Values Voter Summiters Make The Case For Using Religion To Harm Others
During the Values Voter Summit (VVS) over the weekend, leaders and followers of the Religious Right made clear they plan to continue their attempts to weaponize religious freedom as a means to justify discrimination, particularly against LGBTQ people and women.
New Documents Affirm Kavanaugh's Hostility Toward Church-State Separation
Senators Must Question Kavanaugh On His Church-State Separation Record
Senate confirmation hearings for President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh start today—even though thousands of requested documents from Kavanaugh’s time working in the George W. Bush White House have not yet been released or reviewed by the Senate or the public.
Bush-Era Records Reveal Kavanaugh Was 'Walking Point' On Faith-Based Initiative
One of the issues that the Supreme Court will decide in next few years is whether religion can be used to undermine civil rights protections, especially those that protect LGBTQ people and women. What do we know about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s record on this issue? When he worked for President George W. Bush, he volunteered to be the point person on the “faith-based initiative”—a key component of which was allowing taxpayer-funded organizations that provide social services to use religion to justify employment discrimination.
Trump Administration Launches Task Force To Aid In Using Religion To Discriminate
Justice Department’s ‘Religious Liberty Summit’ Offends The True Meaning Of Religious Freedom, Says Americans United
AU And Allies Urge Congress To #PutKidsFirst And Reject Discriminatory Aderholt Amendment
Ignoring the best interest of children, a few House Republicans have proposed allowing federally funded adoption and foster care agencies to use religion to discriminate against prospective parents and children in need. Americans United joined hundreds of civil rights and child welfare organizations this week in urging members of Congress to reject this cruel proposal.
Ignoring The Best Interest Of Kids, House Republicans Pass Amendment To Allow Adoption Agencies To Discriminate
House Republicans amended a spending bill to include language that would allow adoption and foster care agencies that receive federal funding to discriminate against qualified prospective parents and children in need based on the agency’s religious beliefs. The result: Kids could be denied stable, loving homes with prospective parents who are LGBTQ, single, previously divorced or even the “wrong religion.”
South Carolina Seeks A Right To Use Religion To Discriminate
Uncovering Project Blitz: Fighting A Secret, Coordinated Legislative Strategy To Undermine Religious Freedom In The States
Every legislative session, AU tracks hundreds of state bills that, if passed, would undermine religious freedom in nearly every state. We often see trends arise across states. Lawmakers in different states introduce similar bills, and sometimes even the same exact bills with the same exact language. And we can usually figure out why that happens: conservative lobbying groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and state Focus on the Family affiliates often shop model bills around to state legislators, who then introduce these model bills in their states. The lobbying groups also share strategies with legislators to help pass their bills. The result: Similar harmful bills appear and pass in many different states in a nationwide onslaught.
AU To Federal Court: Trump Administration’s New Contraception Rules Harm Religious Freedom And Women’s Health And Equality
Americans United filed a friend-of-the-court brief yesterday in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in California v. Azar—a challenge to the Trump-Pence administration’s new rules that would allow employers and universities to use religion to deny their employees and students health insurance coverage for birth control.
The Do No Harm Act Protects Religious Freedom And Equal Protection Under Law
Senators Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) today introduced the Do No Harm Act in the U.S. Senate. The bill honors two core American values: religious freedom and equal protection of the law. And it couldn’t be more important right now.
Americans United Welcomes Introduction Of Do No Harm Act In U.S. Senate
Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin Has Signed Two Bills That Undermine Religious Freedom
On Friday evening, Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin signed two bills that undermine religious freedom: SB 1140, which allows state-funded adoption and foster care agencies to use religion to justify denying children homes and discriminating against prospective parents, and HB 2177, which authorizes every government building and public school to display the Ten Commandments.
Oklahoma Gov. Fallin Should Listen to Faith Leaders And Advocates Who Say: Put Kids First
Oklahoma’s state legislature recently passed a bill, SB 1140, that would allow state-funded child-placing agencies to use religion to justify denying children homes and discriminating against prospective parents. This bill allows foster care and adoption agencies to refuse to perform, assist or participate in any child placement in the name of religion. So that means religious child placement agencies could turn away prospective parents who want to provide kids with a loving, stable home because they’re a same-sex couple, interfaith, previously divorced, or the “wrong religion.”
In the Last Moments Of Their Legislative Sessions, Kansas And Oklahoma Put Religious Discrimination Ahead Of Kids
State legislatures in both Kansas and Oklahoma passed bills last Thursday (Senate Bill 284 in Kansas and Senate Bill 1140 in Oklahoma) that would allow state-funded child-placing agencies to use religion to justify denying children homes and discriminating against prospective parents.
Trump’s New ‘Religious Freedom’ Order Actually Undermines That Principle
In honor of the National Day of Prayer, President Donald Trump, with his Evangelical Advisory Board by his side, held a ceremony in the Rose Garden and signed an “Executive Order on the Establishment of a White House Faith and Opportunity Initiative.” Under the guise of religious freedom, this executive order further entrenches the administration’s policies to allow religion to discriminate.
Kansas' Child-Welfare System Is In Crisis, But Legislators Are Making It Even Harder For Kids To Find Homes
In Kansas, dozens of foster children are spending their nights not in warm beds in safe homes, but on couches and cots in child welfare offices run by state contractors. These children need loving foster and adoptive families to provide the care they need. Yet, in spite of this crisis, Kansas legislators are trying to make it harder for these children to find families who can give them warm, safe beds.
Oklahoma Adoption Agencies Should Focus On Children And Reject Discrimination
Tomorrow, an Oklahoma House committee will take up Senate Bill 1140, a bill that would allow taxpayer-funded adoption and foster care entities to deny kids good homes in the name of religion.