Democrat Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal Pushes Bill to Legalize Abortions Up to Birth - LifeNews.com

Democrat Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal Pushes Bill to Legalize Abortions Up to Birth - LifeNews.com: Democrat U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal urged the U.S. Senate to end the filibuster Monday so that Congress can legalize the killing of unborn babies in abortions up to birth nationwide. Fearing that the U.S. Supreme Court soon may overturn Roe v. Wade, Jayapal said Congress needs to act quickly to “protect abortion rights,” The Daily Wire reports. […]

Faith On Trial returning at new time for the New Year

Denise Harle, ADF

After a brief hiatus due to Deacon Mike’s stroke, FOT will return at a new time on Thursday January 6, 2022 at 9:30 CT with a discussion of the abortion litigation that is now pending before the Supreme Court with Denise Harle, senior counsel and director of the center for Life with the Alliance Defending Freedom. In this role, she leads her team’s litigation and advocacy efforts to
defend pro-life legislation around the nation.

FOT airs on Iowa Catholic Radio every Thursday morning at the new time of 9:30 CT on 1150 AM, and 94.5, Des Moines; and 90.9 FM in Creston and 88.5 FM Adel. The program also streams on IowaCatholicRadio.com where you can also listen to broadcasts you may have missed.

Join Gina and Deacon Mike every week for a discussion of issues that affect people of faith.

 

Inside the new Texas abortion law

This past week Gina, hosting Faith On Trial, interviewed Texas State Senator Brian Hughes, author and chief sponsor of the new Texas abortion law that is on its way to the U. S. Supreme Court. Some analysists think this may be the legal vehicle to end Roe v. Wade. Listen to the interview, along with guest co-host Mary Beth Beacom, which can be heard below:

https://www.iowacatholicradio.com/faith/episode/23917b1c/sb8-texas-heartbeat-bill-legal-challenges-111121

Faith On Trial is heard every Thursday on Iowa Catholic Radio.

This week (Oct.28) on Faith On Trial

Michael Austin

This week we’re going to look at the problem of child pornography placed in elementary school libraries as essential reading for children. Joining us this week is Michael Austin, a reporter for The Western Journal, discussing his recent article about the book, GenderQueer: a Memoir. Join Deacon Mike and Gina as they discuss the questions these books raise this Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Faith On Trial on Iowa Catholic Radio.

Faith On Trial is broadcast every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Iowa Catholic Radio 1150 AM & 94.5 FM; 90.9 FM Creston; 88.5 Adel, and streaming on IowaCathlicRadio.com.

A Dishonest Judge And The Fight For Life

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – In  2013 the investigative journalist David Daleiden, and his firm, Center for Medical Progress, went undercover to expose the illegal activities of the abortion industry. During the following 30 months, he documented the sale and purchase of aborted baby parts. He was able to document that oftentimes these baby parts were purchased with tax dollars for research purposes.

He also found that some organs would fetch a higher price if the abortion was performed in a manner that might cause a higher risk to the mother seeking the abortion. His report also indicated that some of the fetal parts sold were from babies that were actually born alive.

In 2015 he began to release the undercover videos he had recorded. They confirmed evidence of illegal partial-birth abortions, of infants born alive and vivisected for their organs, as well as a spate of other financial and ethical violations relating to the illegal trafficking of aborted baby parts.

Congress, in response, conducted an investigation that led many states to defund Planned Parenthood. But it also brought multiple suits against Daleiden, including a criminal claim brought by then California Attorney General Kamala Harris.

During the pendency of one of the suits, Daleiden’s defense team became aware of several connections that the federal judge hearing the case, William Orrick, had with the abortion industry. They immediately requested that the judge recuse himself from the case, which the judge refused to do. When Daleiden persisted, another judge was named to resolve the issue who then found that Orrick was fine because the financial involvements were all in his wife’s name.

That case resulted in a $16 million verdict in favor of Planned Parenthood against Daleiden and the Center for Medical Progress. But even before the case ended, Judge Orrick issued a gag order preventing Daleiden and the Center for Medical Progress from releasing any of the videos to the public and suppressed them at trial. Some of those videos showed how abortion clinic employees callously and flippantly negotiated the price of baby hearts, lungs, livers, and brains.

Daleiden’s legal team appealed the decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and in its petition noted Judge Orrick’s conflicts of interest. Recently, The Wall Street Journal included Orrick in a list of judges who broke judicial ethics, and perhaps the law, by hearing cases in which they might have a financial interest and who ruled in favor of their interests.

In the report it found that Orrick had founded a Planned Parenthood clinic that fed pregnant patients into “fetus-harvesting” programs. And before becoming a federal judge, he worked as the board secretary and legal counsel for an entity called the Good Samaritan Family Resource Center, which partnered with Planned Parenthood. While Orrick was working there, it set up a PP facility on site.

So how will this new information affect the case on appeal?

“This may turn out to be determinative,” Tom Brejcha, president and chief counsel of the Thomas More Society, which represents Daleiden, told my Iowa Catholic Radio audience.

“This is something [the judge] should have told us, but didn’t,” Brejcha said, noting that the defense team didn’t find out about the judge’s prejudices until the trial was underway. He noted that they had tried to appeal the recusal matter after the second judge ruled against them, but interlocutory appeals during trial are normally disfavored. Now that the case is over, at least on the trial level, we have a better appellate case.

“We believe we have a good case on appeal on this issue and many others,” he said. “His [Orrick’s] view of the law was so jaundiced — negative to our side; much of our evidence and expert witnesses were barred.”

He added, “It was a one-sided adjudication before Judge Orrick. The Planned Parenthood connection was evident in his slanted instructions he gave to the jury.”

Noting that Daleiden was not trying to make a profit on his reporting, but to shine a light on the abortion industry’s actions, Brejcha said, “You never had a sense in his courtroom that David was only trying to affect public policy.”

