New York Pregnancy Center Aims To Provide Women With A ‘Real Choice’

NEW YORK— Within days of the Supreme Court reversal of Roe v. Wade, activists vandalized the downtown Brooklyn entrance of the Expectant Mother Care Frontline — a pregnancy help clinic — office building. Vandals spray-painted the words “EMC is a fake clinic” in bright red capital letters. 

Chris Slattery, a Catholic motivational speaker on the Maxwell Leadership Team, opened EMC in 1984 as the city’s first pregnancy center. The center aims to save unborn babies and offer free services to pregnant women and girls, especially those in poverty. But critics say organizations like EMC deceive pregnant women searching for all options, including abortion, and these clinics have become the latest targets of vandalism, harassment and threats in the fight over abortion rights.

According to Nicole Moore, director at Pregnancy Help Inc., a group of protesters made its way to the center’s entrance late at night on the same day the court announced its decision. The group spray-painted the front door, spelling out blue, illegible letters and smashed the glass front door. No one was hurt. 

Organized opposition has targeted pregnancy centers in New York since the 1980s. In 1987, State Attorney General Robert Abrams began investigations into different pregnancy centers in New York City due to “deceptive advertising.” According to NARAL Pro-Choice America, “fake clinics do not willingly disclose their true nature to their ‘clients,’ and it’s not hard to see why: If women knew that CPCs (crisis pregnancy centers) existed only to scare them out of considering their full range of reproductive health-care options, particularly abortion, they would avoid them entirely.”

Abrams claimed the pregnancy centers, which are usually run by anti-abortion organizations and don’t provide abortions, are “dangerous” and “harmful.”

A new report by Religious Freedom Institute found that from May 2 — when a draft leak of the Supreme Court indicated the overturning of Roe v. Wade — til late August 2022, vandals have attacked at least 63 anti-abortion organizations across 26 states.

“When I opened my first pregnancy center in New York City, the New York Times and abortion advocates based in New York woke up to the presence of pregnancy centers,” said Slattery. “(Abortion rights advocates) had a virtual complete monopoly on pregnancy and abortion counseling for 15 years, free of pro-life interventions.” 

Slattery’s idea for the center was to provide first responders to pregnant women who could offer pregnancy tests, on-site ultrasounds, anti-abortion counseling, nearby subsidized prenatal care, on-site adoption consultations, referrals for housing, legal aid and material assistance — all at no charge to the client. According to its website, EMC is funded solely by corporate and private donors and accepts baby item, toy and diaper donations to give to clients. 

EMC was the first pregnancy clinic to have mobile clinics, use 3D and 4D ultrasounds and have real-time 3D imaging at every location staffed with a nurse. 

While not advertised as a faith-based organization, most members of the staff are Christian, either Protestant or Catholic, and carry Bibles with them at the clinic. They commonly ask clients what religion they identify with and tell them that Jesus loves them regardless of their decision. EMC does not support abortion. Few staff members and interns were heard using condemning language such as “you are going to hell,” when speaking with the women set on abortion. However, most EMC staff avoid speech that condemns or shames the client.

“We have to be very sensitive to their religious beliefs,” said a nurse who wanted to remain anonymous. “We can’t be talking about Jesus and God and the devil. That’s just going to shut someone way down.” 

At EMC and similar anti-abortion centers, pregnant women begin their visit in the counselor’s office. The counselor tries to understand the client’s desires, concerns and needs to offer the best solution unique to the individual considering their background and current situation. 

“What I like about it is that you really get to get a feel of who the client is,” said Iman Essiet, a counselor and intern at EMC and host of the Loud Conversation Podcast. “I think that sets us apart, obviously, from other organizations that promote choice because it's not really a choice that you're giving them.”

Essiet said she has had abortions at Planned Parenthood and compared the experience to services offered at EMC.

“And I can say that all of the times that I have gone into an abortion, I felt like just a number or just like some type of assembly line,” she said. “And that's what sets us apart from these other places because we really sit down like, ‘Okay, what is your name, where are you from? Who are you?’”

EMC primarily works with women and girls living in poverty and/or with undocumented immigration status, according to Essiet. Regardless of the client’s situation, EMC works to help provide the resources these women and girls need, including ways to find housing if their home is unsafe, to bring family members into the country and to access donated items such as diapers. Very rarely do EMC counselors mention adoption as an option. Adoption is seen as a last resort. 

