EXCLUSIVE: 21 Pro-Life Defendants Targeted by Biden DOJ Ask Trump To Pardon Them

Pro-life Americans “unjustly imprisoned” by President Joe Biden’s Justice Department are formally appealing to Donald Trump for pardons. 

The Daily Wire is first reporting the petitions for pardons of the 21 pro-life advocates, sent Wednesday to Trump by the Thomas More Society, the pro-life law firm that represents the defendants. 

“These peaceful pro-life Americans mistreated by Biden include grandparents, pastors, a Holocaust survivor, and a Catholic priest—all are selfless, sincere patriots,” the Thomas More Society lawyers wrote. “Their respective plights and personal information are provided in attachments to this letter. We respectfully urge that all 21 of them detailed here are richly deserving of full and unconditional pardons.” 

Trump has criticized the Biden Justice Department for targeting pro-lifers on “outrageous charges,” promising on the campaign trail to “rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner who’s unjustly victimized by the Biden regime…so we can get them out of the gulags and back to their families where they belong.” The Daily Wire has spoken to some of the pro-life prisoners, and many of them have hopefully mentioned this promise in eager anticipation of Trump’s inauguration. 

(Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

The pro-lifers requesting pardons are Paul Vaughn, Coleman Boyd, Dennis Green, Eva Edl, James Zastrow, Paul Place, Heather Idoni, Eva Zastrow, Chester Gallagher, Calvin Zastrow, Joel Curry, Justin Philips, Lauren Handy, Paulette Harlow, Jean Marshall, Joan Bell, John Hinshaw, William Goodman, Jonathan Darnel, Fr. Fidelis Moscinski, and Bevelyn Beatty Williams.

“These 21 peaceful pro-lifers, many of whom are currently imprisoned for bravely standing up for unborn life, are upstanding citizens and pillars of their communities,” argued Steve Crampton, senior counsel for the Thomas More Society. “Through full and unconditional pardons for these pro-life advocates, President Trump has the chance to remedy the harm done to them and their families, deliver on his campaign promises, and repair trust in our constitutional order.”

CELEBRATE #47 WITH 47% OFF DAILYWIRE+ MEMBERSHIPS + A FREE $20 GIFT

Since 2022, when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the Biden Justice Department has aggressively targeted pro-life activists through the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, a law protecting abortion clinics under which pro-life activists can be charged for blocking or inhibiting a woman from getting an abortion.

The FACE Act also protects pregnancy centers and Catholic Churches, but Biden’s Justice Department has never used it to prosecute pro-abortion vandals attacking Catholic churches. 

The Justice Department only used FACE on a handful of occasions to prosecute pro-abortion vandals attacking pregnancy centers — though more than 95 pregnancy centers and more than 300 churches have been attacked since the May 2022 leak of the draft Supreme Court opinion indicating Roe would soon be overturned. 

The Cases

Many of those seeking pardons have been convicted multiple times in trials in Washington, D.C., Nashville, and Detroit — trials that The Daily Wire’s Leif Le Mahieu has covered on the ground. While sentencing has not been completed in each case, several pro-lifers are already serving lengthy prison sentences. 

In May 2024, Lauren Handy was given 57 months in prison for her participation after she helped stage a sit-in at the D.C.-based Washington Surgi-Clinic late-term abortion facility. She is currently serving her sentence in Tallahassee and won’t be free until July 2027. 

One of Handy’s co-defendants, 59-year-old Heather Idoni, is serving a two-year prison sentence over a D.C. protest and eight months over a peaceful protest at a Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, abortion facility. 

“I would love to be home with my family,” she said during her sentencing in Nashville in September 2024. “I would love to hold my new grandson.”

In Nashville, Idoni joined a group of pro-life Christians who gathered in a hallway outside the Carafem Health Center where they prayed, sang hymns, and urged women not to get abortions in March 2021. 

Calvin Zastrow, a 63-year-old pro-lifer from Michigan, is serving a six month sentence in federal prison in Thomson, Illinois, for his conviction over the Mt. Juliet protest.  One of his fellow protesters, 75-year-old Chester Gallagher, was sentenced to 16 months in federal prison for his role in the protest. 

During their trial, it was demonstrated that there was no violence or threats of violence during the Mt. Juliet sit-in, which was broken up by local police. While the judge ended up imposing prison sentences for several defendants, they were shorter than what the Biden administration had requested. 

One of those yet to be sentenced is Eva Edl, an 89-year-old survivor of a World War II-era Yugoslavian concentration camp. She faces over 10 years in prison for her conviction on FACE and felony conspiracy in Detroit. Throughout the trial, Edl said that it was her faith in Jesus and belief that suffering would strengthen her that kept her going. 

Federal Judge Matthew Leitman has paused the case due to Trump’s election, suggesting he believes the incoming administration will pursue a different course on prosecuting FACE. 

Repealing the FACE Act

Biden’s disproportionate application of FACE against pro-lifers has come under scrutiny from lawmakers, who say it has been unfairly weaponized. 

In December, the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on FACE where Paul Vaughn, one of those convicted in Nashville, testified about the armed FBI raid of his home. 

“My house was assaulted, my wife and children were terrorized, and I was kidnapped at gunpoint by four armed men,” Vaughn told lawmakers. “I had just sent three of my children to the car so I could take them to school when the house began to shake from a loud banging near the front door. I heard men shouting from my front porch, ‘Open up! FBI!’”

Vaughan told The Daily Wire he was “hopeful that President Trump will honor his campaign promises and pardon all the pro-life Christians.”

“This is especially important for those who have been in jail for over a year at this point. Not only should they be pardoned, they should be rewarded for their sacrifice and dedication to the ideas and values that once made America the freest nation on Earth.”

Republicans like Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) have consistently proposed repealing the FACE Act, arguing that it has become a one-sided law used to go after conservative Christians. 

“Since its passage, the FACE Act has been used approximately 130 times against pro-lifers—but has only been leveled in defense of churches and pregnancy centers five times, even though churches and pro-life centers are 22 times more likely to be attacked than abortion clinics,” wrote Roy and Lee in a joint May 2024 op-ed. 

“Just last year, there were 436 incidents of hostility against churches, but the Justice Department failed to investigate the vast majority of them despite repeated requests. The complete data are difficult to ascertain because, to date, Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke has failed to provide Congress with the Justice Department’s FACE Act prosecution numbers—despite multiple congressional requests and promises to do so during a congressional hearing.” 

The lawmakers argue that FACE holds “no value other than to allow the Justice Department bureaucrats to carry out a radical pro-abortion agenda,” concluding:  “It’s time to repeal the FACE Act once and for all.”