While many U.S. states have tightened abortion regulation since the historic overturning of Roe v. Wade, others have acted to codify abortion and attempted crackdowns on pro-life efforts. Massachusetts, which allows elective abortion up to 24 weeks gestation, has proven to be a legal battleground for serving women and protecting the unborn.
Abundant Hope Pregnancy Resource Center, located in Attleboro, Mass., is facing a lawsuit from a neighboring abortion facility amid the larger battle between pro-life efforts and pro-abortion state leadership.
In September 2024, local news outlets reported that Four Women Health Services had filed a complaint that month, alleging that the pregnancy help center hacked its computer information, broke wiretapping laws, and misled potential abortion clients into receiving alternative care.
The Four Women facility provides chemical abortions up to 10 weeks gestation and surgical abortions up to 20 weeks, per its website. Abundant Hope offers free life-affirming resources such as pregnancy testing, ultrasounds, baby products, and post-abortive support.
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The abortion center’s accusations against Abundant Hope lacked substance, according to the attorney representing the pregnancy help center.
“The allegations in the plaintiff’s complaint regarding violation of wiretapping laws and of computer hacking have all been dropped after Abundant Hope showed that there was absolutely no basis for such claims,” attorney Thomas Harvey told Pregnancy Help News via email.
He added that Four Women has since “attempted to salvage its case by amending the complaint to allege that Abundant Hope deceived women into contacting it rather than the plaintiff.”
In the updated complaint, the abortion facility also named Choose Life Marketing as a co-defendant, relating to accusations of false and misleading advertising.
“Abundant Hope’s defense is essentially that it has not deceived anyone and that, by virtue of the fact that all its services are free of charge, it cannot be involved in any unfair business practices,” Harvey explained. “The plaintiff, the abortion clinic, simply does not like the competition for clients.”
Tweet This: The abortion facility simply does not like competition for clients.
State-led smear campaign targets pregnancy help centers
Meanwhile, another legal battle has been brewing in Massachusetts as pro-life organizations combat a smear campaign spearheaded by the pro-abortion state government.
On August 19, 2024, A Women’s Concern (Your Options Medical Centers), which operates several pregnancy help centers in the Bay State, filed a federal lawsuit against Gov. Maura Healy and Department of Public Health Commissioner Robert Goldstein.
Additionally, the complaint names the Rebecca Hart Holder, head of the pro-abortion organization Reproductive Equity Now Foundation (REN) alleging that she assisted in enacting an information campaign that violates the First Amendment rights of pro-life centers.
The lawsuit stems from the Democrat governor’s “first in the nation” ad campaign launched in June 2024 to discredit pregnancy centers.
According to A Woman’s Concern/Your Options Medical Centers complaint, the campaign “involves selective law enforcement prosecution, public threats, and even a state-sponsored advertising campaign with [the] singular goal to deprive [pregnancy help centers] of their First Amendment rights to voice freely their religious and political viewpoints regarding the sanctity of human life in the context of the highly controversial issue of abortion.”
In other litigation in the commonwealth, Massachusetts pregnancy help organization Bethlehem House filed a defamation suit Jan. 29 against REN, citing the pro-abortion group’s “coordinated smear campaign” with the Healey-Driscoll administration against pregnancy centers.
The complaint alleges that REN launched a “politically-motivated attack” that attempts “to undermine and discredit these organizations [pregnancy resource centers] because they disagree with their religious and moral stances on abortion.”
REN collaborated with Healy’s administration to launch the campaign, which the state funded with a $1 million grant, according to Catholic Vote.
Bethlehem House is represented by Massachusetts Liberty Legal Center. The Massachusetts public interest law center partnered with the American Center for Law & Justice (ACLJ) in the August complaint
Editor's note: Choose Life Marketing is an advertiser with Pregnancy Help News.
