Abortion opponents settle lawsuit against D.C. museum over 'pro-life' hat ban

• The National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., agreed to settle a lawsuit by a group of students, parents, and chaperones from a Catholic school in South Carolina who were told by security guards to remove hats bearing an anti-abortion message during a visit there last year.
• The federally funded museum agreed to pay the more than a dozen plaintiffs a total of $50,000 to settle the suit, according to a filing in U.S. District Court in Washington.
• The settlement comes four months after the National Archives Museum in Washington agreed to pay $10,000 to a smaller group of plaintiffs to settle a similar suit.

The National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., agreed to settle a lawsuit by a group of students, parents, and chaperones from a Catholic school in South Carolina who were told by security guards to remove hats bearing an anti-abortion message during a visit there last year, a court filing Monday revealed.

The federally funded museum agreed to pay the more than a dozen plaintiffs a total of $50,000 to settle the suit, according to the filing in U.S. District Court in Washington. The payment includes attorneys' fees.

The settlement also calls for the museum's director to give the plaintiffs a tour of the facility, which is the largest of the Smithsonian Institution's museums, and for the director to apologize to them for the guards' actions on Jan. 20, 2023, the filing says.

And the Smithsonian agreed to notify security personnel at all of its museums and the National Zoo about its policy allowing hats and other articles of clothing bearing messages, "including religious and political speech."

The settlement comes four months after the National Archives Museum in Washington agreed to pay $10,000 to a