A 2015 California law forcing pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise for abortion was brought to a permanent end Friday evening, thanks to an order by a federal district court.
With that, AB 775, which essentially was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in NIFLA v. Becerra in June, is now officially dead, unable to compel pro-abortion speech from life-affirming pregnancy centers.
“NIFLA v. Becerra is not just about whether or not to hand out abortion information on a piece of paper or post it on the walls of pro-life centers,” said NIFLA Vice President Anne O’Connor, J.D. who acted as co-counsel in the lawsuit on behalf of the national network of pro-life pregnancy centers. “It is about the right belonging to all American citizens to be free from government-compelled speech, and from being coerced into promoting a message that contradicts their values.”
The California law, known among abortion advocates as the “Reproductive FACT Act,” required pregnancy centers to tell their clients that “California has public programs that provide immediate or low-cost access to…abortion”; and to instruct their clients, to “contact the county social services office” at a particular telephone number “[t]o determine whether you qualify.”
The law also required non-medical resource centers to post signage saying that the center is not licensed as a medical facility and does not have a licensed medical provider—even though non-medical centers do not require either.
It also mandated that the disclosure be translated into as many as 13 different languages.
Finally, the statue required the disclosure to appear in any advertisement for a given center, with the disclosure’s text size even larger than the text of the advertisement itself.
During oral arguments this March, Supreme Court Justices from across the ideological spectrum indicated major concerns with the law. Liberal Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Sonia Sotomayor—all of whom dissented from the decision—each challenged California’s burdensome and discriminatory requirements.
Full story at Pregnancy Help News.
First, Dear Readers, note the dissents (notwithstanding their “major concerns.”) Second, always remember that ideology trumps everything to the Zombie-Liberal. They — just like Satan — do not sleep, they do not worry, they do not stop in their quest to destroy morality and overall goodness in life (you know, “the American way.”).
These CA legislators will simply try to find another approach to achieve their ends.