After counseling, the client then sees the licensed practical nurse. EMC is not a medical clinic. There are no doctors, no surgeries or abortions and no one to offer prescription medicines, but the nurses can offer referrals. In private rooms, the nurses talk with clients about their medical history, stages of the pregnancy and how to remain healthy after deciding whether or not to continue the pregnancy. For example, the nurses recommend prenatal vitamins or aftercare if the client chooses abortion, such as encouraging appointments with an OB/GYN and mental health professionals and seeing a doctor after using abortion pills. 

“We do try and ask them if they have any family support if they decide to keep (the baby),” said a licensed nurse at EMC who asked to remain anonymous due to threats. “But we do have certain individuals that come in that are 100% abortion bound. And we have to respect that. … We talk to them just about taking care of themselves no matter what decision they make.”

After taking a pregnancy test and speaking with the nurse, the next step is a free sonogram with the licensed ultrasound technologist. In cases where the client is not interested in viewing the ultrasound themselves, they are welcome to look away from the screen. Still, the ultrasound is more than just a tool to connect with the fetus.

“What I like about working here is that everybody has a story,” said the ultrasound technologist at EMC who also asked to remain anonymous due to threats. “And the girls don’t really know they have options when there are options out there. So, I just think bringing that to the light and letting them know that someone does care about you, or there are people who can talk to you or there is somewhere you could stay if your mom is kicking you out. In that sense, I think the program works. I have seen a lot of women change their minds. In the ultrasound, you could hear the heart. To me, that solidifies that the pregnancy is there and it’s real.” 

Most clients, according to the ultrasound technologist, come in looking forward to the ultrasound the most. Those keeping the child love to hear the heartbeat and take pictures. Those who choose to abort need a sonogram to see how far they are in the pregnancy and determine which procedure they can take.

According to a crisis pregnancy center map created by Andrea Swartzendruber and Danielle Lambert of the Epidemiology and Biostatistics Department at the University of Georgia, there were about 92 clinics total in New York and about 16 centers in New York City in 2018. 

A study conducted by the Charlotte Lozier Institute of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, founded in 1992, shows that in 2019, pregnancy centers nationwide served around 2 million people and provided material assistance worth more than $266 million. 

Care Net, one of the largest networks of pregnancy centers in North America, surveyed its clients in 2019. The clinic claims that on average, across 2,100 pregnancy centers nationwide and 73 centers in New York, 99.19% of clients and patients report an overall positive experience. 

In the past, the judicial branch of the New York government has protected the rights of pregnancy centers. In 2016, a federal district court approved a settlement that protected the free speech rights of New York City pregnancy centers. The lawsuit, Pregnancy Care Center of New York v. City of New York, was filed due to the unconstitutionality of a local law that forced anti-abortion establishments to “clearly disclose whether there is a licensed medical provider on site; whether they provide abortion, emergency contraception, and prenatal care; or if they provide referrals for these services.” If a center failed to do so, they received a fine anywhere from $200 to $2,500. EMC received two fines for refusing to post signage both in person and online.

While this law is no longer in effect,  pro-abortion rights efforts to minimize access to anti-abortion alternatives continue. New York’s current Attorney General Leticia Jones called on Google to correct its search engines and differentiate between anti-abortion centers and abortion clinics. 

“Given the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade, it is more important than ever that New York stands strong in providing safe access to abortion,” said Jones. “New Yorkers, and others traveling to the state, should trust that Google Maps will provide accurate information and direct them to real and safe care. My office will do whatever is necessary to work with Google to make these changes and ensure that people can locate the reproductive health care facilities that they need.”

Google did not remove pregnancy clinics from search engines and on Google Maps. However, to reduce the spread of misinformation, the company decided to label searches with “does not provide abortions” and “provides abortion” online and with “abortion clinic” and “pregnancy care center” on Google Maps.

The suggested solution may, in the end, be to make room for both. 

“If you have a (pregnancy center) and Planned Parenthood side by side sponsored by the government, then you are giving these women a real choice,” said the nurse at EMC. “Where they can go have a minute and think about what they actually want to do. … We are not doing harm to these girls. We are not shaming them, we are not hurting them. We want them to have a real choice.”

Myrian Garcia is a student at The King’s College majoring in Journalism, Culture and Society. She is participating in the New York City Semester in Journalism Program, where she previously interned at the daily amNY.