WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) – Republican U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Texas says he will, if necessary, force a vote on a bill to repeal the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, which the Biden administration infamously used as a pretext to imprison peaceful pro-life activists.
Enacted in 1994, the FACE Act ostensibly protects access to facilities run by both pro-life and pro-abortion organizations, including abortion facilities, pro-life pregnancy centers, and churches. However, conservatives have argued that the Department of Justice under the Biden administration has weaponized the act to prosecute pro-life activists while only a handful of pro-abortion vandals have been arrested after a string of attacks on churches and pro-life centers in the wake of the Dobbs ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade.
Among the most egregious Biden prosecutions have been 23 pro-lifers prosecuted by the Biden Justice Department for entering abortion centers and refusing to leave, and who received prison time despite several of them being elderly with medical issues. Also concerning was the case of Mark Houck, a Philadelphia pro-lifer whom the DOJ prosecuted under the FACE Act after being arrested in a morning FBI raid for a physical altercation with a hostile abortion supporter that local authorities had already dismissed.
Houck was acquitted in January 2023; President Donald Trump pardoned the 23 others in his first week back in office.
Roy first introduced legislation to repeal the FACE Act in 2023 to prevent a future administration from renewing similar prosecutions against pro-lifers, but it stood no chance with Biden still in the White House and Democrats controlling the Senate. Pro-lifers hope that it now stands a better chance with Republicans holding the presidency and both chambers of Congress.
Roy reintroduced the House version of the legislation in January, arguing that “we in Congress need to do our part to eliminate the laws used for the weaponization, including the FACE Act.”
“I mean, this is, this is a straightforward issue, this is legislation that has been hyper-politicized and abused by weaponizing the Department of Justice and prosecuting Americans for simply exercising free speech rights that believe in life,” he told the Daily Caller on Monday. Roy said he expects some Republicans to be ambivalent about the measure, so he may “have to start looking at ways to move that bill on the floor independently.”
“I’m not going to let it just sit and languish because there’s three or four Republicans who kind of balk at it,” he declared. “We need to unite and move that bill. It’s common sense.”
The FACE Act Repeal Act of 2025 is expected to pass the U.S. House of Representatives and be signed by Trump if given a chance, but before reaching the president’s desk, it will still face a challenge in the Senate, which has a 53-seat Republican majority but requires 60 votes to pass most types of legislation.
Trump has also instructed the U.S. Department of Justice to abide by strict new limits on when the FACE Act should be invoked, which gives relief to those already targeted and ensures no new federal cases will arise in the next four years. But without repeal, the danger remains of a future Democrat administration using the FACE Act just as Biden did.
