Lawyers for Mark Houck, a pro-life father of seven being prosecuted by the Biden administration, dropped bombshell evidence in defense of the pro-life advocate at a January 17, 2023, pretrial hearing in Philadelphia. Thomas More Society attorneys produced new evidence – never before considered by a federal court – that when the United States Congress passed the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, it expressly intended to exclude so-called “escorts” operating outside of abortion facilities from being encompassed by the FACE Act.

The Thomas More Society filing on behalf of Houck in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, quotes U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA), chief sponsor of the FACE Act. Kennedy clearly stated that clinic escorts are excluded, because they do not provide reproductive health services in a facility, as required under the FACE Act.

“The FACE Act was never intended to cover disputes between advocates on the public sidewalks outside of our nation’s abortion clinics,” declared Thomas More Society Executive Vice President & Head of Litigation Peter Breen, who is representing Houck. “This new evidence shows clearly that Congress intended to limit the FACE Act to patients and staff working in the clinic, and not to take sides between pro-life and pro-choice counselors and escorts on the sidewalk. The Biden Department of Justice’s prosecution of Mark Houck is pure harassment, meant solely to intimidate our nation’s pro-life sidewalk counselors who provide vital resources to help pregnant women at risk for abortion.”

The Thomas More Society filing highlights a key exchange between Kennedy and U.S. Senator David Durenberger (R-MN), over a bipartisan amendment they negotiated to strip clinic escorts of the right to bring lawsuits under the FACE Act (139 Cong. Rec. S15682):

Mr. DURENBERGER. By defining “aggrieved person” in this way, was it your intention to exclude clinic escorts or so-called clinic defenders? 

Mr. KENNEDY. That is correct. Demonstrators, clinic defenders, escorts, and other persons not involved in obtaining or providing services in the facility may not bring such a cause of action.

Durenberger then reiterated that escorts are not covered under the FACE Act (139 Cong. Rec. S15686):

The bill, as currently drafted before us, allows legal relief only to clinic patients and personnel. And this is the critical, if you will – not the only, but the critical – change that has been agreed to by the proponents of this legislation and by the Senator from Massachusetts. We have recognized that Federal law should be extended narrowly to protect only those who were actually attempting to obtain or provide medical or counseling services. It does not protect the escorts.

Thomas More Society attorneys filed the Objections to Government’s Jury Instructions in response to the Biden Department of Justice’s proposed jury instructions, which claim that, under the FACE Act, “A provider of reproductive health services includes any staff member or volunteer escort who is an integral part of a business where reproductive health services are provided.” The Biden Department of Justice claims that volunteer abortion escort Bruce Love is a “provider of reproductive health services” under the FACE Act.

Thomas More Society attorneys have provided alternate jury instructions, arguing that the clear language of the FACE Act requires that the reproductive health services must be provided “in a…facility,” which excludes escorts – a view reinforced by the clear statements supplied by the Congressional record.

United States of America v. Mark Houck is currently set for a jury trial, January 24 through 27, 2023, before United States District Judge Gerald J. Pappert in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Read the Objections to Government’s Jury Instructions, filed on January 17, 2023, by Thomas More Society attorneys on behalf of Mark Houck, in United States of America v. Mark Houck, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, here.

About the Thomas More Society

The Thomas More Society is a national not-for-profit law firm dedicated to restoring respect in law for life, family, religious liberty, and election integrity. Headquartered in Chicago and with offices across the country, the Thomas More Society fosters support for these causes by providing high quality pro bono legal services from local trial courts all the way up to the United States Supreme Court. For more information, visit thomasmoresociety.org.

At the most recent School District 200 Board Meeting in Wheaton, Illinois, new school board member and cunning rhetorician, Mary Yeboah, Director of Graduate Student Life at Wheaton College, posed six questions to the board,  beginning with a prefatory statement that let the woke cat out of the bag:

I would like to ask six rhetorical questions regarding the proposed October 10th, 2022 and October 9th, 2023 no-school all-grades Columbus Day/Indigenous People’s Day in relation to district purposes outlined in the mission of School District 200, Vision 2022, and the portrait of a graduate work. To be very clear, these are not questions that I expect you to answer right now. I am asking them for the benefit of reflective thinking for the district, especially in the month leading up to the approval of these calendars.

