A federal court has temporarily blocked a new Illinois law that takes aim at maternal health care centers for expressing their pro-life message.
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois granted a preliminary injunction late on Aug. 3, halting enforcement of SB1909, the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Businesses Practices Act.
The problem with the law is that it declares that the pro-life speech engaged in by pregnancy help ministries is a “deceptive business practice,” the plaintiffs say.
According to documents received under the Freedom of Information Act, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, a Democrat, “has received zero complaints from members of the public against an Illinois Pregnancy Help Center for alleged violations of the Deceptive Businesses Practices Act,” said Peter Breen, Executive Vice President and Head of Litigation for the Thomas More Society, a public interest law firm that represents NILFA.
The law “is a blatant attempt to chill and silence pro-life speech under the guise of ‘consumer protection,’” he said.
“Pregnancy help ministries provide real options and assistance to women and families in need, but instead of the praise they deserve, pro-abortion politicians are targeting these ministries with $50,000 fines and injunctions solely because of their pro-life viewpoint.”
But “free speech won today in the Land of Lincoln—pro-life advocates across Illinois can breathe a sigh of relief they won’t be pursued for ‘misinformation’ by Attorney General Kwame Raoul,” Mr. Breen said.
Mr. Breen argued the case on behalf of the National Institute of Family Life Advocates and other pro-life ministries, including pregnancy care centers in Illinois.
“Across the nation, pregnancy help ministries are being discriminated against by laws that target their life-affirming work,” he said in a statement. “The injunction granted today sends a strong, clear message to the country that the First Amendment protects pro-life speech.”
The law, which Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat, signed on July 27, “bars so-called ‘crisis pregnancy centers’ from using misinformation, deceptive practices, or misrepresentation in order to interfere with access to abortion services or emergency contraception,” his office said in a press release at the time.
The statute allows the state attorney general to investigate complaints against centers using such tactics and enhances the power of the attorney general’s office “to prosecute incidences of consumer fraud in such cases.”
“Women need access to comprehensive, fact-based healthcare when making critical decision[s] about their own health—not manipulation or misinformation from politically motivated, non-medical actors,” Mr. Pritzker said at the time. “By empowering the Attorney General’s office to battle deceptive practices, we’re ensuring Illinoisans can make their own decisions about their bodies using accurate and safe information.”
Mr. Raoul said at the time that he “witnessed deceptive crisis pregnancy center tactics firsthand on a visit to tour a Planned Parenthood health center in Illinois.”
There were “people who appeared as though they might work there … outside attempting to divert patients away from the health center,” he said.
“Patients report going to crisis pregnancy centers -- sometimes even receiving exams and ultrasounds -- thinking they were visiting a clinic that offers the full range of reproductive care.
“As a result, patients may disclose personal medical information, unaware the center may not keep that information private and confidential. By signing this law at a time when reproductive health access faces continued attacks in other states, Governor Pritzker is helping to protect patients who seek care in Illinois from these extreme violations of trust and privacy.”
The plaintiffs say in their legal complaint that the new law “openly targets pro-life pregnancy ministries—while exempting abortion facilities—by specifically prohibiting them from engaging in undefined ‘deception’ or ‘omissions of any material fact’ under the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Businesses Practices Act.”
The statute “goes far beyond traditional restrictions on deceptive business practices, in part by stating … that it unapologetically targets alleged pro-life ‘misinformation’—that is, controverted facts about abortion that the Illinois General Assembly majority believes are not among the ‘orthodox’ views on the subject.”
During legislative hearings on SB1909, the attorney general’s office confirmed that “the law could prohibit pro-life pregnancy centers from stating that ‘Life begins at conception’ or require them to speak the State’s view point that childbirth is allegedly associated with a 14-times greater risk of death than abortion, despite studies contradicting that view and in the teeth of the pro-life position that abortion poses a 100% risk of death for the unborn child,” the legal complaint states.
As a result of the law, “speaking common pro-life views as part of a pregnancy help ministry, or failing to speak the State’s pro-abortion views on hotly disputed issues, is illegal under state law, on pain of crippling fines, injunctions, and attorney fees.”
At the same time, “abortion facilities (as well as expressly exempted licensed healthcare providers and hospitals) remain free to engage in their own controversial speech about abortion, as they wish.”
The Epoch Times reached out after hours to the office of Mr. Raoul but had not received a reply at press time.
