Pro-Life Woman Sues to Stop Colorado That Censors Pro-Life Free Speech

State   |   Micaiah Bilger   |   Jun 9, 2023   |   11:01AM   |   Denver, Colorado

Colorado pro-life advocate Wendy Faustin just wants to offer loving, compassionate help to pregnant mothers and their unborn babies.

In a new lawsuit, Faustin said the state of Colorado is preventing her from doing so through a buffer zone law that restricts free speech within 100 feet of abortion facilities.

Faustin and her attorneys with First Liberty Institute filed the federal lawsuit June 1, arguing the law violates her rights under the First and 14th Amendments.

“The government may not target life-affirming speech simply because it disagrees with the message. That is unlawful viewpoint discrimination,” said Roger Byron, senior counsel for First Liberty Institute. “It should not be a crime to lovingly and compassionately approach another person to tell them about alternatives to abortion.”

Since 1993, Colorado law has prohibited individuals from “knowingly approach[ing] another person within eight feet” inside a 100-foot radius around the entrance to abortion facilities and health care clinics “for the purpose of passing a leaflet or handbill to … or engaging in oral protest, education, or counseling with such other person.”

Faustin’s lawyer told Fox News that the law basically forces her to shout at women from a distance instead of approaching peacefully and quietly to offer information and support.

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“Under these laws, it’s a crime to be within 100 feet of the door of an abortion center or to get within 8 feet of another person to hand her a pamphlet that tells her how to get some help,” Byron said.

A Christian, Faustin said she does sidewalk counseling because she believes “abortion is a horrific moral wrong” and every human life is valuable. Compelled by her faith, she said she wants to offer support to pregnant women and help them reconsider aborting their babies.

Her case challenges a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2000 that upheld the Colorado law, Hill v. Colorado. Later, in 2014, the high court did strike down a 35-foot Massachusetts buffer zone law. However, other smaller buffer zones still are in place across the U.S.

In the lawsuit, Faustin “acknowledges that the result she seeks is contrary to currently governing precedent as set forth by the majority opinion in Hill. But for the reasons explained by the dissents in that case and in later Supreme Court precedent, that case was wrongly decided, is irreconcilable with intervening precedent, and has severely ‘distorted First Amendment doctrines.’”

Pro-life advocates are challenging similar laws and ordinances in Florida, Illinois, New York, Pennsylvania and other states across the country, arguing that buffer zones around abortion facilities restrict their right to free speech.

Contrary to claims from abortion activists and the media, pro-life sidewalk counselors are peaceful and compassionate. Being mean or harassing would be counterproductive to their goal of helping parents choose life for their babies. Most pro-life sidewalk counselors are volunteers who stand outside abortion facilities in all kinds of weather to offer mothers support and save unborn babies from slaughter. Sometimes they are victims of assault and harassment. In May, two older pro-life men were brutally assaulted outside a Planned Parenthood abortion facility in Baltimore.