A recent uptick of vandalism and arson at abortion clinics in the aftermath of an inflammatory video campaign targeted at Planned Parenthood needs more scrutiny from the Department of Justice, according to prominent reproductive rights group NARAL Pro-Choice America.
NARAL is asking its supporters to sign a petition urging DOJ officials to investigate the attacks on women’s health clinics as potential incidences of domestic terrorism.
Over the past several months, as the national conversation about abortion has been dominated by accusations that Planned Parenthood is selling “aborted baby parts,” thanks to a series of videos released by anti-choice activists, clinic employees have become concerned that the heated rhetoric is translating into action.
Health centers in California, Washington, Louisiana, and Illinois have all been subject to acts of vandalism over the past three months. The clinics in California and Washington experienced very similar arson attempts. The Southern Poverty Law Center has been keeping its eye on the incidences, which the group describe as potential “terroristic attacks.”
According to a review from Media Matters, the incidents of clinic vandalism have been well-covered in local press but largely ignored by the national media. Cable news shows did not weigh in, and national print publications did not connect the dots between the separate events.
“Where is the outrage?” NARAL head Ilyse Hogue said in a statement in response to the Media Matters report on Friday. “The media need to report these incidents as what they are: domestic terrorism. By staying silent or failing to discuss this new wave of attacks on health clinics in the context of anti-abortion extremism, the media is giving extremists the cover to regressively and violently attack women, their access to health care, and the medical professionals who provide it.”
Hogue noted that, just six years ago, Kansas abortion doctor Dr. George Tiller was gunned down in his church by anti-choice extremists “against a backdrop of tolerance for these radical views.”
Other members of the reproductive rights community have also argued that targeted harassment against abortion providers should be defined as terrorism.
David Cohen, a law professor at Drexel University, interviewed dozens of employees who work at abortion clinic about the backlash they encounter in the course of their jobs and collected their accounts into a book entitled The Untold Stories of Anti-Abortion Terrorism. In his book, Cohen argues that law enforcement officials need to become more educated about the history of anti-abortion threats — and the specific legacy of Dr. Tiller, whose murder sent ripple effects throughout the medical community — so they understand why abortion providers may feel particularly uneasy.
Indeed, it’s not all in providers’ heads. According to the National Abortion Federation, which tracks national statistics related to clinic violence, there have been more than 200 arsons and bombings of clinics since the mid-1970s. Over the past several years, the level of personal attacks against abortion doctors and clinic staff has been on the rise.
NARAL may find that the DOJ is becoming more sympathetic to this line of argument. Just this week, the DOJ created a new post to focus on streamlining efforts to fight domestic terrorism, acknowledging that more Americans have been killed by right-wing radicals than Islamist terrorists since September 11th.