- Feb 5, 2002
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WASHINGTON (OSV News) — Paulette Harlow doesn’t know how President Donald Trump came to know her name.
He had mentioned her both during his presidential campaign last year and in his video message played at the March for Life rally in Washington Jan. 24.
On Jan. 23, the president pardoned Harlow and 22 other pro-life activists convicted of violating the federal Freedom of Access to Clinics Act, or FACE Act.
The Kingston, Massachusetts, resident — a mother of six, grandmother of eight and a Secular Franciscan — figured Trump likely got her name from a court document handed to him at the White House, since he called her Paula. That was the result of a long-standing error in Justice Department documents that recorded her first name as Paula, not Paulette.
None of that mattered, though, when she saw the news on TV at her home.
“I got a little choked up. It was very nice,” Harlow told OSV News.
She was on house arrest, finishing up a two-year sentence she received in federal court last year for her participation in an abortion clinic blockade in Washington in 2020.
“I could go to my dentist appointments, but that’s it,” she said.
Harlow was one of 10 convicted in the best-known of three clinic blockade cases, since it was led by Lauren Handy, who received the longest prison sentence of any of them — 57 months. Handy, a Catholic, was incarcerated in Florida when pardoned. The other cases stemmed from clinic blockades in Mount Juliet, Tennessee, and Sterling Heights, Michigan.
Now, Harlow is looking forward to spending time with her grandchildren, and best of all, attending Mass at Sts. Mary & Joseph Collaborative in nearby Plymouth.
Continued below.
www.oursundayvisitor.com
He had mentioned her both during his presidential campaign last year and in his video message played at the March for Life rally in Washington Jan. 24.
On Jan. 23, the president pardoned Harlow and 22 other pro-life activists convicted of violating the federal Freedom of Access to Clinics Act, or FACE Act.
The Kingston, Massachusetts, resident — a mother of six, grandmother of eight and a Secular Franciscan — figured Trump likely got her name from a court document handed to him at the White House, since he called her Paula. That was the result of a long-standing error in Justice Department documents that recorded her first name as Paula, not Paulette.
None of that mattered, though, when she saw the news on TV at her home.
“I got a little choked up. It was very nice,” Harlow told OSV News.
She was on house arrest, finishing up a two-year sentence she received in federal court last year for her participation in an abortion clinic blockade in Washington in 2020.
“I could go to my dentist appointments, but that’s it,” she said.
Harlow was one of 10 convicted in the best-known of three clinic blockade cases, since it was led by Lauren Handy, who received the longest prison sentence of any of them — 57 months. Handy, a Catholic, was incarcerated in Florida when pardoned. The other cases stemmed from clinic blockades in Mount Juliet, Tennessee, and Sterling Heights, Michigan.
Now, Harlow is looking forward to spending time with her grandchildren, and best of all, attending Mass at Sts. Mary & Joseph Collaborative in nearby Plymouth.
Continued below.
Legal ordeals behind them, pardoned pro-lifers look toward future
Pardoned pro-lifers share their legal struggles and reflect on the future of their activism following presidential pardons.
www.oursundayvisitor.com