Federal law requires judges to recuse themselves from cases in which they or a family member have a financial interest, or the “ownership of a legal or equitable interest, however small.” This Orrick not only did not do, but resisted attempts to have him removed from the case.

The Judicial Administrative Office had responded that the original reports were “troubling” and that the office is carefully reviewing the matter. “That may be something the Ninth Circuit will look at; his ties to Planned Parenthood should have disqualified him from hearing the case,” Brejcha said.

The appellate case is being briefed now, he said, and repeated that he believes they have a good case for reversal; if not, they are prepared to go to the Supreme Court.

Voris And Free Speech Rights

There’s another case that is being appealed to the Second Circuit that you might want to follow. It involves a traditional Catholic ministry that wants to hold a prayer rally in Baltimore near where the bishops are meeting next month.

The case is St. Michael’s Media, Inc. v. The Mayor and City Council of Baltimore and it involves a well-known Catholic media personality, Michael Voris, whose daily “Vortex” episodes are distributed under the program name “Church Militant.”

Voris, as you might know, has been very critical of many of the bishops, especially over the sexual abuse scandal and his claim that the bishops are collectively not taking a strong enough stand against pro-abortion Catholic politicians who still present themselves — unworthily, he suggests — for Communion.

As a result he rented an outdoor city pavilion near the hotel where the bishops will be meeting in November, as he has done several times in the past. The idea is not only to pray for the bishops’ correction, but to be in a place where they can see the gathered crowd. The title for this year’s activity is called: “Bishops: Enough is Enough Prayer Rally.”

To make a long story short, Voris and the entity that controls the pavilion entered into a rental arrangement last summer to coincide with the bishops’ meeting. The city later canceled the agreement, citing reports that Voris and crowd were violent and had connections with the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.

Voris then brought suit in federal court claiming that the cancellation violated St. Michael’s Media’s First Amendment rights. A hearing was held before U.S. District Court Judge Ellen Hollander, a Clinton appointee, who, in an 86-page Memorandum Opinion, sided with Voris, finding no evidence to support the claims that the prayer rally would become violent or a public safety concern (“The City cannot conjure up hypothetical hecklers and then grant them veto power.”), and carefully took apart the constitutional argument that the city had proposed that its action would not violate anyone’s free speech rights (“The First Amendment to the Constitution is at the heart of this case.”).

“Viewpoint discrimination,” the judge found. But when Voris went to check on arrangements, the city — ignoring the court order — shooed him away. As it turned out, the next morning the city was filing an appeal with the court of appeals which may be calculated to drag the legal proceedings out long enough for the bishops to conclude their meeting while things are pending.

This will be a classic First Amendment case. The court of appeals reaction will be interesting, especially if it acts immediately so as to allow the prayer rally should it decide to affirm Judge Hollander’s decision.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.)

Court rules against Baltimore city -- Again

By Christine Niles  

BALTIMORE (ChurchMilitant.com) - In yet another blow to the city of Baltimore, a federal judge has once again ruled in Church Militant's favor.

Judge Ellen Hollander of the U.S. District Court of Maryland issued an order Wednesday morning rejecting the city's request to continue blocking St. Michael's plans for the "Bishops: Enough Is Enough" prayer rally and protest.

"It comes to me as no surprise that the Court denied this," said St. Michael's Attorney Marc Randazza in response to the court decision. "It does come to me as a surprise that the City's attorneys are representing SMG, too — yet they sought an injunction against their own client."

SMG manages the MECU Pavilion on Baltimore's Inner Harbor, where St. Michael's had originally scheduled the Nov. 16 rally. The city claims SMG is an independent, private third party, even as city attorneys serve as their legal representatives in this litigation and appear to be acting against SMG's interests.

"Further, it seems that Judge Hollander is seeing how unreasonable the City is behaving," Randazza continued. "When St. Michael's offered terms that would fully protect and insulate SMG, why is the City still interfering?"

City attorneys Renita Collins and Hannah Marie Sheehan had previously argued that if the judge did not grant their request to block SMG and St. Michael's from continuing with their contract, the city would suffer "irreparable harm," while St. Michael's would encounter only minor inconveniences by being forced to wait several weeks to continue plans for the rally.

The court disagreed.

Defendants could run out the clock by obtaining a stay.GabTweet

"[D]efendants could run out the clock by obtaining a stay, with no decision by the Fourth Circuit in time for the rally," Hollander wrote, adding:

And, November 16, 2021, is less than one month away. A stay pending a ruling by the Fourth Circuit — on some unknown date — could easily mean that the rally could not go forward, even if plaintiff were to prevail. A decision favorable to plaintiff could come too late to undo the stay.

She continued, "As described to the Court, the rally is a complicated undertaking, with many moving pieces, participants and costs."

"I cannot agree with defendants that the injury to St. Michael's from a stay would be as minor as they suggest," the judge noted. "To the contrary, it appears to me that the continuing burden to St. Michael's from not yet having a signed contract with SMG is substantial and increasing with each passing day."

Underscoring the point, she added, "There is a pronounced risk that, if the signing of a contract is pushed to the last minute, the ability of St. Michael's to host its rally will be seriously harmed."

Wednesday's decision is the second time the court has ruled in St. Michael's favor. Judge Hollander granted this apostolate's motion for preliminary injunction on Oct. 12, issuing an 86-page memorandum finding the city had violated St. Michael's First Amendment right to free speech.

A separate lawsuit filed by St. Michael's against the city remains ongoing in the district court.

Conflict of Interest

Unresolved issues remain, including not only the precise status of the Nov. 16 rally, but also the glaring conflict of interest mentioned above involving the city's representation of SMG while apparently working against SMG's interests, trying to prevent SMG from continuing talks with St. Michael's.

"The Plaintiff has argued, ad nauseum, that this is a conflict," Randazza noted in his Oct. 18 motion opposing the city. 

Judge Hollander acknowledged in Wednesday's order she has not formally decided the matter: "To be clear, the Court has made no such ruling on this issue."

