We Won!
On Friday evening we learned of Judge John Marshall's decision in our two-year court battle challenging the Board of Health's unlawful actions to substantially weaken the health and safety regulations for Virginia's abortion centers.
We are thrilled to finally announce that the majority of the Board's amendments were held to be legally invalid and completely suspended!
We want to thank you for your prayers, for so many who showed up early to stand in long lines for the Board of Health meetings when they were rewriting the standards, for those who generously gave financially, and for all of your encouragement in this worthy cause. It has paid off!
A huge thank you goes to the petitioners in this case, Itzel Melendez, Megan Getter, Hank Kuhlman, and Delegate Kathy Byron, who were willing to step up and challenge the Adminstration. And much credit belongs to their attorney Dan Carrell, who represented them and masterfully argued this case through its multiple stages.
Most of all, we thank God for leading and guiding us to this point. The victory belongs to Him.
It's been a long road since Gov. Terry McAuliffe's Board of Health, with the advice of Attorney General Mark Herring, illegitimately carved up our common-sense regulations designed to hold abortion centers accountable and to protect women from unregulated and underregulated abortion operations. We joined this lawsuit challenging the legality of those changes to push back against McAuliffe's and Herring's willingness to ignore the law for ideological ends and to pay back the abortion industry who contributed millions to help get them elected.
It's clear the abortion industry thinks they should have to follow as few standards as possible. But when Terry McAuliffe's Board of Health, with the help of Attorney General Mark Herring, broke the law to grant them their wish, we felt compelled to stand up and say "Not on our watch." Today, we celebrate having substantially prevailed in our determined stand to hold the abortion industry, and the adminstrative state, accountable to the law.
We also joined the suit so we could prevent another Kermit Gosnell from operating in Virginia. After all, it was those very regulations, finally put into effect in 2011 after decades of efforts, that led to the closure of eight abortion centers across the state, including one run by the infamous abortionist, Stephen Brigham, in Northern Virginia. A 70-page report of egregious violations at Brigham's facility in 2016 was so bad that it even forced Gov. McAuliffe's own adminstration to suspend it indefinitely, never to reopen. But even that wasn't enough to slow down McAuliffe and Herring's zealous pursuit to make Planned Parenthood's operations as profitable and unregulated as they could.
In total, 13 of 20 regulatory sections the Board of Health amended were suspended, and it looks like the Board will have to start over from the beginning and actually follow the law if they want to implement them.
Lord willing, this battle is now over and won. But as you know, the war for protecting every innocent human life rages on. And with your support, we look forward to leading the charge in the battles to come.
Today, January 28, the House of Delegates Privileges and Elections Subcommittee #4 will be voting on Delegate Kathy Byron’s resolution to add a Constitutional Amendment prohibiting taxpayer dollars to be used to pay for abortions. You can support this resolution and send a message to all members of that committee by clicking here
