‘Tip of an iceberg’: Ex-attorney general expects more Supreme Court ethics revelations

Gideon Rubin
July 12, 2023

Associate Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas sits with his wife and conservative activist Virginia Thomas while he waits to speak at the Heritage Foundation on October 21, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), who previously served as a state attorney general, said Wednesday he expect more damaging revelations about the Supreme Court to emerge in the coming weeks after The Guardian earlier in the day reported that lawyers with business before the Supreme Court paid money to Justice Clarence Thomas’ top aide’s Venmo account.

Stephanie Kirchgaessner writes for The Guardian that “The payments to Rajan Vasisht, who served as Thomas’s aide from July 2019 to July 2021, seem to underscore the close ties between Thomas, who is embroiled in ethics scandals following a series of revelations about his relationship with a wealthy billionaire donor, and certain senior Washington lawyers who argue cases and have other business in front of the justice.”

The Guardian’s account of payments to Vasisht follows a New York Times report alleging members of the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans provided Thomas with vacations and V.I.P. tickets to sporting events.

The latest revelations come after months of reporting that’s raised questions about the extent to which wealthy donors access to the Supreme Court’s justices warrants new ethical guidelines.

Whitehouse, who on Wednesday delivered a speech on the Senate floor advocating Supreme Court ethics reform, said he believes the latest reports are the “tip of the iceberg” during an appearance on MSNBC’s “The ReidOut with Joy Reid.”

“The speech basically points out that we are in a very peculiar environment at the Supreme Court with multiple right-wing billionaires…who are in various ways, seeing to the care and feeding of so far two United States Supreme Court justices,” Whitehouse said.

“I think this is the tip of an iceberg. A lot more investigation is required, but we're going to start work this coming week and getting a law passed to try to make this all the more transparent and make clear where it's absolutely wrong and shouldn't be done at all even if you have to disclose it later.”

Asked if he thinks there’s enough momentum to advance Supreme Court ethics reform, Whitehouse said it’s possible, noting that he expects new revelations in coming weeks to emerge that could further influence public opinion.

“I think there's going to be a lot more information coming out in the next few weeks,” Whitehouse said.

“So the story is going to continue to get worse, or these justices and Republicans are going to be in increasingly difficult position saying ‘nothing to see here, folks. Nothing to see here, folks,’ when even their own federal judges in their own states are rolling their eyes and saying ‘you've got to be kidding me. We would never do this in my part.’"

“Yeah, it is. It is a conundrum.”

Watch the video below or click the link.

LGBT advocacy group cancels ASEAN event in Jakarta amid pushback

Photo illustration

By Coconuts Jakarta

Jul 12, 2023 

A meeting of Southeast Asian LGBT communities that was supposed to take place in Jakarta from July 17 to 21 has reportedly been canceled by the organizers amid pushback from the public and religious organizations.

The meeting, called the ASEAN Queer Advocacy Week, was organized by ASEAN SOGIE Caucus, a regional network of LGBT rights groups reportedly based in the Philippines.

“The organizers of ASEAN Queer Advocacy Week have decided to relocate the meeting outside Indonesia after receiving a series of threats from numerous groups,” ASEAN SOGIE Caucus said in a statement published yesterday.

The meeting was intended to bring together activists from across Southeast Asia to discuss advocacy and navigating challenges in the region. The organizers said that they wanted to create a safe space for civil society and human rights defenders to learn about ASEAN institutions, to address issues that are important to them, and to collectively exercise their right to freely express their views on how ASEAN advances or fails to advance the rights of their communities.

The organizers also said that they hoped to raise awareness and visibility of the human rights violations and discrimination faced by LGBT people in Southeast Asia, as well as to promote solidarity and cooperation among them. They said that they envisioned an inclusive ASEAN region that respects and protects the rights of all people regardless of their sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression and sex characteristics (SOGIESC).

