumer advisories making it emphatically clear that pro-life PRCs are not welcome in Massachusetts because of their views and speech. Moreover, Defendants have knowingly targeted pro-life PRCs for repeated enforcement actions without a proper basis and based solely on REN's unwarranted complaints, in violation of their rights to equal protection under the law.

Your Options, which says it has been licensed by DPH to provide counseling and certain medical outpatient medical services such as ultrasounds since 1999, "was founded in 1991 by three Christian families in Boston who saw the need to offer women in unplanned pregnancies a safe place to receive help and support in choosing life."

Plaintiff believes that all human life is sacred and made in the image of God.

As a Christian organization, Plaintiff is committed to aiding women and couples facing unexpected pregnancies by providing ultrasounds, counseling, and meeting the practical and material needs that may otherwise cause them to consider abortion.

As a life-affirming entity, Plaintiff does not perform abortions, does not refer for abortions, and does not advertise that it performs abortions.

The heart of Plaintiff's ministry is to meet the emotional, relational, material, and spiritual needs of mothers and their babies.

The group alleges the state is fostering a climate of fear and that its clinics have been the target of graffiti at least three times since the release of the Dobbs decision in 2022.

In response to these acts of vandalism, Massachusetts officials did not pursue a public awareness campaign to bring these vandals to justice.

Instead, government officials took affirmative steps to contribute to, and escalate, the hostile rhetoric against pro-life organizations, such as YOM.

On July 6, 2022, just weeks after YOM was first vandalized, then-Attorney General Maura Healey issued a factually baseless "advisory" stating: "While crisis pregnancy centers claim to offer reproductive healthcare services, their goal is to prevent people from accessing abortion and contraception."

The group alleges the state, acting with Hart Holder, has filed subpoenas for records about its clinics' operations that would reveal confidential patient information, that it has never withheld information about its "pro-life" beliefs from patients and that the state's campaign, which calls on patients to file complaints is harassment:

The conduct of the State Defendants constituted a violation of YOM's clearly established free speech rights such that every reasonable State official in similar circumstances would have understood that the conduct violated YOM's constitutional rights; actively seeking complaints against PRCs in a targeted campaign of harassment, threats, and unequal enforcements based on political and religious viewpoint is a clear constitutional violation that is closely analogous with the constitutional violations in past cases.

The religious nature of the harassment is clear, the group alleges, because "the entire category of reproductive care clinics has not been targeted by Defendants, only those that promote childbirth rather than abortion."

The underlying assumption of the policy is that only those PRCs that promote the sanctity of human life are likely to engage in unethical conduct; and that belief in the sanctity of human life is, for YOM, a religious one.

The suit seeks a court order declaring the state is simply wrong, ordering it to stop its campaign immediately and award damages and attorneys' fees.

YOM is represented by the Massachusetts Liberty Legal Center, affiliated with the rightwing Massachusetts Family Institute, and the American Center for Law and Justice in Washington, whose chief counsel, Jay Sekulow, formerly represented then President Trump.