Crisis Pregnancy Centers and Fake Clinics

Crisis pregnancy centers (also called CPCs or “fake clinics”) are clinics or mobile vans that look like real health centers, but they’re run by antiabortion activists with a harmful agenda: to scare, shame or pressure people out of getting an abortion, and to tell lies about abortion, birth control and sexual health. Since the fall of Roe, CPCs and fake clinics have posed a prolific danger, with many states increasing their public funding for these centers.

Orwell’s ‘1984’ Is Now—Thanks to Trump’s Playbook of Reversal, Gaslighting and Control

PUBLISHED 5/27/2025 by

Many have fallen for Trump’s lies—or don’t care about the truth. His cronies hope to acclimatize us, like a frog in warming water, to the atrocities of Trump’s authoritarian regime. If we continue down our current trajectory, I fear we are destined to become the controlled and manipulated society of Orwell’s 1984.

To think clearly, we must challenge their lies and relentlessly, loudly and clearly speak the truth. And we must invest in science, higher education, open debate and critical thinking without fear of penalty.

Trump Administration Slashes Reproductive Healthcare Funding for Millions

PUBLISHED 4/1/2025 by

On March 31, the Trump administration sent letters to Planned Parenthood affiliates and other reproductive health clinics in 20 states announcing a freeze of close to $35 million in federal Title X funding as of April 1. Title X is a federal program that provides affordable birth control, cancer screenings and other sexual and reproductive healthcare to low-income women. 

“President Trump and Elon Musk are pushing their dangerous political agenda, stripping health care access from people nationwide, and not giving a second thought to the devastation they will cause,” said Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Action Fund.

Mobile Billboard Parks Outside Fake Abortion Clinics to Expose Lies and Protect Would-Be Patients

PUBLISHED 3/27/2025 by

Over the course of a week in early March, five antiabortion pregnancy clinics in Arkansas had an eye-catching visitor: a huge mobile billboard, in Handmaid’s Tale-red, reading:

CAUTION!
Pregnancy Help Clinics in Arkansas DO NOT OFFER ABORTION.
HIPAA PRIVACY PROTECTIONS MAY NOT APPLY.

The first-of-its-kind digital billboard tour was the brainchild of Mayday Health—which the Arkansas Times dubbed “a zero-fucks-given nonprofit”—whose mission is to share information on how to access safe abortion pills and gender-affirming care, and empower people to make their own informed decision about their own bodies.

How to Spot a Fake Abortion Clinic

PUBLISHED 3/17/2025 by

I have a confession: Despite tracking antiabortion fake clinics and their seedy dealings for more years, I sometimes get tricked by one. They’re just that devious and deceptive that even I can get duped.

Here’s a check list of what to look for if you’re just not sure that center near you actually provides or refers for abortion.

New York Times’ Shameful Reporting on Planned Parenthood Bolsters Right-Wing Attacks on Reproductive Healthcare Access

PUBLISHED 2/21/2025 by and

The New York Times recently published a 3,000-word investigative report claiming to have found “scores of allegations” against Planned Parenthood for misconduct, medical malpractice, mismanagement and labor violations. Released within a month of Trump’s inauguration, the article appears timed to provide ammunition for the ongoing right-wing attack on reproductive rights. 

The NYT could have invested its significant resources into investigating how Planned Parenthood plays a unique and irreplaceable role in the U.S. healthcare system as the nation’s leading provider of sexual and reproductive healthcare and largest sex educator. By choosing to publish what reads as a hit job on Planned Parenthood at this political moment, while failing to devote any resources to investigating the opaque and unregulated antiabortion industry vying to defund and replace Planned Parenthood, the NYT has done a grave disservice to readers, especially women and girls who need reproductive healthcare.

Despite Republican Bans and Clinic Violence, Independent Abortion Providers Fight to Keep Their Doors Open

PUBLISHED 1/3/2025 by

In the fight for abortion rights, independent clinics are the unsung heroes.

Even before the end of Roe v. Wade in 2022, independent clinics provided the majority of abortion care in the United States, more than hospitals, private physicians and even Planned Parenthood. Since the Dobbs decision, despite the closing of dozens of indie clinics in states where total abortion bans went into effect, they’ve still provided about 58 percent of abortions in the country, according to data from Abortion Care Network (ACN)’s latest report, released on Tuesday.

Trump and His New Republican Congress Will Make *All* U.S. Taxpayers Fund Unregulated Crisis Pregnancy Clinics

PUBLISHED 1/3/2025 by

While serial attacks on abortion rights seize the headlines, the anti-choice movement has quietly built an on-the-ground network of unregulated pregnancy clinics—also known as crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs) and antiabortion centers (AACs)—that is eroding access to comprehensive reproductive healthcare and electioneering against abortion rights, mostly under the radar and increasingly on the public dime.

‘Abortion Librarians’: The Online Abortion Resources Squad’s Vital Work on Reddit

PUBLISHED 11/26/2024 by

If someone needs an abortion and is unsure how to get one, they’ll probably do what seems obvious to many of us: Use Google or another search engine and type “abortion options near me.” It’s likely they’ll find a mishmash of antiabortion crisis pregnancy centers, clinics that aren’t actually near them, and irrelevant information. 

That’s where the Online Abortion Resources Squad (OARS) comes in. We run the r/abortion subreddit on the social media platform Reddit. No matter who you are, where you live, or what you need regarding your abortion, you can write a post on the r/abortion subreddit any day at any time, and you’ll receive a quick, thorough, accurate and compassionate personal response.