Baltimore City Solicitor James Shea

Other apparent conflicts also exist between City Solicitor James Shea's close ties to the U.S. bishops and Shea's decision to quash a rally critical of the bishops' corruption.

Not only are the U.S. bishops, the Maryland Catholic Conference and the archdiocese of Baltimore clients of Venable law firm, where Shea is chairman emeritus and a managing partner, thus technically making them his clients, Shea used his public office as city solicitor to okay $2.3 million to the archdiocese and the bishops, via Catholic Charities.

His law firm also argued on behalf of Maryland's bishops against a 2019 bill proposed by lawmakers to make it easier for sex abuse victims to sue the Church.

Shea donates to the archdiocese of Baltimore, and was a bronze sponsor of the 2017 Baltimore archdiocese gala. A partner at his law firm also sits on the archdiocesan school board.

 

Faith On Trial, Iowa Catholic Radio|10/21/2021

David Kallman

Topic: 6th Circuit upholds religious rights v. vaccination against Western Michigan University 

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has unanimously upheld a lower court’s injunction against Western Michigan University which allows sixteen athletes who refused the Covid-19 vaccine for religious reasons to continue to play intercollegiate sports. The Great Lakes Justice Center filed the suit on behalf of the students claiming that the university had unlawfully denied their request for a religious accommodation from the school’s vaccine mandate to participate in sports.  

Guest: David Kallman, Kaliman Legal Group & Senior Counsel Great Lakes Justice Center

https://www.iowacatholicradio.com/faith/episode/22f79f79/religious-rights-vs-vaccination-102121

Faith On Trial is broadcast every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Iowa Catholic Radio 1150 AM & 94.5 FM; 90.9 FM Creston; 88.5 Adel, and streaming on IowaCathlicRadio.com.

Shocking sex ed for young kids

Confronting Corporate Censorship, Advancing the Human Right to Life

 

This week – October 21 – on Faith On Trial

David Kallman

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has unanimously upheld a lower court’s injunction against Western Michigan University which allows sixteen athletes who refused the Covid-19 vaccine for religious reasons to continue to play intercollegiate sports. The Great Lakes Justice Center filed the suit on behalf of the students claiming that the university had unlawfully denied their request for a religious accommodation from the school’s vaccine mandate to participate in sports.  

This Thursday David A. Kallman, of the Kallman Legal Group and chief counsel for the Great Lakes Justice Center will be our guest. He’s a graduate from the Thomas M. Cooley Law School where he was an adjunct professor and has served as commissioner for the State Bar of Michigan. He has had a successful litigation practice in many areas, including: homeschooling, education law, family law, criminal law, administrative law as well as church/state and constitutional law.   

Faith On Trial is broadcast every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Iowa Catholic Radio 1150 AM & 94.5 FM; 90.9 FM Creston; 88.5 Adel, and streaming on IowaCathlicRadio.com.

Has Mr. Biden Finally Poked The Bear?

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – I don’t think you need to know much about wild life to know that one place you never want to be is between a mama bear and her cub.

Everyone knows that, except, apparently, Joe Biden.

During the past nine months we have suffered through an amazing display of arrogance, lies, incompetence, and stupidity on behalf of the president; but no matter how deep the crisis du jour, the border, Afghanistan, vaccination mandates, out of control crime, Mr. Biden, even with dwindling poll numbers, continues to say he is following the moderate policies on which he claims to have campaigned.

And, for the most part, his obedient shills in the media and the Progressive Left of his party have done their best to keep his flaws under wraps so as not to unnecessarily stir up the average low information voter. But this month he may have gone too far in trying to crack down on issues in which the president normally doesn’t have any interest: school masks and history curriculum.

And, for the mother bears among us, Mr. Biden has not only gotten between mama and her cub, but he has poked mama with a stick. This he will live to regret.

During the past two years as we have tried to deal with the COVID pandemic, two issues have come to the surface, both courtesy of the teachers’ unions. In an effort to keep schools closed as long as possible, the unions have worked with the new administration to erect barriers to reopening schools which have created hardships for parents who had depended on schools as a much needed care facility for their children allowing them to return to work.

The hardship of the closings and the collateral damage that was done to many children was regularly ignored by the politicians and pooh-poohed by the press. Yet even when the schools opened, too many, without any real medical logic, required students to wear masks in class, and some even required masks during recess. That set off another round of collateral damage that only the parents seemed to appreciate.

But school administrators and the unions soon came up with the idea of online classrooms, claiming that it was just as good as in-person instruction. That satisfied some, especially parents who were able to monitor the kiddies’ classes. And what they found was oft-times not teaching but indoctrination, especially in the area of race relations taught under the guise of Critical Race Theory or the 1619 Project.

Both, of course, had been complained of, but again this too was pooh-poohed and simply called teaching true history to include marginal groups. Of course that was false and the parents who actually saw the lessons delivered over the Internet were outraged. Throw in a student mask requirement and a fire was lit under mama bear.

She was finally awakened to the dangers presented to her cubs. Mama bear was none too happy. Mama bear then did something she normally would not do; she attended a school board meeting and with other moms who were pricked by school policies, once the bleeding started it did not stop. Everything from pornographic library books to sexual fluidity to cultural Marxism came pouring out and the fire that was already lit exploded.

Angry parents stormed their school board meetings with complaints and arrogant local officials turned a deaf ear to them shutting off their microphones, sometimes only for improperly wearing their masks, then finally adjourning meetings or shutting off public comment periods in a manner that seemed to challenge the mama bears.

Then the debate started: Who is primarily responsible for the education of your kids, you or school officials? And, how much input should parents be allowed?

School officials cried foul and using their political connections raised an alarm with the administration. Claiming that these uppity parents were a threat to the proper administration of the schools by “threats or actual acts of violence” against school leaders and teachers and that they have “incited chaos” during school board meetings, they have asked Mr. Biden for help. Send in the FBI, they said, arguing these parents may be domestic terrorists.