One, does the District 200 administration recognize the impact of holidays, statues, and other memorials on shaping school culture, which in turn shapes student experiences and outcomes?

Two, does the District 200 administration consider celebrating extreme violence, theft, genocide, and dehumanization to be in line with the study of social science to help students develop the ability to make informed and reasoned decisions for the benefit of the global society in which they live?

Three, does the District 200 administration affirm the accurate telling of history and recognize the impossibility of “discovering” land already inhabited?

Four, does the District 200 administration take into consideration the perspectives of Indigenous people regarding this particular calendar event?

Five, could maintaining this District 200 calendar event unintentionally support a myth of U.S. exceptionalism that could undermine district efforts to create diverse, inclusive schools for all children?

Lastly, does this calendar event advance the vision and mission of District 200 goals? And if it does not, must it remain despite state-level support?

It was so considerate of Yeboah to make very clear that she didn’t expect her six loaded questions to be answered immediately. It was also odd in that she had declared these were rhetorical questions, which are questions intended to make a point—not to be answered.

After some reflective thinking, I have some reflective thoughts and questions on Yeboah’s questions.

1.) Does Yeboah recognize the impact of using a leftist lens through which to view, socially construct, revise, and impose a particular interpretation of the meaning of holidays, statues, and other memorials, which in turn shapes student experiences, beliefs, and outcomes—including outcomes like the 2020 riots?

2.) Yeboah’s second question presumes an astonishing premise that she doesn’t even attempt to prove: She presumes that Columbus Day is a celebration of “extreme violence, theft, genocide, and dehumanization.” That is akin to saying Martin Luther King Day is a celebration of plagiarism, marital infidelity, and the exploitation of women.

What school has ever used Columbus Day to celebrate extreme violence, theft, genocide, or dehumanization?

Historian Victor Davis Hanson offers a relevant critique of the impulse that animates Yeboah:

Campuses and Western critics in the last half-century have turned a once risk-taking and heroic Christopher Columbus into an evil emissary of disease and destruction. History is now seen as one-dimensional melodrama in which our contemporary duty is to pick sinners and saints of the past based on our own modern (quite imperfect) perceptions of morality and then judge them worthy of either hagiography or banishment from memory.

And Hanson shares a fact inconvenient to the narrative of those who love to hate America:

[K]nocking down images of Columbus will not change the fact that millions of indigenous people in Central America and Mexico are currently abandoning their ancestral homelands and emigrating northward to quite different landscapes that reflect European and American traditions and political, economic, and cultural values.

3.) Does Yeboah affirm the accurate telling of history? Does Yeboah believe children at every age should be alerted to every serious foible, sin, or moral failing of every human involved in significant historical events or achievements? Should children of every age be taught about MLK Jr.’s significant moral failings? Should children of every age be taught the sordid stories of the abuse of women by John F. Kennedy and his lady-killer brother Ted Kennedy? Should kindergartners be taught that Harvey Milk was a homosexual ephebophile who acted on his sexual interest in teenage boys?

Regarding Yeboah’s concern about the impossibility of “discovering” an already inhabited land: Good teachers should and do explain that “discover” means “to obtain knowledge of something through observation, search, or study.” Benjamin Franklin “discovered” electricity in this sense. James Wilson Marshall “discovered” gold at Sutter’s Mill in this sense. The gold was always there in the ground. Erasmus Jacobs, son of a poor Boer farmer in South Africa “discovered” diamonds along the banks of the Orange River—diamonds that had always been there.

4.) Does Yeboah consider the perspectives of indigenous people about celebrating their histories of extreme violence, theft, genocide, and dehumanization on Indigenous People’s Day?

5.) In her fifth point, Yeboah again presumes a premise she doesn’t attempt to prove: In her fifth rhetorical question, she presumes that American exceptionalism is a myth. But is it? What objective standards or criteria has Yeboah applied to conclude that America is not exceptional?

6.) Yeboah implies that honoring Christopher Columbus’ exploratory achievement and how it transformed the world violates the vision and mission of District 200, which are here set forth:

Our vision is to be an exemplary, student-focused school district that is highly regarded for the competence and character of our students and people, programs, and learning environment.

