Violence Against Anti-abortion Movement Increases Ahead of Dobbs Decision

Violence and threats against the anti-abortion movement have increased in recent weeks as the Supreme Court prepares to issue opinions in a landmark abortion case.

An alleged assassin targeting conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh generated headlines this week after police say they arrested an armed man near Kavanaugh’s family home.

But attacks against crisis pregnancy centers, some of them faith-based, have risen steadily since the leak of a draft opinion in the case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which suggested the court is considering overturning the legal precedent that prevents states from banning abortion.

A Washington Examiner review identified recent incidents of arson, vandalism, or both at at least 13 anti-abortion centers across the country.

Police are investigating an alleged arson at a crisis pregnancy center in Buffalo, New York, on Tuesday after a fire destroyed much of a Christian pregnancy center and injured two of the firemen who responded to it.

Investigations are underway at several other pregnancy centers hit by Molotov cocktails in the month since the Dobbs opinion leaked, including in Keizer, Oregon , and in Madison, Wisconsin .

But police have made few, if any, arrests.

An extreme pro-abortion group known as Jane’s Revenge has seemingly claimed credit for a number of the incidents.

In Washington, D.C., a crisis pregnancy center near the U.S. Capitol was hit with vandalism that included red paint splashed on its door, resembling blood, and a spray-painted message: “Jane Says Revenge.”

In Lynnwood, Washington, threatening spray-painted messages at the Next Step Pregnancy Center included: “Abortion isn’t safe, neither are you” and “Jane’s revenge.” The suspects in the attack also threw rocks at the building, shattering several windows.

An Asheville, North Carolina, pregnancy center was defaced with a similar message: “If abortions aren’t safe, neither are you.”

The same message was spray-painted onto a pregnancy center in Reisterstown, Maryland, as well.

The Biden administration prepared a memo last month that said the Department of Homeland Security is bracing for unrest related to the looming decision in Dobbs but did not specify one side as being more likely to engage in violence.

Led by Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS), 16 Republican senators wrote in a letter this week to Attorney General Merrick Garland “to request information about how the Department of Justice is addressing the disturbing trend of harassment, intimidation, and violence against religious and other pro-life organizations and individuals in the aftermath of the leaked draft opinion.”

A spokesperson for Moran told the Washington Examiner the Justice Department had not yet responded to the letter as of Friday.

For its part, the media have continued to portray the specter of violence ahead of the Dobbs decision as an equally distributed threat.

“For most of history, it’s the abortion providers who have come under threat from extremists on the right,” the Washington Post said in coverage Friday of some of the attacks. “Now, both sides of the abortion debate say they’re preparing for the potential for centers, clinics and headquarters to be attacked.”

CNN warned of violence from “ both sides ” the morning an alleged assassin was taken into custody on Kavanaugh’s block with the stated goal of retaliating for the leaked decision in Dobbs.

Reporting from Washington Examiner.

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