The ASEAN Queer Advocacy Week was reportedly first promoted via ASEAN SOGIE Caucus’ Instagram, and came to the public’s attention after several local media outlets reported about the event.

The news prompted condemnation from, among others, the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI), who argued that LGBT advocacy goes against the constitutional right to belief in God.

The Jakarta Metro Police said no party had filed for a permit to hold such an event in the capital.

ASEAN SOGIE Caucus’ Instagram has been set to private amid reported abuse by Indonesian netizens.

While homosexuality is not illegal in Indonesia, LGBTQ+ communities often face discrimination in the country, fueled by pressure and intolerance from religious conservatives and authorities in Indonesia.

Also Read

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March 16, 2023

Indonesian media’s discriminatory coverage of LGBT issues endangers minority ahead of 2024 elections, group warns
Based on an analysis of news stories from this year, they found that politicians are increasingly using anti-LGBT rhetoric to gain voter support, which is then amplified by the media.
March 6, 2023

A Trans Woman Is Crowned Miss Netherlands for the First Time

Rikkie Valerie Kollé, 22, will represent the Netherlands at the 72nd annual Miss Universe pageant in El Salvador later this year.

Rikkie Valerie Kollé, center, won the Miss Netherlands beauty pageant this weekend.

Credit...Evert Elzinga/Agence France-Presse 


By Claire Moses
July 11, 2023


Rikkie Valerie Kollé, Miss Netherlands 2023, can still hardly believe she won her country’s annual pageant.

She spent all day on Saturday preparing for and enjoying every moment of the ceremony that night, which was attended by the reigning Miss Universe, the American R’Bonney Gabriel.

The show, which started at 8 p.m., flew by, “and two and a half hours later I was Miss Netherlands,” Ms. Kollé, 22, said in a phone interview on Tuesday, adding that her victory “had finally sunk in.”

Ms. Kollé’s win is historic: She is the first trans woman to win the pageant in the Netherlands, and she will be the second openly trans woman to compete in a Miss Universe competition when she represents her country in El Salvador later this year.

As the first trans woman to be named Miss Netherlands, Ms. Kollé said she hoped to be there for her community and help young queer people, as well as raise awareness of the long waiting times for transgender health care in the Netherlands.

“I’m going to be an open book,” she said. In February, a post on her Instagram account outlined her experiences as a child and her treatments as a teenager as well as an update about her gender-transition surgery.

But being an open book on social media comes with a lot of hate, too, and avoiding online negativity can be difficult. Ms. Kollé said she had faced a lot of online abuse and insults since winning the pageant, as had some of her close family members, including her mother and sister.


Ms. Kollé is not the first Dutch trans woman to reach the Miss Netherlands finals. Solange Dekker, a finalist from last year’s competition who took home the title of Miss Social Media, went on to become the first Dutch Miss International Queen 2023 last month, an annual pageant for trans women.

When she goes to El Salvador, Ms. Kollé will be the second trans woman to partake in a Miss Universe competition. Spain’s Angela Ponce, also a trans woman, was a finalist in 2018.

“We’re really looking for the most beautiful woman in the Netherlands,” said Monica van Ee, a member of the jury who chose Ms. Kollé this weekend. She is also the national director of Miss Netherlands.

She said that while national and international media had been interested to talk about Ms. Kollé’s victory, a lot of people had sent upsetting and threatening messages attacking Ms. Kollé.

Anne Jakrajutatip, the owner of the parent company of Miss Universe who is a trans woman herself, celebrated Ms. Kollé’s win in a statement.

“My Miss Universe superfan conversion was sitting in the front row while Angela Ponce, the first trans Miss Universe Spain, walked the runway for the first time,” Ms. Jakrajutatip said, adding that she was happy to make a statement that “trans women are women — and we are here to celebrate women.”

Ms. Kollé, who is from the southern Dutch city of Breda, has modeled since she was a teenager. She said she chose to apply to become Miss Netherlands because pageants offered her a chance to tell her story.

