UPDATE: San Diego Supervisor Pulls Plan to Shut Down 16 Pro-Life Pregnancy Centers
A San Diego county supervisor has withdrawn her plan to shut down 16 pro-life pregnancy centers that she slandered as "fake and fraudulent."
San Diego County District 3 Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer's plan was introduced at the county supervisors' board meeting last month, but it failed to get enough votes after more opponents of her plan showed up to the meeting than supporters.
Lawson-Remer had scheduled her plan again for the board's Dec. 5 meeting after a new pro-abortion supervisor was elected to fill a vacancy on the board. However, last Friday, she pulled it from the meeting's agenda.
According to her office, Lawson-Remer has received a lot of calls from the community and decided to withdraw the proposal as part of "incorporating community feedback." Her office wouldn't say whether the proposal would return at a later date, the California Family Council reported.
In addition, CBN News discovered her board letter outlining her plan titled Advancing Reproductive Rights Education and Pursuing Litigation to Shut Down Fake and Fraudulent Crisis Pregnancy Centers dated Nov. 7, 2023, has also been removed from the San Diego County District 3 website. The board of supervisors and staff use board letters to introduce policies and procedures that are then used to manage County government. Board Letters are voted on during scheduled Board meetings, the website states.
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Pro-Life Citizens Spoke Against Plan at November Board Meeting
As CBN News reported in November, more than 60 people spoke in opposition to Lawson-Remer's proposal with another 975 responding in written comments. No one spoke in support at the hearing, and only 60 people sent in comments supporting her idea to shut down the women's clinics.
The San Diego Union-Tribune reports, "In her recommendation, Lawson-Remer had called for her fellow supervisors to support an educational campaign and possible legal action 'to shut down fake and fraudulent crisis pregnancy centers,' accusing them of spreading 'blatant misinformation, presented as medical advice,' that is designed to 'stop individuals from terminating their pregnancy.'"
The outlet reported several people who spoke at the meeting pushed back against the idea that the centers were not qualified health care providers.
California Family Council's Outreach Director Sophia Lorey also spoke to the supervisors, highlighting the professionalism exhibited by pregnancy care centers in San Diego County with 13 being licensed by the California Department of Public Health and two more being run by licensed sole practices of physicians.
She also pointed out the substantial contribution of pregnancy centers to the state, valued at over $14.2 million in free services and support in 2019 alone. "By attacking pregnancy centers, you are only hurting the San Diego County residents in need of their services," Lorey told the board.
According to the California Family Council, Anne O'Connor, J.D., vice president of legal affairs for the National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA) came to the San Diego pregnancy centers' defense as well. She voiced her condemnation of the proposal in a letter to the board.
"Supervisor Lawson-Remer's outrageously unconstitutional proposal attacking the good work of legitimate non-profits is unwarranted," O'Connor wrote, referencing the Supreme Court case NIFLA v. Becerra, which "defended California pregnancy centers in 2018 by reversing a state law forcing pregnancy care centers to tell clients where to get a free abortion."
"Supervisor Lawson-Remer and her Planned Parenthood partners are acting egregiously in their attacks against life-affirming pregnancy centers, most of whom are licensed by the CA Dept of Public Health as primary care clinics. Lawson-Remer's aggression against these centers is unwarranted; not based on any facts or actual complaints; and motivated by an extreme political agenda. It only serves to hurt the people of San Diego County who need the services provided by pregnancy centers," O'Connor continued.
In addition, constitutional attorney Dean Broyles, a San Diego resident, responded in a five-page letter condemning Lawson-Remer's plan as a "brazen and foolish attempt to misuse the power of government."
Broyles, the president of the National Center for Law and Policy and a graduate of the Regent University School of Law in Virginia Beach, Virginia, also warned the supervisor her proposal was blatantly unconstitutional and would cost the county millions to defend.
Lawson-Remer told the November meeting she brought the proposal to the board after hearing from residents who were "lured in an unsuspecting way into these clinics that did not actually provide medically-accredited care," according to The Union-Tribune.
The outlet also reported the supervisor said those centers that operate with appropriate oversight have nothing to fear.
"Let us be clear, there are a range of services and a range of crisis centers here in San Diego County," Lawson-Remer had said. "The purpose of this bill today is only to target those that are operating outside the law, that are not accredited, that are not providing medically certified treatment and services."
