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Mark Houck and his battle with the U.S. Dept. of Justice is a man of the hour, and his experience is a prime illustration that in many aspects of life, the law is applied unevenly to ordinary Americans.
Last Friday night I attended the Family Institute of Connecticut’s (FIC) annual banquet and fundraiser in Stamford. Peter Wolfgang, the Family Institute’s executive director, hosts this soulful event every fall. It’s a great gathering of those in CT who wage the fight for traditional values in what has become an ever-increasing legislative onslaught against us. In Peter’s words, “at a time when laws should be passed to strengthen the family structure, measures are being implemented in Connecticut and nationally that are further undermining the family.”
As Peter reviews each year’s actions, FIC’s perennial theme is ‘Standing in the Gap’ – for that is exactly what they do as they galvanize opposition to some of the most odious bills proposed by ‘progressive’ committee hives in CT’s legislature. For the 10th year in a row FIC led the effort to defeat the ‘Assisted Suicide’ bill in committee. FIC also pushed back efforts to advance a Bill incrementally normalizing the euphemistic ‘Minor Attracted Persons’ (MAPs), also known as pedophiles.
Much of the past year’s efforts were consumed with defeating an entire raft of equally corrosive proposed legislation. As William F. Buckley often said, “a conservative is someone who stands athwart history” – and in recognition of FIC’s efforts, it was awarded the ‘Defensive Player of the Year’ award by the national organization, Family Policy Alliance.
Back to Mark Houck - he was Friday night’s FIC keynote speaker. Mr. Houck, a Kintnersville, PA man made international news a year ago when he was swatted by about 20 federal agents at 6:30am at his home, with his wife and seven children looking on. They were dressed in full riot gear, with guns drawn to create maximum intimidation of both his family, and anyone else sharing their traditional views and values. Houck was a regular, praying outside a Philadelphia abortion clinic. A year prior, after persistent verbal intimidation of his young son by a clinic worker, Houck pushed the man back, and he fell and required medical attention. The case was handled by local authorities. The Feds decided NOT to intervene in the case in Oct.’21, but in a 180-degree reversal, decided to indeed swat him at his home in Sept.’22. What changed? The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade three months earlier – that’s what!
In its indignation for the Court’s returning power back to the states and the people, Merrick Garland’s DOJ decided to flaunt its true colors, and rain some maximum intimidation upon the head of a man who regularly stood in defiance and prayed. The DOJ’s action was selective prosecution, and pursued with the intent that every Conservative in the land take note. It is lawfare, and its weapon of choice was the federal FACE Act (freedom to access clinic entrances). Laws such as the FACE act are written by progressives to virtue-signal their donors and special-interest groups. They are directed and targeted straight at conservatives and people of all stripes on the right side of the political spectrum. The FACE Act is loaded up with a penalty of 11 years in prison, which hung over Mr. Houck head... while incidentally, the maximum for involuntary manslaughter in PA is 10 years! With these laws there is no pretense of balance. This literally amounts to persecution of political enemies by those in control of the legislative and judicial apparatus – a clear illustration of two-tiered justice!
Rather than accept a plea deal offered by DOJ, Mr. Houck went to trial, facing 11 years. He was acquitted by a jury. Following the verdict, the judge lodged a formal notice with the DOJ stating the FACE Act was demonstrably bad law – so there’s still hope. There are thousands across the country who have been caught in the crosshairs of a malignly repurposed justice system, whose stories have not made national news. Mark Houck is just one of the many notables. And he came to Connecticut to bear witness to the fact that things have gone radically awry in our Federal government. Such virtue-signaling laws should be removed from the books, and power should be devolved back to the states and the people where it rightly, and constitutionally belongs.
Jim Himes has never seen a Federal law he didn’t like. He gladly supports laws targeting his political opponents, such as the FACE Act. And of course, he’s done nothing in his 15-year reign to return any usurped Federal power back to its rightful place in the states.
The 2024 election will be a referendum on this man’s failed 15-year rule.