“As these acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials have increased, the classification of these heinous actions could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crime,” they said in a letter to the administration, urging it to use such laws as the Patriot Act and to employ the Postal Service to “filter threatening letters,” all to curb these unruly parents.

Now instead of simply replying that the local police are perfectly capable of handling any violent confrontation at a public meeting, Mr. Biden did what the local school officials wanted. He turned the matter over to the Justice Department where the obedient Merrick Garland, masquerading as a competent arbiter of justice, ordered the FBI to crack down on parents who protest against school officials over mask requirements and their indoctrination of the curricula.

Garland, President Obama’s unsuccessful Supreme Court nominee (glad he didn’t get that!), now Mr. Biden’s attorney general, said in an announcement that he will “address the rise in criminal conduct directed toward school personnel” by creating a task force of agents from the department’s “criminal, civil rights, and national security divisions.”

Interestingly, it turns out that Mr. Garland and his family actually have a financial “conflict of interest” when it comes to the issue of Critical Race Theory. His daughter is married to a man who co-founded and runs an education group that supplies Critical Race Theory materials to schools.

Got all of this, Mama Bear? You are going to be investigated for criminal behavior, civil rights violations, and as a national security threat if you dare raise your voice in protest. After all, you may be a domestic terrorist because your interest in your children’s education can be considered subversive in this the Era of Biden. You are warned, we will brook no resistance to our enlightened decisions, after all, it takes a village and Papa Joe and his minions are now the village.

Garland, in his announcement, claims that free-speech must yield when they represent “efforts to intimidate individuals based on their views.”

Sounds good, right? Except that Senators Sinema and Manchin might not agree. But I do wonder why nobody ever thought of that when Maxine Waters was telling her supporters how to intimidate Trump officials in public. Maybe somebody will ask her.

In the meantime we’ll see how docile mama bear becomes when she is threatened by the Biden Gestapo. My money is on mama; if our kids aren’t worth fighting for, all just might be lost.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMikeq.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.)

Rogue Catholic picked for Holy See post

By Catholic League President Bill Donohue

Several Catholic news outlets, including Catholic News Service, have reported that Joseph Donnelly, President Biden’s nominee to be the new U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See, is a “pro-life” Democrat. They are wrong. Worse, Donnelly is not only at odds with the Catholic Church on abortion, he is pro-gay marriage, against religious liberty, and against school choice.

When Donnelly served as a congressman from Indiana (2007-2013), he was pro-life, but when he became a U.S. Senator (2013-2019), he pivoted and joined the pro-abortion camp. Here’s the evidence.

While serving in the 111th Congress, 2009-2010, Donnelly agreed with the positions of National Right to Life 83% of the time. When he became a senator, his numbers dropped to 20% (2013-2014), 25% (2015-2016), and 28% (2017-2018).

NARAL, the pro-abortion giant, gave him a 0% score in 2016, but he jumped to 84% in 2017 and 80% in 2018.

Donnelly also voted for the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, in 2010, even though the bill required Catholic non-profits, such as the Little Sisters of the Poor, to pay for abortion-inducing drugs in their healthcare plans.

According to Bill McGurn of the Wall Street Journal, he was not initially in favor of the bill, but a phone call from the former president of Notre Dame University, Father Theodore Hesburgh—done at the behest of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi—convinced him to change his mind. It worked. Thereafter, Donnelly never voted to repeal Obamacare.

Donnelly’s support for Obamacare pitted him against the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). In 2012, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the USCCB, wrote that the Obama administration “has refused to exempt religious institutions that serve the common good—including Catholic schools, charities and hospitals—from its sweeping new health-care mandate that requires employers to purchase contraception, including abortion-producing drugs, and sterilization coverage for their employees.”

In 2017, when President Trump signed a bill that would deny states the right to use Title X funds to enable abortion providers, Donnelly voted against it.

In August 2015, Donnelly voted against funding Planned Parenthood, but literally four months later he voted to fund it. In 2018, he once again voted to have the taxpayers fund this abortion-clinic behemoth.

On gay marriage, Donnelly went through a similar “evolution.” He was initially opposed to it, which is why the Human Rights Campaign, a prominent gay organization, gave him a score of only 30% when he was  in the House. But when he got to the Senate, this homosexual entity was so delighted with him that they gave him a score of 85%.

In 2013, the USCCB issued a statement opposing the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). The bill, which was promoted as a way to protect homosexuals from being discriminated against in the workplace, was much more than that. “The bill does not distinguish,” the bishops said, “between sexual inclination and sexual conduct.”  The bishops also criticized the bill for inadequate religious-liberty protections. Donnelly voted for it.

A year later, after the U.S. Supreme Court issued its “Hobby Lobby” ruling—it protected the religious rights of private business owners—the Democrats sought to undo it. Bishop Timothy L. Doherty of the Lafayette Diocese was none too happy with Donnelly. “Two weeks after they pleaded with Congress to maintain our religious freedom, a majority of the Senate—including our own Sen. Joe Donnelly of Indiana—voted to move forward with legislation to take that freedom away.”

In 2015, Donnelly fought against an Indiana bill that would safeguard religious liberty. The bill, which was modeled after the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act, had already been adopted by thirty states. More important, allegations that it would lead to discrimination against homosexuals were unfounded. The evidence showed that these laws did not engender a single act of discrimination against any American.

In Donnelly’s last term in the Senate, he voted against a school choice measure that would have allowed families to use 529 account funds to help pay for private and secondary education, including homeschooling. Thus did he stand fast against the bishops in their support for school choice initiatives that would assist Catholic schools.

Joe Donnelly started out as a Catholic official who was mostly in line with the policy prescriptions of the Catholic Church. But he ended his career in government as a foe of the Church’s moral teachings. Now he wants to represent the U.S. at the Vatican.

