SPOTLIGHT: Crisis Pregnancy Centers Under Attack in Illinois

Written by Alyssa Sonnenburg

In this episode of Illinois Family Spotlight, Monte Larrick interviews former state representative, Peter Breen, who now serves as the Executive Vice President of the Thomas More Society, which is a non-profit national public interest law firm that is dedicated to restoring respect in law for life, family, religious liberty, and election integrity. They discuss at length the tyrannical Senate Bill 1909, which is designed to shut down pro-life pregnancy care centers through litigation, fines, and more. In answer to the practical and legal flaws that are contained within this piece of legislation, Breen notes,

This bill targets only those (they call them limited services) pregnancy centers… You see the bias in terms of the law– it’s viewpoint discriminatory.

When asked about the Thomas More’s Society platform on fighting SB 1909, Breen answers,

Your principle ground is going to be free speech and this bill is viewpoint discriminatory and it is content based. So we would urge, and we’re going to urge strongly, that it is subject to strict scrutiny– the highest level of scrutiny– against which most regulations on speech just fail…

When you’ve got a bill like this, it so clearly targets those who hold religious beliefs about human sexuality. We believe this now triggers Free Exercise Clause protection, that’s also strict scrutiny– a totally different analysis but two different ways for us to go after this bill, which is so flawed…

This is an interview you will not want to miss.

Listen to Illinois Family Spotlight Episode #355 anywhere you find podcasts or click the link below.

To learn more about the Thomas More Society and their mission, click HERE.

To learn more about Senate Bill 1909, click HERE.

Peter Breen is joining Illinois Family Institute’s Special Forum on Religious Liberty. If you are interested in learning more about this event, click HERE.