RICHMOND, Virginia (LifeSiteNews) – Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation this week that would have imposed a bubble zone around abortion facilities so stringent that, in the governor’s view, pro-lifers “could be jailed simply for carrying a sign.”

SB 1324 states that “Any person not authorized by the health care facility who knowingly obstructs, detains, hinders, impedes, blocks, or delays another person’s entry to or exit from such health care facility is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.”

“No person shall knowingly approach another person within eight feet of such person in the public way or sidewalk area within a radius of 40 feet from any entrance door to a health care facility,” it adds, “unless such other person consents to the approach, for the purpose of giving, tendering, or exhibiting any material to, displaying a sign to, or engaging in oral protest, education, or counseling with such other person.”

The bill claims that it does not “place any restriction on the content of any message that anyone may wish to communicate to anyone else, either inside or outside the regulated areas,” but the requirement for another person to “consent” to being approached would effectively mean excluding messages an abortion facility’s customers would generally not like to see.

In the veto message, Youngkin called the bill “an unconstitutional time, place, and manner restriction on the God-given, constitutionally protected right to the freedom of speech. It creates new criminal penalties for what one might say or where they stand when they say it. If this bill were to become law, a citizen of the Commonwealth, the crucible of our representative democracy, could be jailed simply for carrying a sign.”

In 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court gave pro-abortion bubble (or “buffer”) zone laws a reprieve when it refused to hear Bruni v. City of Pittsburgh, which concerned a 2005 ordinance requiring pro-life activists to stay more than 15 feet away from the entrances to abortion facilities, effectively keeping pro-lifers from communicating with women entering or exiting the building to appeal to them to choose life or offer them assistance with abortion alternatives. 

While agreeing that rejecting the particular case was valid on technical grounds because “it involve(d) unclear, preliminary questions about the proper interpretation of state law,” conservative Justice Clarence Thomas urged his colleagues at the time to “take up this issue in an appropriate case to resolve the glaring tension in our precedents,” because such laws “often impose serious limits on free speech.”

In the meantime, the Trump administration has instructed the Department of Justice to abide by strict new limits on when the federal Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act should be invoked to prevent it from being used to persecute pro-life activists as it was under the Biden administration. Many pro-lifers believe the FACE Act must still be repealed entirely, arguing that localities can handle local crime on their own and that the danger of a future pro-abortion president abusing the law again is too great. Republican U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Texas has reintroduced legislation to repeal the FACE Act in the House of Representatives and says he is prepared to force a vote on it if necessary.