Under Biden’s watch, the Department of Justice (DOJ) has been targeting regular people in addition to former President Donald Trump, who may become a political competitor once again in 2024. As it was reported over the weekend, Mark Houck was detained and his home was searched by the FBI after he was accused of breaking the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act.
The author and speaker Mark Houck was arrested by up to 25 armed federal agents for “allegedly committing a single count of simple assault by pushing a man near an abortion clinic.”
While his seven kids and wife watched in terror, the raid came in the early morning hours of last Friday, Houck’s wife, Ryan-Marie, a homeschooling mother of the family’s seven children said that FBI agents surrounded the house and “started pounding on the door and yelling for us to open it.”
“[T]hey had big, huge rifles pointed at Mark and pointed at me and kind of pointed throughout the house,” Ryan-Marie described. “The kids were all just screaming. It was all just very scary and traumatic.”
Houck’s family says that Houck pushed an abortion facility employee who was using vulgar language to verbally harass his 12-year-old son, causing him to fall down. The family claimed that Houck only shoved the man away to protect the child.
However, details keep getting worse, with the raid adding insult to injury given that Houck was already planning to turn himself in.
Now, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO), who has been tweeting and retweeting his outrage over Houck’s arrest, sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland on Monday inquiring about the tactics used.
In a Monday tweet in which he attached copies of his letter to the DOJ, Hawley said, “I want to know from Merrick Garland directly why Biden’s DOJ is arresting Catholic protestors like terrorists – complete with SWAT-style tactics – while letting actual terrorist acts like firebombings go unpunished.”
Hawley noted that the initial criminal complaint against Houck had already been dismissed months before the raid in his letter to Garland on Monday.
The senator claimed that FBI agents “reportedly executed the search warrant in as extreme a manner as one can imagine,” in addition to turning “a local dispute into a national case.”
Hawley stated that the news “is especially shocking” considering the agency’s apparent double standard when dealing with pro-abortion violence targeting pro-life groups.
“To say the least, using this kind of force to make an arrest for a single charge of simple assault is unprecedented,” Hawley said.
“[Y]our office has so far turned a blind eye to the epidemic of violence across the country by pro-abortion extremists against pregnancy resource centers, houses of worship, and pro-life Americans – violent acts that are prohibited by the very same law under which you are charging Mark Houck.”
The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, which forbids intimidation, physical obstruction, and destruction of both abortion centers and pregnancy centers, was used by federal authorities to acquire the FBI warrant that was used to serve Houck.
Hawley also criticized the attorney general selected by Biden for “repeatedly weaponizing the FBI” against the administration’s “political opponents” in his letter.
“If you are trying to inspire confidence in your department, you are failing magnificently,” he said.
The senator from Missouri also wanted an explanation from Garland as to why up to 25 FBI officers were dispatched to Houck’s house brandishing weapons. In addition, he asked Garland to specify “how many charges” had been filed by the DOJ “against pro-abortion radicals who have attacked pregnancy resource centers, churches, and pro-life Americans” since May 3, 2022.
Hawley concluded the letter by demanding that Garland “testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee, under oath, about your selective use and apparent political weaponization of the FACE Act.”
The question of whether the FBI and DOJ want to use this pro-life activist as a political punching bag is one that merits consideration.
I want to know from Merrick Garland directly why Biden’s DOJ is arresting Catholic protestors like terrorists – complete with SWAT-style tactics – while letting actual terrorist acts like firebombings go unpunished pic.twitter.com/tU1Jwe4c7h
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) September 26, 2022
Sources: Dailywire, Hannity, Theepochtimes