Our mission is to inspire, encourage, and challenge, and to support all students to reach their highest level of learning and personal development.

Yeboah has yet to make her case that honoring a history-making explorer undermines the development of competence and character, or how it undermines the mission to inspire, encourage, and challenge students to reach their highest level of learning and personal development. Do District 200 taxpayers even know how District 200 distinguishes between good character and bad?

Yeboah’s reference to the vision and mission of District 200 raises other questions:

• How does the sexual integration of restrooms and locker rooms support all students to reach their highest level of personal development and character?

• How does the wildly obscene  (*WARNING*) graphic novel/memoir Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe, which is available in both District 200 high school libraries, foster character and personal development?

• How was the invitation to lesbian activist Robin Stevenson, who promotes cultural approval of both the “LGBT” ideology and the legalized slaughter of the unborn, to speak to 8-11-year-olds at Longfellow Elementary School in Wheaton supposed to foster character and personal development?

• How did the offensive student drawings defacing the walls of Monroe Middle School through positive portrayals of homosexuality and opposite-sex impersonation, some accompanied by ignorant and troubling captions, contribute to character development?

In a Facebook post, Yeboah announced she’s all in for “anti-racism,” which everyone should know by now is a euphemism for anti-white racism.

In an upcoming “Table Talk” at Wheaton College, “Topics for White students” include “Invisible Racism” with guest speaker Mary Yeboah.

Yeboah is also a promoter of the  controversial “Culturally Responsive Teaching and Leading Standards” that garnered nationwide condemnation, including by National Review.

In a Feb. 7, 2021 Facebook post, Yeboah admits that one of her “favorite scholars” is Tyrone Howard who wrote the book All Students Must Thrive. Howard’s publisher writes that Howard’s book “brings together three frameworks relevant for equity in schools–wellness, critical pedagogy, and critical race theory.”

If there’s any doubt about Yeboah’s “progressive” bona fides, this should dispel it: In 2020, as BLM was destroying cities across the country, Yeboah was part of a “white moms” group in Wheaton that created signs to encourage support–including financial support–for the Black Lives Matter organization, which is hell-bent on destroying the nuclear family and normalizing homosexuality and cross-sex impersonation.

And Yeboah worries that Columbus Day will undermine character development in children? Sheesh

Public schools are no longer places that foster character development or provide the highest level of learning. Get your kids out now.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Wheaton-Illinois-School-Districts-Wokest-Board-Member.mp3

Written by Rey Flores

Parents have plenty of concerns as they do their best to raise their children. From the moment they are born, God entrusts parents to make the best choices for their children regarding everything from their basic needs to how they are educated.

For a very long time, most families have had no choice when it comes to the schools their children attend. Income and neighborhood determine which schools families will have to send their children to, and for many Illinoisans those schools are dangerous, underperforming, and engaged in indoctrination. Far too many government schools are led by school administrators and faculty who care more about union activities and Leftist sexuality indoctrination than they do about children. 

In recent years, school choice has been a battle many parents have joined, because it should not be only wealthy parents who have the freedom to choose their children’s schools. All parents should have that freedom.

The latest challenge Illinois parents face is trying to save a fairly new private scholarships program that enables parents to have available better education options for their children and empowers parents to exercise their parental rights. If Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker has his way, this program will end.

The “Invest in Kids Program” website summarizes how this program works to help provide donor-powered scholarships for Illinois families:

 “Illinois enacted the Invest In Kids Scholarship Tax Credit Program in 2017. This program offers a 75 percent income tax credit to individuals and businesses that contribute to qualified Scholarship Granting Organizations (SGOs). The SGOs then provide scholarships for students whose families meet the (low and middle-income) income requirements to attend qualified, non-public schools in Illinois.”

According to Empower Illinois, SGO’s have raised over $61.5 million dollars from thousands of individual donors who want to help provide these scholarships and a bright future for Illinois students, schools and communities.

School choice is critical to Illinois families. It offers children much-needed opportunities to reach their educational potential early in their formative years and on through the ninth grade. Denying school choice to Illinois families is condemning kids to subpar, politicized education simply because of their family’s socio-economic status and geographic location.

