DC dealt more harshly with pro-life protesters than Black Lives Matter, federal court rules

Washington, D.C., unfairly enforced its "defacement" ordinances by dealing more harshly with pro-life protesters than with Black Lives Matter activists, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

"In the summer of 2020, thousands of protesters flooded the streets of the District to proclaim 'Black Lives Matter,'" the court wrote in its decision, obtained by Fox News. "Over several weeks, the protesters covered streets, sidewalks, and storefronts with paint and chalk. The markings were ubiquitous and in open violation of the District’s defacement ordinance, yet none of the protesters was arrested."

However, during the same summer in August, D.C. police arrested two pro-life protesters "for chalking 'Black Pre-Born Lives Matter' on a public sidewalk," the court also wrote. 

The lawsuit was filed by the Frederick Douglass Foundation and Students for Life of America.

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