As a model, she said, “you’re a bit of a clothes hanger. Otherwise you mostly have to be quiet.” But in the world of pageantry, she said, “it’s also important that you have something to say.”

Ms. van Ee, Miss Netherlands’s national director, said that over the last decade or so, the pageant had modernized. Now, mothers, divorced women and trans women can participate, she said. “I took over Miss Netherlands because I wanted to make women stronger,” Ms. van Ee said. “I want to inspire young girls.”

She said she had been shocked by the number of negative responses from men and women.

The ideal winner of a Miss Netherlands competition must have an impressive presence and make heads turn when she walks into a room. She also needs a message that can inspire others, Ms. van Ee said. “Beauty comes from the inside,” she said.

She said that Ms. Kollé had been the strongest contender. “Throughout the whole process, she was the most beautiful woman,” Ms. van Ee said.

“I was chosen for who I am and my story,” Ms. Kollé said, “and not because I’m a trans woman.”


Claire Moses is a reporter for the Express desk in London. More about Claire Moses

Russian lawmakers move to further restrict transgender rights in new legislation

There is little doubt that the bill, a crippling blow to Russia's oppressed LGBTQ+ community, will be adopted amid the Kremlin's crusade to protect what it views as the country's “traditional values.”
FILE - Gay rights activists hold a banner reading "Homophobia - the religion of bullies" during their action in protest at homophobia, on Red Square in Moscow, Russia, on July 14, 2013. Russian lawmakers have approved a toughened version of a bill that outlaws gender transitioning procedures, with added clauses that mandate annulling marriages in which one person has "changed gender" and barring transgender people from becoming foster or adoptive parents. 

(AP Photo/Evgeny Feldman, File)

July 14, 2023
By Dasha Litvinova

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Russian lawmakers on Thursday approved a toughened version of a bill that outlaws gender transitioning procedures, with added clauses that annul marriages in which one person has “changed gender” and bar transgender people from becoming foster or adoptive parents.

The bill received swift, unanimous approval of Russia’s lower house of parliament, the State Duma, in its key second reading, and lawmakers scheduled the third and final reading for Friday. There is little doubt that the bill, a crippling blow to Russia’s oppressed LGBTQ+ community, will be adopted amid the Kremlin’s crusade to protect what it views as the country’s “traditional values.”

The bill bans any “medical interventions aimed at changing the sex of a person,” as well as changing one’s gender in official documents and public records.

New clauses added to the bill also amend Russia’s Family Code by listing gender change as a reason to annul a marriage and adding those “who had changed gender” to a list of people who can’t become foster or adoptive parents.

Lawmakers portray the measure as protecting Russia from “the Western anti-family ideology,” with some describing gender transitioning as “pure satanism.”

It has rattled the country’s transgender community and has drawn criticism not only from LGBTQ+ rights advocates but from the medical community as well.

Lyubov Vinogradova, executive director of Russia’s Independent Psychiatric Association, called the bill “misanthropic” in an interview with The Associated Press. Gender transitioning procedures “shouldn’t be banned entirely, because there are people for whom it is the only way to … to exist normally and find peace with themselves,” Vinogradova said in a phone interview.

The crackdown on LGBTQ+ people started a decade ago, when President Vladimir Putin first proclaimed a focus on “traditional family values,” a move ardently supported — and fueled, to a certain extent — by the Russian Orthodox Church.

In 2013, the Kremlin adopted the first legislation restricting LGBTQ+ rights, known as the “gay propaganda” law that banned any public endorsement of “nontraditional sexual relations” among minors. In 2020, Putin pushed through a constitutional reform that outlawed same-sex marriage.

But the authorities ramped up their rhetoric about protecting the country from what it called the West’s “degrading” influence after sending troops into Ukraine last year, in what rights advocates saw as an attempt to legitimize the war.

Lawmakers moved last year to ban “propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations” among adults. That initiative was quickly rubber-stamped, and by December 2022, any positive or even neutral representation of LGBTQ+ people in movies, literature or media was outlawed.

