Pro-life activist Terrisa Bukovinac urges DOJ to investigate potential 'crime' behind abortions of 'The Five'
Progressive pro-life activist Terrisa Bukovinac spoke to Fox News Digital on Wednesday about the DOJ allegedly covering up an investigation into whether five babies in were aborted illegally in D.C. in 2022.
Pro-life lawmakers Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., and others, along with pro-life activists spoke to reporters outside the U.S. Capitol Building on Wednesday, demanding that the Department of Justice investigate whether five fully formed babies – whose remains were found in a D.C. abortion clinic’s waste in 2022 – were victims of illegal abortions.
Progressive pro-life activist and current Democratic presidential candidate Terrisa Bukovinac told Fox News Digital she believes that the DOJ is perpetrating a "cover-up" of crimes by seeking the destruction of these babies’ remains without them getting autopsied.
Dubbed the "D.C. Five," these five aborted babies were uncovered in 2022 at the Foggy Bottom Washington Surgi-Clinic, according to Bukovinac, who claimed to have discovered them along with the remains of another 115 aborted children.
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Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, and pro-life activist Terrisa Bukovinac demanded the Department of Justice investigate the remains of five aborted fetuses recovered in D.C. in 2022 to see if they were victims of illegal abortions. (Both: Anna Moneymaker/Staff)
The remains of the Five appeared to show nearly fully formed infants at the times of their deaths, prompting pro-life activists and lawmakers to wonder whether they were victims of infanticide or partial-birth abortions, which are illegal under federal law.
D.C. authorities retrieved the remains of the Five in March 2022 from a Capitol Hill home that a pro-life activist had been staying in. At the time, authorities determined the fetuses were aborted in accordance with D.C. law, according to Fox 5 DC.
According to GOP lawmakers and pro-life groups, including Bukovinac’s Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU), the Department of Justice recently instructed the D.C. Medical Examiner to destroy the remains of the children. There has been no attempt at an autopsy on the children, the groups maintain, and if they are destroyed, so will any evidence that illegal abortions were committed.
During Wednesday’s press conference, Roy called the DOJ’s push to have the five’s remains destroyed an "absolute atrocity" and declared that he and his pro-life colleagues in Congress are working to make the department "understand what is going on here in the District of Columbia with the discarding of human remains – of lives, precious lives – which seem to have indicated the possibility of crime being committed."
He continued, "We have laws on the books to make sure that we do not continue to carry out the barbaric practices of partial-birth abortions or late-term abortions and we need to make sure that laws are followed."
"We are going to continue to call this out. We need to protect these individual lives – these five precious lives deserve to be respected. And we are here united to say this should be done," he also claimed.
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Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, claimed at a Wednesday press conference that the DOJ's push to discard the remains of babies that may have been aborted illegally without investigating what killed them is an "absolute atrocity." (Getty Images)
A letter signed by 35 pro-life organizations was sent to Congress last week, urging lawmakers to "immediately intervene to demand these bodies are not discarded before the proper autopsies and investigations have occurred."
"Additionally, we urge Members of Congress to offer their voice to speak out about the five innocent unborn children whose lives were brutally taken just three miles from the House chamber," the letter added.
Biggs addressed the press, stating, "The D.C. abortion case is horrifying. Period. Full stop. When we consider that anyone would use the barbaric practice of partial-birth abortion, we must discover what happened and hold those individuals accountable."
He continued, saying, "both the D.C. Metropolitan police department and Biden’s Department of Justice chose to ignore any potential evidence of a crime for two years. MPD and DOJ’s investigation was insufficient, and it was inadequate. The DOJ’s effort to dispose of these bodies without conducting an investigation is simply malpractice, and it is wrong."
Both Biggs and Roy sent a letter to D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and D.C. police last week, urging them not to destroy the fetal remains. The letter stated, "On February 5, 2024, The Daily Signal reported that DOJ had advised the Washington, D.C., Medical Examiner to dispose of the remains of five preborn children whose bodies were allegedly recovered from the Washington Surgi-Clinic. We strongly urge you to reconsider this decision and request that you preserve this evidence."
Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., shared PAAU’s account of finding the remains of the Five at the presser, saying, "Five of these babies appeared to have sustained injuries suggesting they were killed using the illegal partial birth abortion method, which I won’t describe at this press conference. Or perhaps they were born alive and just abandoned to die. One of the two."
WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 19: People attend the annual March for Life rally on the National Mall on January 19, 2024 in Washington, DC. Amidst snow and freezing temperatures, anti-abortion activists attended the annual march that marked the anniversary of the Supreme Court’s, now overturned, 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling which legalized abortion in all 50 states. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images) (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Good slammed the U.S. government, adding that "The very law enforcement tasked with protecting the most vulnerable in our society" has "become complicit in covering-up the cold-blooded murder of these precious lives."
Bukovinac spoke to Fox News Digital after the press conference about this alleged DOJ cover-up.
"Well, there’s certainly a cover-up trying to happen here. I mean these are very serious federal crimes that will have huge implications for the entire abortion industry," she said.
She added, "We have evidence from the Center for Medical Progress in some of their FOIA requests that show that the National Abortion Federation sent out an email to their list right after the discovery was made, saying that they were working with the DOJ to ensure that Lauren and I were somehow blamed or held accountable, even though we’ve committed no crimes."
Bukovinac was referring to Lauren Handy, the pro-life activist who discovered the remains along with her. Handy was arrested in March 2022 on federal charges for allegedly trying to block patients from entering an abortion clinic in 2020. Her arrest happened the same day D.C. authorities retrieved the remains of the five.
"So I think it’s clear that the Biden administration, that Merrick Garland, they’re all colluding with the National Abortion Federation, and probably others in the abortion industry, to cover up these crimes," she concluded.
Fox News Digital's Marisa Schultz contributed to this report.
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