There is a reason why Donnelly was co-chair of Catholics for Biden. Like our “devout Catholic” president, he turned rogue.

 

This week’s Faith On Trial program

Tom Brejcha

Iowa Catholic Radio|10/14/2021

Guest: Tom Brejcha, president and chief counsel, 

Thomas More Society

Topic: The case of David Daleiden, the independent journalist who exposed the Planned Parenthood aborted baby parts scandal and has faced numerous lawsuits since; and the expanded conflicts of interest by the federal district judge who handled one of the civil cases.

https://www.iowacatholicradio.com/faith/episode/34d42d18/the-case-of-david-daleiden-101421

Faith On Trial is broadcast every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Iowa Catholic Radio 1150 AM & 94.5 FM; 90.9 FM Creston; 88.5 Adel, and streaming on IowaCathlicRadio.com.

Happy Columbus Day and Italian Heritage Month!

 

Forced speech is "free" speech?

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – Okay, how can it be that forced speech is free speech, or even that suppressed speech is also free speech? Well, that’s the brainchild of Judge Mary Briscoe, a Clinton appointee to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is now being airmailed to the United States Supreme Court.

The case comes from Colorado and arises out of the state’s public accommodation law, the same one that the state Civil Rights Commission used to try to punish Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips for refusing to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex wedding. This one has similar issues except it involves wedding promotional videos.
Lorie Smith is a web designer and graphic artist who works out of her own studio, 303 Creative. Smith, the sole owner of 303 Creative, sincerely believes that same-sex marriage conflicts with God’s law and as such violates her deeply held Christian beliefs. As a result she will not offer her services to create wedding websites to celebrate those weddings.

In addition, she plans to publish a statement on her website explaining her religious objections and her policy against “creating websites promoting and celebrating ideas or messages that violate my beliefs.”

Colorado’s law, however, prohibits discrimination in two areas of concern for Ms. Smith:
First is what is referred to as the Accommodation Clause: “It is a discriminatory practice and unlawful for a person…to refuse, withhold from, or deny to an individual or a group, because of disability, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, national origin, or ancestry, the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services . . . or accommodations of a place of public accommodation.”

And a companion provision forbids any public notice “that indicates that the full and equal enjoyment of goods, services…or accommodations…will be refused, withheld or denied,” referred to as the Communication Clause.

Thus before she went public with her plans, she filed a pre-enforcement action against the state seeking to adjudicate her rights and to prevent the state from enforcing either clause of the public accommodation law against her.

She lost in the district court and on appeal the two Clinton appointed justices, Mary Briscoe and Michael Murphy, ruled against her while the Bush-appointed Timothy Tymkovich, serving as chief judge, penned a fiery dissent.

The court’s majority decision starts off well enough for Smith clearly rejecting the state’s arguments that she lacks standing or an injury; the court found that she has a reasonable basis for concluding that if she moves ahead with her plans she will be prosecuted.

It wrote that while Smith’s goal may be to only discriminate against same-sex marriage, it is actually discrimination against same-sex couples and would expose her to liability under the state law, noting that the law, while providing some exceptions, did not provide a religious exception.

Turning to the question of Smith’s free speech rights, the court did recognize her argument that the creation of wedding websites is pure speech and cited several cases where wedding videos and invitations have been held as speech. And it recognized that the First Amendment has protections against compelled speech and that those protections apply to unsophisticated expressions as well as those by professional publishers.

But then it turned to a key question. In order to show that such a restriction is legal and meets the constitutional test of strict scrutiny, the government must show a compelling interest for the statute to survive constitutionally. “Here, Colorado has a compelling interest in protecting both the dignity interest of members of marginalized groups and their material interests in accessing the commercial marketplace.”

“The Accommodation Clause is, however, narrowly tailored to Colorado’s interest in ensuring ‘equal access to publicly available goods and services.’ When regulating commercial entities, like Appellants, public accommodations laws help ensure a free and open economy. Thus, although the commercial nature of Appellants’ business does not diminish their speech interest, it does provide Colorado with a state interest absent when regulating noncommercial activity . . . recognizing the changing nature of the American economy and of the importance, both to the individual and to society, of removing the barriers to economic advancement and political and social integration that have historically plagued certain disadvantaged groups.”

The court then compared Smith’s services to a monopoly in upholding the Accommodation Clause restrictions in the Colorado law:

“Excepting Appellants from the Accommodation Clause would necessarily relegate LGBT consumers to an inferior market because Appellants’ unique services are, by definition, unavailable elsewhere…our analysis emphasizes the custom and unique nature of Appellants’ services….LGBT consumers may be able to obtain wedding-website design services from other businesses; yet, LGBT consumers will never be able to obtain wedding-related services of the same quality and nature as those that Appellants offer. Thus, there are no less intrusive means of providing equal access to those types of services.”

Then turning to the Communication Clause the court held that the First Amendment does not protect the statement Smith wants to place on her website explaining her belief in traditional marriage and the reasons why she would refuse work for same-sex weddings.

The court wrote, “Having concluded that the First Amendment does not protect Appellants’ proposed denial of services, we also conclude that the First Amendment does not protect the Proposed Statement. Yet, the Proposed Statement also expresses an intent to deny service based on sexual orientation — an activity that the Accommodation Clause forbids and that the First Amendment does not protect. Thus, the Proposed Statement itself is also not protected and Appellants’ challenge to the Communication Clause fails.”

The dissent pounced: “The majority takes the remarkable — and novel — stance that the government may force Ms. Smith to produce messages that violate her conscience. In doing so, the majority concludes not only that Colorado has a compelling interest in forcing Ms. Smith to speak a government-approved message against her religious beliefs, but also that its public-accommodation law is the least restrictive means of accomplishing this goal. No case has ever gone so far. . . .

“Indeed, this case represents another chapter in the growing disconnect between the Constitution’s endorsement of pluralism of belief on the one hand and anti-discrimination laws’ restrictions of religious-based speech in the marketplace.

