`Never Had FBI Agents Show Up on the Sidewalk Before': Pro-Life Group Claims FBI Questioned Volunteer By Planned Parenthood

[Ubiquitous]

A pro-life sidewalk counseling group warned members Tuesday that President
Joe Biden’s Justice Department is determined to intimidate pro-life
organizations, claiming that two FBI agents showed up to question a pro-life
activist praying outside Planned Parenthood – St. Paul – Vandalia Health
Center.

In an email obtained by The Daily Signal, Pro-Life Action Ministries
Executive Director Brian Gibson put members on high alert about “a new effort
by the Biden Justice Department to intimidate us all from the important work
we do to save lives.”

Gibson referenced the FBI’s Friday arrest of Mark Houck, a Catholic father
and pro-life activist accused of pushing an abortion clinic volunteer in
Pennsylvania, though a spokesperson for the family told The Daily Signal that
Houck “was defending his son from a man who was verbally abusing his son.”

“We have had a couple recent incidents locally in which a sidewalk counselor
or prayer supporter had a physical altercation on the sidewalk,” Gibson told
members in the Tuesday email. “Two FBI agents came out to the sidewalk
outside Planned Parenthood in St. Paul today to talk to the prayer supporter
involved in one of these incidents.”

In a Wednesday phone interview with The Daily Signal, Gibson shared that on
May 16, a female Planned Parenthood client allegedly began cutting up a pro-
life sign outside the clinic with a box cutter. An activist urged her to
stop, he said, and she went back into the clinic.

“When she came back out, probably about an hour later, there was a man who
comes and prays every day kneeling down, and he was kneeling down near the
sign praying,” the pro-life leader explained. “And the woman went back after
the sign to finish what [she] started.”

The activist pushed her away, Gibson said, and the abortion clinic escort
fell down.

“He got charged with assault in state court in Minnesota,” Gibson continued.
“All charges were dismissed because they didn’t have a case. I mean, she was
a woman wielding a weapon and he’s trying to prevent her from doing physical
harm. And that’s the individual the two FBI agents wanted to speak to
yesterday came on our sidewalks. And I’ve been doing this for more than 40
years. I’ve never had FBI agents show up on the sidewalk before.”

The Daily Signal was not able to independently confirm the assault charges or
that the charges were dropped.


(Photo courtesy of Brian Gibson)
Gibson told The Daily Signal that he learned about the incident from another
activist and did not witness the events himself. Neither the Planned
Parenthood nor the St. Paul Police Department immediately responded to
requests for comment from The Daily Signal.

Gibson himself did not see the FBI agents at the abortion clinic, but The
Daily Signal also spoke with Lucy Maloney, a pro-life activist who said she
saw two female agents come to the clinic on Tuesday and engage in discussions
with clinic workers and with the pro-life activist (or “prayer supporter,” as
she described him) who had been engaged in the box-cutter incident.

“They didn’t talk to me or the other side walk counselor,” Maloney said.
“They went straight to the prayer supporter that was out there, who was
kneeling and praying. And they talked to him for a while and then they went
back to their cars.”

“They stopped and talked with escorts,” she continued, referring to the
abortion clinic workers, “for a minute or two before they went back to their
cars.”

After the agents left, Maloney said the prayer supporter told her friend that
they were FBI. She also said she did not witness the box-cutter incident.

In his email to the members of his organization, Gibson urged members to be
“in deep prayer before, during, and after our presence on the sidewalk.”

“It also seems very clear that the focus is pro-life people who have
physically defended others (or signs),” he continued. “This is why we
continue to admonish everyone to never touch anyone while you are on the
sidewalk.”

“If someone pushes you or hits you, defend yourself by walking away and
calling the police,” he continued. “Do not push back. Be extra careful not to
interfere with those driving or walking into the abortion facility.”

The FBI national office did not immediately respond to requests for comment
from The Daily Signal, and FBI Minneapolis Public Affairs Officer Cyndi
Barrington would not confirm that agents went to the clinic, saying, “per
policy, the FBI neither confirms or denies an investigation.”

The FBI’s arrest of Houck, conducted at 7 a.m. on Friday in front of his
screaming children, according to his wife, has sparked national outrage from
conservatives and pro-lifers who insist that the Justice Department is being
weaponized against President Joe Biden’s political opponents.

Catholic Vote President Brian Burch told The Daily Signal this week that the
Justice Department has “made clear that partisan political ideology is now
driving its decision making, not equal justice under the law.”

“Our chief federal law enforcement agencies have utterly failed to protect
the safety and integrity of Catholic churches, pregnancy resource centers,
and even the private homes of Supreme Court justices,” he said. “Instead the
Department has weaponized its agents to intimidate and pursue pro-life
religious Americans.”

Burch noted that his organization has repeatedly called on both the Justice
Department and the FBI to protect religious institutions and pro-life groups
from “pro-abortion domestic terrorism” as “more than 150 attacks on Catholic
churches and pro-life organizations—just since May— have gone unanswered.”

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Let's go Brandon!