Anti-abortion groups responded Monday to the Common Council’s unanimous approval Feb. 25 of a buffer zone ordinance establishing restricted areas around health care facilities.
Groups, including Madison Vigil for Life, Students for Life of Madison and Badger Catholic, filed a federal lawsuit against the ordinance Feb. 26, maintaining the ordinance impedes free speech.
Badger Catholic President Sean McNally said in an email to The Daily Cardinal that the city’s ordinance is “effectively banning person-to-person leafleting in ‘bubbles’ all over campus and downtown.”
“It was blatantly unconstitutional for the City to restrict speech areas, or on any public sidewalk, and the City has no evidence for its law but simply points to nonexistent problems that allegedly occur outside any office housing a doctor,” McNally said in the email.
The ordinance could affect areas around the Lucky apartment building, Medical Sciences buildings, “controversial” research facilities and State Street campus buildings used by doctors, according to McNally.
Pro-Life Wisconsin said in a statement “it is painfully clear that the Madison Common Council overreached with this massively broad ordinance that drowns the whole city in anti-free speech bubble.”
Gwen Finnegan, director of Madison Vigil for Life, said in the email no city should create a “gag rule” concerning free speech “just to drive its brazen pro-abortion agenda against peaceful people who offer women compassionate choices outside of abortion facilities.”
Ald. Lisa Subeck, District 1, said in the Feb. 25 meeting the ordinance is “aimed at the individuals who, instead of peacefully protesting, choose to harass patients.”
The Council plans to vote on suspending the ordinance March 18.