The bill to severely restrict trans rights came a few months after that.

Vinogradova was among two dozen lawyers, activists and psychiatrists who put their names to a review of the bill that deemed it unnecessary and harmful. The document pointed that the bill goes against Russia’s existing laws, including its constitution.

Existing Russian regulations view gender transitioning procedures as medical treatment for “transsexualism,” a psychiatric condition in accordance with the 10th version of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, a medical classification list by the World Health Organization that Russia follows.

So to ban gender transitioning procedures is to deprive people diagnosed with the condition of medical help in violation of the constitution and other Russian laws, according to the review.

“(Medical) professionals we’re talking to believe it is absolutely unacceptable,” Vinogradova said.

She rejected the state narrative that gender transitioning is something imposed on Russia by the West and noted that studies of transgender issues were being conducted since the 1960s in the Soviet Union, “and it was normal, no one was concerned by it, but now, it turns out, goes against our traditional values.”


An online petition against the bill by Yana Kirey-Sitnikova, a transgender studies researcher, also mentions that gender-affirming care was available in the Soviet Union since the late 1960s and that transgender people were able to change gender markers in official documents as early as the 1920s.

“Medical and legal assistance to transgender people has a long history in the Soviet Union and Russia,” said the petition, signed by over 7,200 people to date. It warned of “serious deterioration in the health and well-being of transgender people” if such assistance ceases to exist.

Nef Cellarius, coordinator of the peer counselling program at the LGBTQ+ rights group Coming Out, told AP that already high depression rates and suicide thoughts are likely to spike among transgender people once the bill is adopted. Another negative consequence of that could be the emergence of an unregulated black market of gender-affirming care, he said in a phone interview from Lithuania.

The new provisions on annulling marriages and banning adoption or guardianship over children leaves transgender people even more vulnerable, Cellarius said.

In some previous cases, officials did demand that a couple divorce before changing gender in documents, if such a change could lead to a same-sex marriage, which are illegal in Russia; but some were able to keep their marriage certificate, the activist said. Now all marriages in which one or both people have changed gender would be annulled.

There is one new provision, however, that might leave the window open for some transgender people, according to human rights lawyer Max Olenichev, who works with the Russian LGBTQ+ community. It allows for a “transitional period” for those who have undergone gender-affirming surgery but haven’t yet changed gender in official documents to do so, Olenichev told AP in an interview from Prague.

“These transitional provisions will remain in place for an indefinite period of time, and people will be able to use them,” Olenichev said, adding that even with this provision in place, “in essence, gender transitioning in Russia is banned.”

LGBTQ+ Americans are more religious than our Supreme Court battles let on

Religion and queerness make strange bedfellows, but they are not as hostile as we may think.

A gay Pride rainbow flag flies along with the U.S. flag in front of a church in Prairie Village, Kansas, April 19, 2019. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

Opinion
July 7, 2023
By Kelsy Burke, Andrew Flores, Suzanna Krivulskaya, Tyler Lefevor

(RNS) — In one of the last decisions announced this season, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a conservative Christian business owner had the right to refuse service to same-sex couples if the service could be construed as a creative expression or implied endorsement of their relationship. The ruling, the latest in a series of such cases, affirmed a common narrative: that religious people and LGBTQ+ people are mutually exclusive groups and in tension with one another.

This story isn’t only perpetuated in the courts, but also in the mainstream media and, often, in the field of public opinion research.

As academics and public fellows for the Public Religion Research Institute, we have access to some of the latest national surveys asking questions about religion and LGBTQ+ rights. We also know that most of the time this data includes too few LGBTQ+ people to make definitive claims about this group. We know, in other words, that we know more about attitudes about LGBTQ+ people than we do about LGBTQ+ people themselves.

