CelebsPop: Conservative say new state law violates 1st Amendment

A federal judge in Rockford has temporarily blocked the enforcement of a new law that allows the Illinois attorney general’s office to penalize anti-abortion pregnancy centers if they use deception to interfere with patients seeking the procedure.

The ruling stemmed from a lawsuit filed by the conservative Chicago nonprofit law firm the Thomas More Society that contended the measure, signed into law last week by Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker, violates the First Amendment right to free speech.

During a hearing on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Iain Johnston, appointed to his post by former Republican President Donald Trump, agreed to issue a preliminary injunction in the case, temporarily halting the law from taking effect until the courts make a final determination on its merits, according to parties to the lawsuit.

A spokesman for the Thomas More Society said the ruling would apply to a “large majority” of the pregnancy centers in Illinois as one of the plaintiffs in the case, the National Institute of Family & Life Advocates, represents 81 of about 100 of the centers throughout the state.

”Free Speech won today in the Land of Lincoln—pro-life advocates across Illinois can breathe a sigh of relief they won’t be pursued for ‘misinformation’ by Attorney General Kwame Raoul,” Peter Breen, executive vice president and head of litigation for the Thomas More Society and a former Republican state representative, said in a statement issued Thursday night.

The head of another plaintiff in the lawsuit praised the ruling as “a victory for the women of Illinois, who are being pushed” by the governor and the Democrat-led legislature “into abortions they often desperately do not want.”

“This injunction restores real choice to women facing untimely pregnancy in Illinois — and a chance at life for their unborn children,” Eric Scheidler, executive director of the Pro-Life Action League, said in a statement.

Pritkzer said he’s confident the law will ultimately be upheld.

“I’m disappointed that the far-right is interfering with the ability for women to access safe medical care without deception or lies,” Pritzker said in a statement issued by his office. “This law is constitutional and I am confident that the law will ultimately be found constitutional and we’ll continue to work alongside Attorney General Raoul to ensure Illinois patients are protected from misinformation.”

Jennifer Welch, President and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Illinois, said in a statement that she was “frustrated that a federal judge temporarily halted a new law targeting organizations actively working to deceive people trying to access health care.”

“For decades, crisis pregnancy centers have targeted our patients using deceptive and false practices,” Welch said. “Often crisis pregnancy centers provide misleading and medically inaccurate information, sometimes deliberately misdiagnosing patients or misdating their pregnancies so people think they have more time to decide about abortion or that they are past the time when they can have an abortion.”

Clinics under the law are subject to injunctive action and a financial penalty of up to $50,000 under the state’s Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act if they are found to be dissuading “pregnant persons from considering abortion care through deceptive, fraudulent, and misleading information and practices.”

Raoul said in a statement last week that these clinics go to great lengths to deceive people seeking abortion care. When Pritzker signed the bill into law last week, he said that “Women need access to comprehensive, fact-based health care when making critical decision(s) about their own health — not manipulation or misinformation from politically motivated, nonmedical actors.”

Illinois lawmakers passed the measure this spring as part of their efforts to shore up abortion rights throughout the state following the U.S. Supreme Court decision last year overturning Roe v. Wade, which for 50 years granted abortion access nationwide with limited exceptions. Since that ruling, many Midwestern states have restricted abortion access while Illinois has maintained strong reproductive rights protections.

Abortion providers have predicted that 20,000 to 30,000 additional patients will be crossing state lines each year to terminate a pregnancy in Illinois, up two to three times the number of patients before Roe was overturned.

The deceptive practices measure on abortion is the latest law championed by Pritzker and passed by his Democratic allies in the Illinois General Assembly to be challenged on constitutional grounds.

A measure to eliminate cash bail as a means of pretrial release in criminal cases was blocked by a Kankakee County judge late last year, but that ruling was reversed last month by the Illinois Supreme Court. The state’s ban on certain high-powered guns and high-capacity ammunition magazines was temporarily blocked on the state and federal levels, with those challenges now being considered by the state Supreme Court and a federal appellate court.

Earlier this week, Pritzker attributed the legal challenges to his agenda as a last resort tactic by conservative Republicans in a blue state.

“What the right wing in Illinois has decided is they can’t win at the ballot box, they can’t win in the legislature, they didn’t win the governorship, they didn’t win the races around the state that they were trying to take in school boards and library boards and so on, and so they have only one thing that they have resorted to and that’s take every one of these pieces of legislation and try to take it to court and get a decision they like,” Pritzker said at news conference on Monday announcing a series of initiatives to help people seeking an abortion in Illinois.

Tribune reporters Angie Leventis Lourgos and Dan Petrella contributed.

jgorner@chicagotribune.com

hsanders@chicagotribune.com

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