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| Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron (R) |
When a user looked up a crisis pregnancy center on Yelp's website, the site presented a notice stating that crisis pregnancy centers "typically provide limited medical services and may not have licensed medical professionals onsite." Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron led a group of 24 state attorneys general in condemning this discriminatory practice against pro-life clinics.
“Discriminating against the services of crisis pregnancy centers hinders women and families from accessing the life-affirming care and support that they need,” said Attorney General Cameron. “Yelp’s decision to issue warnings on the profiles of crisis pregnancy centers but not on Planned Parenthood facility profiles places politics above the health and wellness of women and children, and we will do everything in our power to stop this discrimination.”
“The fact that Yelp has apparently applied the Consumer Notice only to crisis pregnancy centers means that Yelp has singled out crisis pregnancy centers for disparate treatment,” read a letter sent to Yelp by the coalition of attorneys general. “This sort of discrimination is unacceptable.”
On February 9, two days after the letter was sent to Yelp, the company changed the consumer notices on its website. The notices now read, “This is a Crisis Pregnancy Center. Crisis Pregnancy Centers do not offer abortions or referrals to abortion providers.”
Yelp announced the change in a letter of its own. The letter denies claims that Yelp's policy was discriminatory, but describes its change as a "good faith effort to address [the attorneys generals'] concerns."
