Biden DOJ Targeted Pro-Lifers After Abortion Industry Asked Them To

At the behest of abortion activist groups, the Biden administration’s Department of Justice weaponized the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act to disproportionately prosecute and jail pro-lifers for exercising their First Amendment-protected right to protest, a new report reveals.

The 882-page report released on Tuesday details, with five key findings, exactly how the DOJ under Biden executed its years-long lawfare campaign that put nearly two dozen of its pro-life political opponents in prison. The investigation was triggered by President Donald Trump’s February 2025 “Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias” executive order and former Attorney General Pam Bondi’s simultaneous “Restoring the Integrity and Credibility of the Department of Justice” memo.

A majority of Americans admitted during the Biden era that the nation was ruled by a two-tiered system of justice. This lopsided application of rule of law was only partially remedied when President Donald Trump pardoned nearly two dozen of those targeted pro-lifers and the Trump DOJ swore it would only use the FACE Act in “extraordinary circumstances, or in cases presenting significant aggravating factors.”

The real hammer came more than one year later, the day before the lawfare findings debuted, when the DOJ fired the “personnel responsible for weaponizing the FACE Act.” CBS News indicated at least one of the four prosecutors terminated was Sanjay Patel, who was already suspected by congressional Republicans of participating in the Biden administration’s weaponization scheme.

“This Department will not tolerate a two-tiered system of justice,” Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement accompanying the findings. “No Department should conduct selective prosecution based on beliefs. The weaponization that happened under the Biden Administration will not happen again, as we restore integrity to our prosecutorial system.”

Lawfare Like No Other

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s leaked Dobbs v. Jackson decision, more than 90 lifesaving pregnancy centers, pro-life organizations, and churches suffered pro-abortion-fueled firebombings, vandalism, and other attacks. The Biden administration, however, aimed its prosecution power almost solely on people who were documented advocating for the protection of unborn babies at abortion facilities. This “biased enforcement” of the FACE Act, the report indicates, blatantly violated Americans’ rights.

The report notes that the heart of this FACE Act weaponization came from “career attorneys,” like Patel, in the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division who were named to Attorney General Merrick Garland’s “National Task Force on Violence Against Reproductive Health Care Providers.”

Perhaps the most damning revelation in the findings is that it was at abortion activists’ suggestion that this task force used the FACE Act to target the pro-lifers that later had to be pardoned by Trump.

“In each of the later-pardoned FACE Act cases, DOJ and the FBI learned of the possible FACE violations from abortion NGOs, rather than from the purported victims or local law enforcement,” the report states.

The task force director, Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta, Patel, and National Abortion Federation (NAF) Security Director Michelle Davidson were described as maintaining “routine communication.” In emails, Patel describes Davidson’ as a “wonderful contact for me as it relates to FACE Act investigations.”

“She has been an MVP bringing incidents to my attention, often in real-time, which usually result in an investigation/prosecution,” Patel wrote in November 2021.

By the time the Dobbs v. Jackson decision debuted, which Biden and his team sought to undermine, Patel and the task force had relied heavily on the NAF and other abortion group’s surveillance and dossiers of pro-lifers’ First Amendment-protected protests across the country to fuel their FACE Act prosecutions for years.

Emails indicate, against the NAF’s congressional testimony, that NAF employees such as Davidson directly fed Patel and other DOJ attorneys information to help the Biden administration build its case against people like Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising member Lauren Handy, a pro-life activist who received 57 months in prison and three years supervision, an extreme expansion of the usual punishment for such convictions, for her participation in a peaceful protest at one of Washington DC’s most controversial abortion facilities.

The DOJ also leaned into demands from abortion organizations such as the Feminist Majority Foundation, which listed off several “relentless acts of violence” to urge the DOJ to pursue “criminal charges and nationwide injunctive relief to prevent ongoing and future [FACE Act] violations.”

Malfeasance Abounds

The DOJ’s misconduct did not stop once the charges rolled in. According to investigators, Biden-era prosecutors not only “knowingly withheld” evidence from defendants’ legal teams, but also “falsely claimed to not have such information available.” In the DOJ’s case against pro-lifer Calvin Zastrow, prosecutors actively schemed to keep Christians off off the jury and private referred to people of faith as “culty.”

Previously disclosed in reporting was the DOJ’s use of “Aggressive Arrest Tactics,” including loaded guns, battering rams, and ballistic shields during the raid on the home of father Mark Houck.

Data showing that the Biden administration disproportionately focused its FACE Act prosecutions on pro-lifers who prayed, sang, and evangelized at abortion facilities. The findings additionally emphasized that the DOJ under Biden requested and ultimately secured longer sentences for pro-lifers, an average of 26.8 months and 14 months respectively, than pro-abortion defendants, who averaged 12.3 months and 3 months respectively.

The cherry on top of the DOJ’s FACE Act lawfare campaign was Patel’s repeat offer to serve as a reference for NAF’s push to secure “large” grant funding.

“We found no record of ethics approval for a DOJ attorney to take an interest in the financial
outcome of a party having business before the Biden DOJ. Indeed, it is doubtful that the Biden
DOJ could validly give any such ethical clearance for this conflict of interest,” the report concludes.

Jordan Boyd is an award-winning staff writer at The Federalist and producer of “The Federalist Radio Hour.” Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on X @jordanboydtx.