In early June, we set out to remedy this shortcoming by surveying 1,255 LGBTQ+ adults in the United States. While not a representative sample (we used the survey platform Prolific), we set quotas to make sure we surveyed at least 250 each of gay men, lesbian women, bisexual men, bisexual women and transgender and gender non-conforming people. The resulting data provides us a unique opportunity to explore and compare the beliefs, attitudes and experiences of queer people in the U.S.

RELATED: The search for gender identity, say trans seekers, brought them closer to God

Our findings suggest that the relationships LGBTQ+ people have with religion are more complicated than most media headlines portray. Many LGBTQ+ people are religious, with bisexual men reporting the strongest religious identities. In our sample, 36% of participants report a religious affiliation; about the same percentage say they attend religious services at least once a year. A similar percentage report spending time in prayer or meditation a few times a month or more.

Religion has often played an important role in the lives of LGBTQ+ people, even if they are not currently religious. A full 80% of survey respondents were raised religious. Of those who no longer identify religiously, nearly 1 in 3 say they nonetheless continue to feel a connection to their religious heritage.

At the same time, only a minority of religious LGBTQ+ individuals belong to congregations that explicitly affirm their sexual orientation and/or gender identity. Of religious LGBTQ+ people, 38% report that their congregation allows people in same-gender relationships to be congregation leaders, and 32% report that their congregation has an official statement welcoming LGBTQ+ individuals. Roughly the same percentage of religious LGBTQ+ individuals report experiencing conflict between their religious beliefs and sexual orientation or gender identity. These respondents came from a variety of Christian traditions, including Protestant, Roman Catholic and “just Christian.”

Transgender respondents, compared to gay and bisexual men and lesbian and bisexual women, report the highest levels of conflict between religion and their gender identity. This aligns with the broader social and political landscape in the United States, where, overall, Americans are less supportive of certain measures of transgender equality when compared to LGBTQ+ equality and there have been recent attacks on transgender rights led and supported by white evangelical Protestants.

Regardless of religious affiliation, LGBTQ+ people in our survey perceive high levels of hostility from most major religious groups. Eight out of 10 believe that evangelical churches are unfriendly toward LGBTQ+ people. The perception of unfriendliness is similarly high for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (76%), Islam (71%) and Catholicism (70%).

Judaism is perceived as the friendliest among the six groups we asked about, with 3 in 4 respondents characterizing the religion as either friendly or neutral toward LGBTQ+ people, followed by a similar perception of non-evangelical Protestant churches (56%).

Although faith and participation in religion have been clearly linked to better health in heterosexual people, these effects are less strong for LGBTQ+ people. Our data supported these findings, showing that only LGBTQ+ people who saw religion as central to their identity could be linked to lower rates of depression. For queer people who may not feel connected to a religious community but still attend services, religion doesn’t offer this positive benefit.

RELATED: Queer bars offer sacred space for LGBTQ community

While belonging to a religious community is not the generally “positive” experience it is for cisgender/heterosexual individuals, our understanding of LGBTQ+ people’s religious lives need to be more nuanced. When we asked open-ended questions in our survey, we found that LGBTQ+ people recognize that, while religious groups are often hostile toward them, it is religious extremists who seek to ostracize them or take away their rights. Some religious groups are even recognized as allies in the fight toward greater inclusion.

While religion and queerness may make strange bedfellows, many LGBTQ+ people realize these two forces are connected in complex ways. The rest of us should take the cue.

(Kelsy Burke is an associate professor of sociology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Andrew Flores is an assistant professor of government at American University. Suzanna Krivulskaya is an assistant professor of history at California State University San Marcos. Tyler Lefevor is an associate professor of counseling psychology at Utah State University. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.)

‘Really hurtful’: How LGBTQ disinformation ensnares Americans

By AFP
Published July 12, 2023

Copyright AFP Alain JOCARD
Bill McCarthy and Anuj Chopra

Waving a rainbow flag, Desmond Napoles ambled through a confetti-soaked pride parade — in defiance of a troubling disinformation campaign that sought to link LGBTQ Americans to pedophilia.

