Nonbinary 'socialist' pleads guilty to vandalizing pro-life pregnancy center: 'Abort God'
An Ohio woman has pleaded guilty to vandalizing a pro-life pregnancy care center, having spray-painted messages like "abort God" and "Liars" on the building.
Whitney M. Durant, 20, who also goes by the name Soren Monroe, pleaded guilty last Friday to violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a federal law prohibiting the intentional damaging or destroying of facilities that provide reproductive healthcare services.
A Bowling Green State University student at the time of the crime, Durant vandalized the property of HerChoice, a pro-life center based in Bowling Green, Ohio, also known as the Bowling Green Pregnancy Center.
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U.S. Attorney Rebecca Lutzko for the Northern District of Ohio said in a statement that the government "will enforce federal laws that protect uninterrupted access to all clinics providing reproductive health services, whether they provide women with options that include abortion care or whether they solely encourage women to consider non-abortion alternatives."
"Here, the vandalized clinic did not provide abortion care, but that did not give the defendant license to deface the clinic's property in protest, violating federal law in the process," stated Lutzko.
A sentencing hearing is scheduled for next April. Durant faces a maximum of one year in prison for the misdemeanor charge under the FACE Act.
In April, Ohio Right to Life announced that HerChoice had been vandalized with phrases including "Fake Clinic," "Jane's Revenge," "Fund Abortion" and "Abort God" on the exterior wall of the clinic while "Liars" was spray-painted on a window.
"Jane's Revenge" refers to a collective of pro-choice domestic terrorists who have a record of threatening and attacking churches and pro-life organizations over their views on abortion.
In July, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Ohio arrested Durant and charged the student with a federal misdemeanor charge under the FACE Act.
While a student, Durant was a member of the activist student organization the Bowling Green Student Rights Union and a member of BGSocialists. Durant reportedly identifies as nonbinary.
The BGSRU released a statement on Instagram stating at the time that while it "does not condone the use of vandalism," it still "stands in solidarity with activists who choose to use non-violent disobedience as a form of protest."
The group also provided a link to a GoFundMe page launched to help pay Durant's legal fees and called on voters to support the ultimately successful referendum making abortion a state constitutional right in Ohio.
Signed into law by Democrat President Bill Clinton in 1994, the FACE Act came in response to a reported uptick in threats and violence leveled against abortion centers.
Although occasionally used to prosecute vandals of pro-life facilities, the FACE Act is often used to prosecute pro-life activists who block access to abortion facilities, resulting in prison sentences of several years.
In September, Republican U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Texas introduced legislation aimed at repealing the FACE Act, arguing that it wrongfully targets nonviolent pro-life activists.
"Biden's Department of Justice has brazenly weaponized the FACE Act against normal, everyday Americans across the political spectrum, simply because they are pro-life," Roy claimed in a statement.
"Our Constitution separates power between the federal government and the states for a reason, and we ignore that safeguard at our own peril. The FACE Act is an unconstitutional federal takeover of state police powers; it must be repealed."
