Pro-choice group claims arson attack on Wisconsin anti-abortion workplace | Wisconsin

Federal agents and detectives from the Madison police division are investigating a claim by a pro-choice group that it was behind a weekend arson attack on an anti-abortion workplace in Wisconsin.

The headquarters of Wisconsin Household Action in Madison was attacked in the early hours of Sunday, with a molotov cocktail thrown by way of a window, starting a small fire, and graffiti spray-painted on an exterior wall. Nobody was harm.

In a press release reported on Tuesday by the Lincoln Journal Star, which stated it was unable to confirm the group’s authenticity, Jane’s Revenge stated it launched the assault because of the group’s anti-abortion stance, and demanded that related institutions across the US disband or face “increasingly excessive techniques”.

“Wisconsin is the first flashpoint, but we are everywhere in the US, and we will subject no additional warnings,” the assertion said, citing the violence of anti-choice groups who “bomb [abortion] clinics and assassinate medical doctors with impunity” as justification.

The Madison attack got here days after the leaking of a supreme court draft ruling that might overturn its 1973 Roe v Wade determination and finish virtually half a century of constitutional abortion protections.

On Tuesday, a spokesperson for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) advised the Guardian that its brokers have been aware of the group’s claims of duty, however cited the ongoing investigation for being unable to offer more details.

The Madison police department said it was “conscious of a gaggle claiming duty for the arson at Wisconsin Household Action and are working with our federal partners to find out the veracity of that claim”.

It urged anybody with relevant info to make contact, saying: “We take all info and suggestions associated to this case seriously and are working to vet every one.”

At a press conference on Monday afternoon, the Madison PD and ATF brokers introduced a joint investigation into what it referred to as an “abortion extremism case involving an arson and graffiti attack of a pro-life advocacy workplace in Madison”.

The Madison police chief, Shon Barnes, mentioned no suspects had up to now been identified. Authorities had been anticipated to present an extra replace on Tuesday afternoon.

In a values statement on its website, Wisconsin Household Action (WFA) describes itself as a Judeo-Christian group dedicated to “strengthening, preserving, and selling marriage, household, life and liberty.

“We support the sanctity of human life from the second of conception by way of natural dying. This contains opposing laws that promotes the destruction of human life – which begins at conception – by means of abortion and other means,” it says.

Jack Hoogendyk, the WFA board chairman, attacked the response to the attack in a tweet posted on Tuesday morning, singling out Wisconsin’s Democratic governor, Tony Evers, and Madison PD detectives.

“We have to see a much stronger message of condemnation of this exercise from our Governor [and] from local regulation enforcement,” he wrote.

At a press convention on Monday, Evers referred to as the assault “a horrible incident”.

Calling for a full investigation and arrests, he added: “As the state of Wisconsin, we don’t accept that type of violence here.”

An assault on an anti-abortion office is a relative rarity compared with assaults on abortion clinics and suppliers. In 2019, the Guardian reported on an “alarming escalation” in picketing, vandalism and trespassing by anti-abortion activists at medical services.

Arson, bombings, murders and acid assaults were among greater than 300 acts of maximum violence recorded by the Rand Company between 1973 and 2003, and in one of the heinous incidents, in 2009, Dr George Tiller, a Kansas abortion provider, was shot lifeless in a church in Wichita.

In March, MS journal reported that the number of brick-and-mortar abortion clinics nationwide had dropped precipitously, partly because of the constant risk of violence in opposition to personnel. Six states, MS stated, had just one abortion supplier, largely small, independent operators who have been thought of most at risk.

“Abortion clinics have been closing at an alarming price,” the article stated. “Independent suppliers are probably the most susceptible to anti-abortion attacks and violence directed at their staff.”