“It seems we have moved from ‘live and let live’ to ‘you can’t say that.’ While everyone supports robust and vigorously enforced anti-discrimination laws, those laws need not and should not force a citizen to make a Hobson’s choice over matters of conscience. . . . But what Colorado cannot do is turn the tables on Ms. Smith and single out her speech and religious beliefs for discriminatory treatment under the aegis of anti-discrimination laws.

“The First Amendment prohibits states from ‘abridging the freedom of speech’ or the ‘free exercise’ of religion. And the freedom to speak necessarily guarantees the right to remain silent. So the majority ushers forth a brave new world when it acknowledges that [the state law] compels both speech and silence — yet finds this intrusion constitutionally permissible. [It] forces Ms. Smith to violate her faith on pain of sanction both by prohibiting religious-based business practices and by penalizing her if she does speak out on these matters in ways Colorado finds ‘unwelcome’ or ‘undesirable’.”

The appellate court made “a very disturbing decision that what Lorie does is custom art and is speech that should be given the highest protection under our Constitution and yet the Tenth Circuit held that Colorado can force her to create messages that violate her beliefs,” ADF senior counsel Kate Anderson told my radio audience.

“What they are trying to force her to do is to violate her religious beliefs by promoting a view of marriage that is not in accord with her beliefs then telling her she cannot promote her view of marriage on her own website,” she added.

Now, on to the Supreme Court.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.)

 

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Louisiana Hospital Fines Employees For Having Unvaccinated Spouses: After enforcing a job-threatening vaccine mandate on its employees, Oschner Health will now charge employees with unvaccinated spouses up to $2,400 a year.

And It Doesn’t Ever Let Up

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – There is an old saying, “If at first you do not succeed, try, try again.” That now seems to be the mantra for the crazy anti-religious zealots who populate blue state administrative agencies.

About a year ago a Federal District Court in New York granted a request for a preliminary injunction against the state commissioner for the Office of Children and Families (OCFS) in favor of a Christian adoption agency, New Hope Family Services.

New Hope’s lawsuit was provoked by a rule promulgated by OCFS which prohibited “discrimination and harassment against applicants for adoption services on the basis of race, creed, color, national origin, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, religion, or disability.” Ultimately, OCFS sought to terminate New Hope’s authority to serve as an adoption agency because its religious beliefs would not allow it to place children in the homes of same-sex, unmarried, or transgendered couples.

OCFS appealed the decision to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals which sided with New Hope, finding that “the adoption provider’s arguments demonstrate that the government’s regulation may not have been neutral and may instead have been ‘informed by hostility toward certain religious beliefs’.”

Good for them, you might say. But hold on, the unreligious bureaucrats who run the administrative agencies in New York have tried another bite at the apple. Now the state Division of Human Rights is threatening New Hope for the same thing, apparently believing that what might be unlawful for OCFS is perfectly fine if it comes from a different agency. On behalf of New Hope, the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) has filed a new legal challenge to the current threats, so New Hope is back rehashing the same legal ground as before, only with a different arm of the state than the last go-around.

Not unexpectedly, New Hope’s new lawsuit sound a lot like the pleadings that went to the Second Circuit before.

But there is something new this time. Last June, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a case eerily similar to New Hope’s, Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, ruled unanimously that the city could not discriminate against a faith-based foster care and adoption agency.

You have to wonder if the New York power system is so anti-religion, or just so overly stupid, to try to bully New Hope again. It just goes to demonstrate how the new “progressive” administrative agencies can use their powers in an attempt to just inflict damage on those with whom they disagree.

But the anti-religion sentiment is not limited to New York. The state of Vermont is doing the same thing.

Under state law, if a child lives in an area which is not served by a high school, the school district is to pay tuition to a school of the parents’ choice — even if that school is out of state. One such school district decided it would not pay the tuition for students wishing to attend a religious school.

Well, maybe. As it turned out the schools under consideration were to be rated according to how religious they were. The more so, the less likely they would be approved; thus a school religious in name only would be approved but one that taught religious principles would not. Confusing? Sure was, but the one thing easy to understand was that the state was evaluating these schools by measuring their religiousness.

So there was another lawsuit and it also found its way to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals which, citing numerous Supreme Court cases, ruled against the school district. There is now a preliminary injunction preventing the state to consider the religiousness of the schools.

So, the good guys win again? Well, not so fast. The key to the state is that the injunction against it is “preliminary” and if only the state waits until it expires they can try it all over again. Or so they think. The ADF also represents the plaintiffs here and it has already filed another suit to protect what we thought had already been protected.

There’s a time when you should know enough to throw in the towel and give up, but religious bigots don’t use common sense, as a result everything from the first case will need to be replayed simply to get the same result.

Where do these guys come from?

Of course they’re all over the place. Remember Jack Phillips of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Colorado. He was cited by the state for violating its public accommodations laws for refusing to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. He was dragged through the state courts, losing all the way. That is until the Supreme Court got ahold of the case and vindicated Phillips’ religious conscience rights by refusing to bake the cake.

He’s now going through the entire process again. This time the issue is not a wedding cake but a gender transition cake, a custom pink and blue cake to reflect the client’s transition from one sex to another. Now, knowing that Mr. Phillips will fight this to the bitter end again, and he’s got a very good chance of prevailing on the merits again, why would someone pick a fight with him again?

It’s simple, and ADF attorney Jake Warner summed it up best:

“In this case, an activist attorney demanded that Jack Phillips create custom cakes in order to test Jack and to ‘correct the errors’ of his thinking, and the attorney even threatened to sue Jack again if the case is dismissed for any reason. This case and others like it represent a disturbing trend: Activists are weaponizing the legal system to ruin those who simply disagree with them. Someone you disagree with might be the one targeted today, but when political winds shift, it could just as easily be you or anyone else tomorrow.”

