Designed to Deceive: A Study of the Crisis Pregnancy Industry in Nine States
A new report, created with our partners in the Alliance: State Advocates for Women’s Rights & Gender Equality, shows that, instead of providing the real healthcare and services our communities need, CPCs target pregnant people of color and pregnant people with lower incomes with deceptive marketing; provide no real medical services; and systematically mislead clients about services they do provide, potentially resulting in delayed care and risks to their clients’ health.
Our report uncovers a crisis for pregnant Minnesotans.
Crisis pregnancy centers, or “CPCs,” are anti-abortion organizations that target pregnant people with predatory, deceptive marketing. Their main function is to attract and intercept Black, brown, Indigenous, and low-income people before they access abortion care.
Their goal is ideological, not medical: They want to prevent pregnant people from obtaining abortion services using any means necessary, including by using delay tactics, disinformation, and deception. And in Minnesota, CPCs are funded to the tune of 3.5 million dollars per year or 7 million per biennium.
“Even in the middle of a massive maternal mortality crisis, anti-abortion legislators would rather fund fake clinics than provide their pregnant constituents with desperately needed resources,” said Megan Peterson, Executive Director at Gender Justice.
“They don’t do this because it’s better for pregnant people and their families, but because it serves their ideology. That is the extreme position in this conversation.”
The report shows that rather than offer legitimate healthcare and resources, CPCs target pregnant people of color and pregnant people with lower incomes with deceptive marketing; provide few or no real medical services; and systematically mislead clients about services they do provide, potentially resulting in delayed care and unnecessary risks to their clients’ health.
It also recommends legislative solutions to hold CPCs accountable and expand healthcare options for pregnant Minnesotans.