On their website, the first words offered by Aid for Women are “Pregnant? We can help.” They go on to offer “pregnancy verification and ultrasound…at NO CHARGE”; the same goes for all of their other services, according to a bolded sentence farther down. In a section entitled “I’m pregnant. What now?,” the site declares that “This is your decision. Your health matters.” Several sentences later, in large, bolder letters: “It’s your decision. You have options.”

Without looking closely, you could miss the second sentence before those words: “We do not provide abortion services or referrals.”

Aid for Women is, in fact, the manager of six different crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs) in Illinois—facilities which resemble abortion clinics, but which are meant to convince pregnant people not to have an abortion. Aid for Women, in particular, was founded in reaction to the Supreme Court ruling in Roe v. Wade: according to a different website operated by Aid for Women, the High Court’s decision motivated Deacon Thomas Pressler of Deerfield, Illinois, to lead the creation of a crisis pregnancy center in the suburbs of Deerfield in 1978. The group lists a total of six locations in Illinois, including in the Loop and Edgewater neighborhoods of Chicago. (Aid for Women did not respond to requests for comment for this story.)

CPC’s are known to offer misleading details regarding abortion to those who come through their doors. For instance, many of them offer ultrasounds of their patients’ fetuses, which may be administered by people who lack the medical qualifications to correctly interpret such a test. Those same staff may also wear white lab coats, reminiscent of those worn by actual doctors, in order to create the impression of being a trustable medical source. In this unqualified capacity, CPC workers may claim that having an abortion can cause breast cancer or mental illness (neither of which is true.) 

Then there are the claims of “abortion pill reversal.” Aid for Women declares on their website that, by having patients ingest progesterone, they “have been able to save 64-68% of pregnancies.” This is despite the advisory of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, in a statement on the issue of CPC’s, that “this course of treatment is unproven, experimental, and potentially dangerous.” Meanwhile, since they are not official medical facilities, these centers are not bound by any limitations on how they share the information given to them by visitors. 

Aid for Women is not alone among CPC organizations in being founded on religious principles. The National Institute of Family and Life Advocates, a group which supports and legally represents CPC’s nationwide, refers to itself online as a “faith based non-denominational ministry,” while Heartbeat International, a CPC network, states on its website that its activities are “consistent with Biblical principles and with orthodox Christian (Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox) ethical principles and teaching on the dignity of the human person and sanctity of human life.”

In many cases, those who enter crisis pregnancy centers are seeking genuine abortion care. Facilities are sometimes located only a short distance from legitimate reproductive health centers, and will use particular abortion-related keywords and digital advertisements in order to appeal to those seeking such treatment. 

There are, on average, three times as many crisis pregnancy centers as abortion clinics across the United States. Though abortion is legal in Illinois, according to founder and president of Reproductive Transparency Now (RTN) Lisa Battisfore, CPCs in this state are not going anywhere. 

“There’s no such thing as a ‘safe state’ when it comes to abortion access,” Battisfore said. “Because abortion is legally protected in Illinois, these huge anti-abortion groups are pouring money into crisis pregnancy centers to intercept pregnant people–especially those who belong to marginalized groups–and prevent them from accessing abortion care. So how can we really say that abortion access is ‘safe’ in Illinois when, in our state alone, there are a hundred of these places, many of which are strategically located very close to abortion clinics working to misdirect people and keep them from getting to their appointments?”

In 2023, abortion rights activists worked with Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul to minimize the harm of CPCs for good. Illinois Senate Bill 1909 would require the state to issue a consumer warning against CPCs, since they are not bound by HIPPA. The bill was signed into law but then blocked shortly afterward by Iain D. Johnston, after several CPC organizations claimed the law was a violation of freedom of speech and religion. Johnston subsequently issued a permanent injunction against the state, negating the law. 

Regarding CPC’s, “They’re relying on people being desperate and emotional and grasping at straws,” English paraprofessional and Fem Club sponsor Cynthia Fey said. “If you’re drowning, you’re gonna grab anybody’s hand.” Of pregnant women who visit CPCs, Ms. Fey said, “The hand that is reaching out to her might be the one that kills her.”

A note to readers: this article was originally published as a news story, and included a quote from Lisa Battisfore which had mistakenly not been corrected, in line with feedback offered by Ms. Battisfore, before publication. Given the tone of the article, we have marked this as an opinion story, and have corrected Ms. Battisfore’s quote. We apologize for the error.