Embattled Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is in the news again, this time filing a friend-of-the-court brief in support of East Texas Baptist University's never-ending quest to avoid providing contraception to its employees.
From Raw Story:
"'Many employers around the country feel driven by their faith to care for their employees by providing them health insurance,' the brief reads. 'But some employers find it incompatible with their religious convictions to provide that health insurance when it means contracting with a company that then, by virtue of that very relationship, becomes obligated to pay for drugs regarded as abortifacients.'
A federal district court previously sided with the universities, blocking the requirement from going into effect. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services appealed the case to the New Orleans-based U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals — considered the most conservative appellate court in the country — which reversed that decision, saying the universities had 'not shown and are not likely to show that the requirement substantially burdens their religious exercise under established law.'
In its ruling, the panel of the appellate court sided with the federal government in its argument that the universities’ religious exemption from providing contraception coverage did not extend to third parties left to administer insurance plans if a religious organization is exempted."
Both Paxton and the university hope that this issue will be taken up by the Supreme Court in the next session.
One would think that Ken Paxton would have had his fill of the the court this year after a lawsuit resulting from his refusal to name a Texas resident as the surviving spouse on his late husband's death certificate, and his indictment on three felony securities fraud charges. We've certainly had our fill of him.