President Donald Trump holds up a signed executive order relating...

President Donald Trump holds up a signed executive order relating to clemency for anti-abortion protesters in the Oval Office of the White House on Thursday. Credit: AP/Ben Curtis

President Donald Trump has pardoned 23 abortion clinic protesters, including two Long Islanders, who were convicted of conspiring to create a physical blockade at a reproductive health care clinic in Washington, D.C. in 2020.

"I just signed a pardon and, in the pardon, we released 23 people that were unjustly put in having to do with pro-life," Trump said in remarks to reporters outside the White House Friday, before he left to travel to North Carolina and California to tour disaster areas, according to the White House pool report. "And they will be released and they'll be out very shortly. It was disgraceful what happened. That was a persecution."

The New York Times reported that Trump signed the orders Thursday evening. Network broadcasts show a Trump aide describing them as "peaceful pro-life protesters who were prosecuted by the Biden administration for exercising their First Amendment rights."

The Times said they included 10 anti-abortion activists who were prosecuted for blocking the entrance to a D.C. abortion clinic in October 2020.

Trump, before he signed the documents with his black Sharpie, said: "Twenty-three people were prosecuted. They should not have been prosecuted. Many of them are elderly people. They should not have been prosecuted. This is a great honor to sign this."

Among those who were pardoned were John Hinshaw, 70, of Levittown, who was sentenced in May to 21 months in prison and 3 years of supervised release. Hinshaw was convicted by a jury of civil rights conspiracy and Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act violations, prosecutors said.

The FACE Act, enacted in 1994, makes it a federal crime to use physical force or threats to injure or intimidate someone seeking an abortion.

As of Friday afternoon, Hinshaw was still listed on the federal Bureau of Prisons inmate locator as being incarcerated at the Federal Medical Center Devens, a federal prison in Ayer, Massachusetts.

Jay Smith, 34, of Freeport, who pleaded guilty, was sentenced to 10 months in prison and 3 years of supervised release in March 2023, prosecutors said.

Smith was released from the custody of the federal Bureau of Prisons on May 31, according to its online inmate locator.

Hinshaw and two co-defendants traveled to Washington, D.C. to block the clinic, prosecutors said in a May news release announcing that three defendants were sentenced.

Hinshaw — along with his co-conspirators — "forcefully entered the clinic and set about blockading two clinic doors using their bodies, furniture, chains, and ropes," the release said. The actions of the defendants were livestreamed, prosecutors said.

Attorneys for the defendants could not immediately be reached.

Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, a Manhattan-based abortion rights advocacy group, expressed disdain at the move, saying it would endanger providers and patients.

"President Donald Trump’s pardons are a get-out-of-jail free card inviting anti-abortion extremists to step up their attacks on reproductive health clinics with impunity," said Northup in a statement. "Congress enacted the FACE Act over 30 years ago with strong bipartisan support because patients, clinic staff and doctors needed protection from a reign of terror that included murders, arson, vandalism and clinic blockades. Since the news of the pardons, we have heard from abortion providers across the country that they are terrified for the safety of their staff and patients."

The pardons came as the pro-life March for Life was held in Washington on Friday. Trump said he would be watching and Vice President JD Vance would attend in-person.

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