Pritzker, who seeks to limit the freedom to choose for less privileged Illinoisans, comes from an affluent and influential family, who sent him to the elite and pricey Milton Academy in Milton, Massachusetts, where cultural luminaries like T.S. Eliot, Robert Kennedy, Ted Kennedy and James Taylor attended.

Without the “Invest in Kids Scholarship” program, most low- and middle-income Illinois families will never have the incredible educational opportunities that Pritzker (and his children) enjoyed and from which they benefitted. Giving a quality educational opportunity to these children today is a long-term investment in the growth of our state’s success tomorrow. Denying Illinois children this opportunity today is denying the success of Illinois tomorrow.

The #SaveMyScholarship campaign organized by Empower Illinois, and the many parents of the Tax Credit Scholarship Community with whom the organization collaborates, are working diligently to convince Governor Pritzker not to eliminate the “Invest in Kids” program.

The campaign is also educating and encouraging Illinois lawmakers about the importance of this five-year pilot program. The governor’s proposed budget would phase out the program over the next three years so that the state can direct revenues to public schools.

As The Center Square recently wrote,

“Opponents of the program have said the tax credits given to donors is revenue that could have potentially gone to public schools. The loss of public-school students to private schools also represents a loss in government funding that’s tied to total students attending the districts. In his budget proposal, Pritzker estimated cutting the program in half would bring $6 million into the state’s coffers in the fiscal year beginning in July (2019).”

What Pritzker is proposing is preposterous. He is attempting to do away with a potentially terrific program before it has time to demonstrate its efficacy. Pritzker and other supporters of his budget proposal would rather keep kids corralled in public schools that have amply demonstrated over decades their inability to provide good educations to Illinois children.

For more information and to join the #SaveMyScholarship #SMS campaign, click here.

“All of life is partisan.” ~ Saul Alinsky

In the 24 hours since Josh Earnest announced that President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle would not attend the funeral of renowned U.S. Supreme Court Justice, much virtual ink has been spilled about the appropriateness of this choice. Even a number of liberals have expressed puzzlement and disappointment. In light of the ceremonial duties that Obama has performed, including pardoning turkeys, throwing baseballs, and visiting dictators, it is passing strange that he won’t attend Justice Antonin Scalia’s funeral.

Obama sought and won—twice—the highest office in the greatest nation in history and then spurns the funeral of arguably one of the greatest legal minds ever to grace the U.S. Supreme Court—a claim that even Justice Scalia’s ideological foes acknowledge. Justice Scalia’s public service did not begin with his appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court. He also served another ten years in various governmental positions. Not even forty years of highly esteemed public service merits Obama’s presence at his funeral. As many times as President Cool has exposed the depth of his contempt for his ideological opponents, for convention, and for true principles, he manages to dig a little deeper, confounding even his allies.

A Leftist writer tried futilely to defend Obama’s indefensible, childish, and partisan decision by saying Obama’s presence would be a distraction. Isn’t a world leader’s presence at funerals always a distraction? Wasn’t it a distraction when Obama appeared at Former U.S. House Speaker Tom Foley’s funeral, or U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye’s, or U.S. Senator Robert Byrd’s, or U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy’s, or Walter Kronkite’s?

In light of Obama’s divers dubious actions, including this most recent egregious symbolic insult, surely Obama can’t expect Americans to believe these statements of his:

• We, the People, recognize that we have responsibilities as well as rights; that our destinies are bound together; that a freedom which only asks what’s in it for me, a freedom without a commitment to others, a freedom without love or charity or duty or patriotism, is unworthy of our founding ideals, and those who died in their defense.
• What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility—a recognition on the part of every American that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world; duties that we do not grudgingly accept, but rather seize gladly.
• Let us remember we are all part of one American family. We are united in common values.
• Those of us who have the privilege to serve this country have an obligation to do our job as best we can. We come from different parties, but we are Americans first.
• What the American people hope—what they deserve—is for all of us, Democrats and Republicans, to work through our differences; to overcome the numbing weight of our politics.
• We want everybody to act like adults, quit playing games, realize that it’s not just my way or the highway.

Perhaps his light-hearted quip most truly reveals his political philosophy:

That’s the good thing about being president. I can do whatever I want.

