Pro-Lifer Says She Was ‘Shocked’ When Trump Pardoned Her

A pro-life woman who faced imprisonment until July 2027 before President Donald Trump pardoned her said Thursday that she was “shocked” to hear of her pardon — and didn’t believe it at first.

Lauren Handy, 31, said she was on the phone with a loved one when the news came down last month that Trump had pardoned her and 22 other pro-lifers prosecuted by the Biden administration. At the time, Handy was in federal prison in Tallahassee after being convicted over a sit-in at a notorious late-term abortion facility in Washington, D.C., and sentenced to 57 months behind bars.  

After a loved one told her on January 23 that Trump had pardoned her, Handy said that she was in “complete disbelief.” 

“And I was like, ‘no, that’s an AI video. That’s not true. I’m not being pardoned,’” she said during a video call on Thursday hosted by the Thomas More Society, which defended her and other pro-life activists. 

She said that she had told her family not to expect a pardon because she didn’t want to raise any false hopes. 

“I didn’t want to be disappointed. I didn’t want my family to be disappointed. And so it was complete shock. I didn’t know what to feel. I didn’t know what to think,” she said. “But it was real. So there was a lot of joy and a lot of celebration, but also a lot of sadness because I was leaving my friends.” 

Recounting her time in prison, Handy says that some days she would receive upwards of 20 letters from around the world. She said this gave her an opportunity to share her faith with fellow prisoners who had “vastly different” values and talk to people who had committed “extreme” acts of violence. 

“And so the question is: how do I love them? How do I love these people in the moment right now? How would Jesus love this person in front of me?” she said. 

Paul Vaughn, another pro-lifer pardoned by Trump, also spoke during the video call, revealing when he found out the news about the pardon. Vaughn was sentenced to six months of house arrest and three years of supervised release over a pro-life sit-in at an abortion facility in Tennessee. The Biden administration had asked for the father of 11 to be given one year in prison. 

Vaughn said that he was participating on a panel in D.C. with the Thomas More Society when they got the news that Trump had issued the pardons. They were able to announce the news live from the panel. 

In December, Vaughn testified about the unannounced armed FBI raid of his home in rural Centerville, Tennessee.  

“The raid wasn’t just meant to persecute us and intimidate us, it was really a message from the Biden administration and those that hate God and hate life,” he said Thursday. 

On Sunday, Vaughn celebrated the pardons with his community at Heritage Church in Centerville alongside Paul Place, another pro-lifer targeted by Biden’s Justice Department and pardoned by Trump. 

Steve Crampton, a lawyer with the Thomas More Society who defended Vaughn and others, praised Trump for the pardons and his announcement this week to form a task force to look into anti-Christian bias. 

“You know to make America great, it must first be good. In order to be good, we need people like Paul and Lauren and Chet Gallagher and Cal Zastrow, Heather Idoni, Paul Place, and all these others on the street not rotting in some dark prison cell somewhere,” he said Thursday.