A similar issue is at play in Alaska, which I pointed out before. In Anchorage, the Downtown Hope Center is a shelter for battered and abused women who need a safe place. In 2018 an inebriated and injured man appeared for shelter and the Hope Center referred him to a nearby hospital and even paid for his cab fare there. The man later filed a complaint with the city’s equal rights commission for not allowing him to sleep with homeless women, many of whom had been abused.

The city decided to pursue the matter and ADF again filed suit to protect the Hope Center. After a temporary order against the city, the city agreed to drop the suit and the parties agreed to make the temporary order permanent.

Later the city ordinance under question was amended in an attempt to find a new way to punish the Hope Center. Now they’re all back in court re-litigating the same issue: Should a man be able to take refuge in a battered woman’s shelter?

And remember the Little Sisters of the Poor? How many times were they dragged into court only to have the Supreme Court vindicate them against the bigots who tried to destroy them?

You can’t make this stuff up. Pray! It may be the only answer to such human hate and stupidity.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.)

Madness In The Schools

By Bill Donohue, Catholic League president: 

The new school year is off to a wild start. Perversion, anti-Americanism, and racism are being taught in some schools, and it's happening at all levels, from K-graduate school. Those pushing this sick agenda are imbued with hate: their animus is clearly directed at Western civilization, the very home to liberty and equality they have targeted for assault. 

In one Minnesota school district, a sex education class asks heterosexual students to engage in role playing, pretending they are homosexual; they are also asked to consider whether they should have sex with each other. Other students in the Richfield School District are asked to pretend that they belong to the opposite sex, and to consider whether they should have sex with a woman. In a gesture toward inclusivity, they are taught about anal sex. This begins in kindergarten. 

In a more sane time, the educators would be arrested for child abuse. 

Fairfax High School in Virginia was the site of a recent school board blowup. One of the parents, Stacy Langton, complained that the school library housed porn books that discussed man-boy sex; they also featured illustrations of oral sex, masturbation and "violent nudity." 

She also read aloud obscene words from the books about the male sex organ and fellatio, only to be interrupted by a female school board member who was worried—now she was worried!—that children in the room might hear what was being said. Langton was not deterred and kept on talking. 

In a more sane time, the school would be sued for corrupting the morals of minors. 

Alexander Hamilton High School in Los Angeles started the year with a deranged teacher who took down the American flag from the classroom. Inserted in its place were a Palestinian flag, the transgender flag, a Black Lives Matter flag and "the modern PRIDE flag." Hanging from the wall were posters saying, "F*** THE POLICE" and "F*** AMERIKKKA. THIS IS NATIVE LAND." 

In a more sane time, the teacher would have been terminated. 

The public school system in Evanston, Illinois started the academic year with a pending lawsuit against it. The officials who run it are teaching children about the horrors of being a white person. That's just for starters. They are teaching third, fourth, and fifth graders that "it is important to disrupt the Western nuclear family dynamics as the best/proper way to have a family." They explicitly denounce as "normal" the family that consists of "mom, dad, son, daughter, and pet." 

So what family form should we emulate? Dysfunctional ones? Of course, in the racist mindset of these anti-Western civilization maniacs, there is no such things as "dysfunctional" families—they are simply "alternative families." 

In a more sane society, the school system would be branded as racist and the administrators would be quarantined. 

It's not just in the elementary and secondary schools where insanity reigns. Columbia University has a new program where students are implored to "critically engage with whiteness." They specifically target white students who claim to be "liberal, progressive, and a champion of social justice." Looks like conservative students are written off as hopeless, and are therefore exempt from these thought control exercises. 

American University and Western Washington University have decided to follow the lead of schools like Stanford University by introducing segregated housing for black students. "Black Affinity Housing" is what these dorms are being called. George Wallace must be smiling from his grave. And a professor from Virginia Tech recently told students that she was working "on a daily basis to be antiracist and confront the innate racism" within herself, which, she said, was the "reality and history of white people." 

In a more sane society, the segregationists and the confessed white racist would be arrested for violating the 1964 Civil Rights Act. 

Pope Benedict XVI warned us many times about the attacks on our Judeo-Christian heritage. His only mistake was in underestimating the extent to which educational elites have literally gone off the deep end. 

In a more sane society, the elites would be straightjacketed and taken to the nearest asylum. If they were lucky, that is.

Faith On Trial, Thursday September 30, 2021

Deacon Mike and Gina Noll visit with Kate Anderson, senior counsel with the Alliance Defending

Freedom, on the case of 303 Creative LLC and Lorie Smith v. Elenis and how the case of Jack Phillips and Masterpiece Cakeshop might impact it.

https://www.iowacatholicradio.com/faith/episode/43f2cebb/303-creative-llc-and-lorie-smith-v-elenis-93021

Faith On Trial airs every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Iowa Catholic Radio which can be heard locally on 1150 AM & 94.5 FM Des Moines; 90.0 FM Creston, and 88.5 FM Adel, and streams live on IowaCatholicRadio.com. 

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Thursday (9-30) on Faith On Trial: How far can the government go to force or suppress speech?

Kate Anderson

This week’s guest: Kate Anderson senior counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom, where she is the director of the Center for Parental Rights. Since joining ADF in 2015, Anderson has focused on protecting the conscience rights of individuals being unjustly compelled to forfeit their beliefs under threat of government retaliation, heavy fines, or other punishment. We will discuss the case 303 Creative v. Elenis which has just been appealed to the Supreme Court to decide if the government can force a web designer to create messages that violate her core beliefs.

See post below: Friday September 24, 303 Creative v. Elenis 

Join Kate, Deacon Mike and Gina this Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Iowa Catholic Radio: Des Moines 1150 AM; 94.5 FM; FM 88.5 Adel or 90.9 Creston, or streaming on IowaCatholicRadio.com.

Mr. Biden’s Magic Elixir

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – If you are a Catholic student at the University of Massachusetts and expect a conscience exemption to the COVID vaccine mandate, think again. A university official has ruled that no Catholic student is eligible for the exemption.