I am reminded of a recent Chicago Tribune front-page headline that read: “Politics imperils court’s prestige.” Perhaps it should be rewritten: “Politics imperils presidential prestige.”

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The Democratic Party and liberal pundits are trying to make the case that because Mitt Romney is extraordinarily wealthy, he can’t relate to the struggles of average or economically disadvantaged folk; and if he can’t relate to their struggles, he doesn’t care; and if he doesn’t care, he is unworthy of the office of president.

History demonstrates that that argument fails miserably.

In 2010, the Wall Street Journal published a list of the inflation-adjusted net worth of past American presidents. Some of our finest presidents and some presidents that the Left love were also men of considerable means. Some inherited their wealth, some made it themselves.

• John F. Kennedy (according to WSJ, “Although he never inherited his father’s fortune, the Kennedy family estate was worth nearly $1 billion”)
• George Washington ($525 million)
• Thomas Jefferson ($212 million)
• Theodore Roosevelt ($125 million)
• Andrew Jackson ($119 million)
• James Madison ($101 million)
• Franklin Delano Roosevelt ($60 million)
• Bill Clinton ($38 million)
• James Monroe ($27 million)
• John Quincy Adams ($21 million)
• John Adams ($19 million)
• Dwight Eisenhower ($8 million)

And let’s not forget the extraordinarily wealthy Democrats who have served or are serving in Congress (some of whom sought to be president). Information comes from Roll Call and The Center for Responsive Politics :

Democratic U.S. Senators:

• John Kerry ($193.07 million)
• Jay Rockefeller ($81.63 million)
• Ted Kennedy ($43-163 million)
• Mark Warner ($70.30 million)
• Frank Lautenberg ($55.07 million)
• Richard Blumenthal ($52.93 million)
• Dianne Feinstein ($45.39 million)
• Claire McCaskill ($17 million)
• Tom Harkin ($10.28 million)
• Herb Kohl ($9.23 million)
• Jeff Bingaman ($7.41 million)
• Kay Hagan ($70.6 million)
• Ben Nelson ($6.56)

Democratic U.S. Representatives:

• Nancy Pelosi ($35.20 million)
• Jared Polis ($65.91 million)
• Nita Lowey ($15.46 million)
• Carolyn Maloney ($10.14 million)
• Shelley Berkeley ($9.29 million)
• Lloyd Doggett ($8.53 million)

If being raised by wealthy parents or possessing wealth renders people unable to relate to the poor and unable to be compassionate, are George Clooney, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet callous men unable to feel the pain of the disadvantaged? Are they unable to provide solutions to the problems that plague those with fewer material blessings?

What about Obama’s daughters? They have never known poverty. They are being raised in privilege and affluence, attending the most expensive private schools in the country. Are their characters being deformed by such affluence and privilege? Will they become callous young women unable to relate to the disadvantaged, lacking in compassion, and unable to contribute to solutions for those who have far fewer privileges?

Chelsea Clinton was raised in affluence, attended the best schools in the country, and married a wealthy Wall Street hedge fund employee who previously worked as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs. Is she a heartless, selfish elitist unfit for serving the less privileged?

According to CNBC , Hillary Clinton’s current net worth is $85 million. What will Democrats say about that if she decides to run for president in four or eight years?

If wealth renders people compassionless and unsuitable for elected office, Democrats need to tell Americans how much wealth disqualifies a person for the office of president. And does wealth equally disqualify someone for fitness for Congressional office?

The truth is that one doesn’t have to “relate” to those who are poor to have deep sympathy and empathy for their suffering.  Wealthy people often have the luxury to travel and read deeply about the world. Through these experiences, their eyes, minds, and hearts are opened to the suffering around the world and here at home. It’s true that among the wealthy there can be found greed, self-absorption, and cruelty, but there can also be found thankfulness, selflessness, generosity, and kindness. Sometimes people who have been given much or earned much are acutely aware of their blessings and believe that to whom much is given, much is required.

There is ample evidence that those who have been raised in privileged circumstances and those who have worked doggedly to be successful are fully capable of feeling compassion, demonstrating service, and finding solutions to even the most challenging social problems.  The argument that wealthy people cannot serve the poor is foolish, dishonest, and—as is so often the case with liberal arguments—inconsistently applied only to conservatives.