Faith-based pregnancy care centers in Vermont have successfully challenged officials over a law they say restricted their free speech and their services to women. As a result, state lawmakers have walked back on a measure and will no longer openly discriminate against the centers over their life-affirming service to their communities.
As CBN News reported, the National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA), Aspire Now, and Branches Pregnancy Resource Center sued state officials in July 2023. They argued the state unconstitutionally restricted their speech and provision of services with a bill that was signed into law by Gov. Phil Scott.
According to Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a conservative non-profit legal group, the law only applied to pro-life pregnancy centers. It censored their ability to advertise services and to counsel women against abortion.
“[It] specifically targeted pro-life pregnancy centers as ‘limited services’ providers because they do not refer for or perform abortions. Under the law, pregnancy centers could be fined up to $10,000 for advertising their services in a way that Vermont’s pro-abortion attorney general believes is misleading,” the group explained. “An abortion facility that provides identical information would not be subject to the law.”
The state has now amended the language of the law to eliminate its targeting of pregnancy centers.
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“We’re pleased that Vermont recognized it needed to amend its discriminatory law that unlawfully targeted faith-based pregnancy centers and restricted their ability to speak and act according to their conscience. Pregnancy centers must be free to serve and empower women and their families by offering the support they need without fear of unjust government punishment,” said ADF Legal Counsel Julia Payne Koon.
Jean Marie Davis, who now serves as a director of Branches Pregnancy Resource Center in Brattleboro, Vermont, remembers when she desperately sought the help of pro-life pregnancy centers.
Davis was trafficked across 33 states starting at the age of two. She told ADF she remembers seeing a fellow trafficking victim give birth on the sidewalk and then being forced to get up and continue working for her trafficker.
“I could not help or do anything because my trafficker would have punished me,” she recalled.
When she became pregnant, she fled from her traffickers and found refuge at a domestic violence shelter in New Hampshire.
While at the shelte,r she was referred to a pregnancy center, which provided her with clothes, an ultrasound, and other resources.
After seeing her ultrasound and receiving help from the pregnancy center, Jean Marie chose life for her baby boy. After her son was born, the center provided additional help, offering her a program for women and children affected by drugs.
She later testified, “Because of the pregnancy resource center, I not only graduated from the women’s program. I went to Northpoint Bible College and graduated with an associate’s degree.”
“Our work powerfully shows that there is real help for men, women, and children in need who are caught in impossible snares and feel there is no hope — whether it’s human trafficking, homelessness, abuse, or abortion. Pregnancy centers like Branches exist to provide for them,” Davis told Live Action News. “The hateful narratives that smear pro-life pregnancy centers would have some believe that I fell ‘victim’ to their work. On the contrary, because of their work, I was set free.”
Pro-life centers across the state are applauding lawmakers’ decision to roll back the law.
“The state of Vermont has backed away from attacking the work of pro-life pregnancy centers,” said NIFLA Vice President of Legal Affairs Anne O’Connor. “Pregnancy centers are no longer under direct threat from the law and pro-abortion lobby in Vermont. For this, NIFLA celebrates; however, if in the future the state again decides to unconstitutionally pursue the work of pro-life pregnancy centers, NIFLA stands ready to take Vermont back to court and seek appropriate relief.”
ADF attorneys filed a stipulated dismissal of the case last week.