It seems that the vice chancellor of student affairs, Shawn DeVeau, who has a long history in school administration, but no known background in theology, made the ruling after a study of the Church’s teachings. He explained his methodology thusly:

“When reviewing students’ appeals, I engage in a holistic process: I review the student’s request, research the faith tradition on which they are basing their request, and respond to the students based on my research. . . . My process for reviewing appeals is to engage in an interactive process to discuss the student’s specific circumstances and determine if the exemption is based on a sincerely held religious belief” (emphasis mine).

In denying the student appeals, he quoted two statements from the USCCB stating that the vaccines can be morally justified. Apparently he forgot to check the statement of Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, Kans., and chairman of the USCCB Committee on Pro-Life Activities, whom we quoted recently as stating that while it is prudent for people to get vaccinated, some “could reasonably choose” to reject the abortion-tainted vaccination to give “prophetic witness” against abortion; and he condemned those who would require vaccination as a predicate for holding or keeping their jobs.

“A society that fails to respect the rights of conscience lacks a key element of the common good,” the archbishop wrote. “The most charitable and just posture is to seek to accommodate the consciences of all persons.”

Of course Mr. DeVeau might have been too busy with his duties to have seen that. He also missed the legal point: conscience objections are not limited to a specific religious belief but a sincerely held belief irrespective of the religious status — or even non-status — of the individual.

But have no fear if you are a mandate proponent. The administration will be monitoring whether those claiming to be exempt from Mr. Biden’s mandate are “not abusing” the system.

Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said that the administration would be keeping tabs on those businesses and workers claiming exemptions. He told CNN’s State of the Union program that “we’ve got to be vigilant there and make sure that people are using them in the spirit that they’re intended and not abusing them or asking for exemptions when they don’t apply. That’s an area that we continue to monitor in the days and weeks ahead.”

But none of this allows for any discussion of the merits of the mandate that doesn’t seem to fit in with the “one-size-fits-all” policy of the administration’s White House medical regime which, to date, has not even recognized the concept of natural immunity to the virus, nor with the spade of unexpected problems with the vaccine. And that dynamic is playing out in places where it has worked to the disadvantage of far too many citizens.

For example, in Lowville, N.Y., the Lewis County Health System says that since some nurses are refusing to take the vaccine, the hospital will have to close its maternity ward. In New York all healthcare workers are required to get the vaccine. According to the hospital administrator, 165 of the 464 hospital employees have refused to get it and 30 have resigned over the mandate.

In Texas, the CEO of the Brownfield Regional Medical Center said that 20 to 25 percent of his staff will leave due to Mr. Biden’s mandate that stipulates that healthcare workers in facilities that receive Medicaid or Medicare funds will have to get the vaccine. Losing those workers, he said, would likely cause his hospital to shut down.

Researchers and others are reporting on many unexpected negative implications with the vaccine. One, among many, involves the negative impact on breastfeeding mothers and their children.

According to LifeSiteNews, the government’s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) reports that a six-week-old baby died from blood clots and “severe inflammation of [his] arteries” after the child’s breastfeeding mother received Pfizer’s vaccine.

“The mother had received her first dose on June 4, and her baby started experiencing a high fever shortly thereafter [and]…passed away on July 17.” According to the VAERS report, the mother wondered if “the spike protein could have gone through the breast milk and caused an inflammatory response in [her] child,” as the six-week-old was healthy prior to the injection.

But, worry not, your concerns over the vaccine can be ameliorated if you can do just one thing: Cross our southern border. True! Just look at this exchange between Fox News’ Peter Doocy and the White House’s chief propaganda minister, Jen Psaki:

Doocy: “Why is it that you’re trying to require anybody with a job or anybody who goes to school to get the COVID-19 vaccine, but you’re not requiring that of migrants that continue walking across the southern border into the country?”

Propaganda Minister Psaki: “Well, look, our objective is to get as many people vaccinated across the country as humanly possible. And so the [mandate is] an effort to empower businesses, to give businesses the tools to protect their workforces. That’s exactly what we did. But certainly we want everybody to get vaccinated.”

Doocy: “But it’s a requirement for people at a business with more than 100 people, but it’s not a requirement for migrants at the southern border.”

Propaganda Minister Psaki: “That’s correct.”

With that huge loophole in the system, why is it so important to risk side-effects and the loss of jobs and even risk the closing of hospitals and other businesses to try to vaccinate nearly everybody else? Yet the administration and its allies apparently will try to do everything to eliminate conscience and medical objections to the vaccine including attempts to ostracize the unvaxed.

Recently, former Obama Secretary for Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius was part of the pile-on, suggesting that if you are unvaccinated you should not be able to work, roam freely, or have access to children. She, like several other prominent pro-mandate observers, hinted that the unvaccinated are responsible for COVID deaths.

And some courts are even jumping into the fray. In Illinois, a judge during a routine child support hearing stripped a mother of all parenting time when she said she had not been vaccinated. The judge later withdrew the order but the father’s attorney is asking that it be reimposed.

In an Ohio court, getting the jab was a requirement for probation. In Georgia some judges are making the jab a condition of reduced sentencing, in Louisiana it will reduce community service time.

In an adjacent matter, the Federation of State Medical Boards said that physicians who spread COVID vaccine misinformation risk disciplinary action by state medical boards, including loss of their medical licenses. The American Board of Emergency Medicine made a similar announcement. Neither organization defined “misinformation,” but you can be sure it means disagreeing with Mr. Biden.

And disagreeing with Mr. Biden’s ideas about his fix-all elixir is apparently the touchstone for all that may follow. He says it’s not about freedom but public health and safety. Always the argument, it’s about safety. But, of course, if it was, they’d close the southern border, study the effects of natural immunity and those of possible therapeutics. Since they’re not doing that this must be about something else.

Go figure!

As Benjamin Franklin once said: “Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. CT on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.)