In June, the face of the 16-year-old model, fashion designer and activist from New York appeared in a doctored image that ricocheted across social media platforms, fueling anti-LGBTQ hysteria that has reached a fever pitch in the United States.

Emerging from the darkest corners of the internet, the altered picture made it appear like a California pride parade participant had worn a shirt bearing Desmond’s face alongside a disturbing slogan: “Trans kids are sexy.”

The original photo, published in a southern California newspaper, showed the man wearing a plain white shirt as he marched during the festivities in 2021.

The manipulated version triggered a deluge of angry online comments accusing the participant of pedophilia, echoing a far-right conspiracy theory that LGBTQ people are “grooming” children. Many people called for his death or castration.

“They were using it to make LGBTQ people look like ‘groomers,’ and they were using my face,” Napoles told AFP at a glittering New York pride event last month.

“I was really disgusted.”

AFP identified the participant in the photo as a middle-aged gay man in California who said in a Zoom interview that he was in “disbelief” when a concerned friend showed him one of the abusive posts.

“I am sickened by people who are accusing us of being child molesters. This has to stop,” he said, requesting anonymity out of concern for his safety and privacy.

The menacing discourse facing Napoles and the California man — coupled with attempts by bad actors to profit off it — shows the real-world harms caused by the rising tide of anti-LGBTQ disinformation.

“God forbid that this were to grow, and that’s what scares me,” the man said.

– ‘Hateful narrative’ –

The disinformation comes amid a sharp spike in anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.

That includes false claims -– amplified by conservative influencers — linking the community to pedophilia, a barrage of anti-transgender bills introduced by US lawmakers and right-wing boycotts that have targeted brands such as Target over their support of LGBTQ causes.

Last month, the US Supreme Court ruled that certain private businesses can refuse service to same-sex couples on religious grounds.

“There has been an explosion in the hateful narrative that associates LGBTQ people with child abuse and ‘grooming,'” Imran Ahmed, chief executive of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), told AFP.

“Hate actors spread these lies about LGBTQ people solely to dehumanize them and whip up fear — and it’s mirrored by an alarming rise in real-world violence.”

The altered image — which exploited an old photo that showed Napoles, then a teenage drag star, at an awards ceremony — appeared to originate on the fringe forum 4chan before spreading to other platforms including Twitter and TikTok.

“It just kept spreading and spreading. We didn’t know who was behind it or what was going on,” Napoles said.

– ‘Heartbreaking’ –

Adding to the horror, T-shirts and other merchandise — embossed with Napoles’s photo and the slogan “Trans kids are sexy” — suddenly became available for sale online.

They are advertised across dozens of dubious print-on-demand websites using overseas domain registrars.

Wendy, Napoles’s mother, said she spent hours trying to get some of them to take them down, but with little success.

“I’ve been emailing, just asking, saying: ‘You have a picture of my minor on your T-shirt, this is not acceptable,'” she told AFP.

Many of the websites appear interconnected –- displaying similar layouts and sales pitches and listing matching contact information. According to online customer reviews, some have sold trademarked material and stolen artwork.

The websites, which also advertize hoodies and sweaters with the same image and slogan, did not respond to AFP’s request for comment.

The sites illustrate efforts to profit off anti-LGBTQ disinformation.

According to one CCDH study this year, mentions of the “grooming” narrative more than doubled on Twitter since billionaire Elon Musk’s takeover last October. Just five prominent accounts notorious for promoting this falsehood were estimated to generate $6.4 million annually for Twitter in ad revenues, the study said.

Wendy said it was very hurtful that her child’s image was exploited to stir up hate and “to cause people to believe in something that isn’t real.”

“These people used it without thinking that there’s someone behind the image that they may be hurting,” she said. “It’s heartbreaking.”

The Origin of American Conspiracy Theories

Josh Hawley tweets fake quote about US founding, sparking allegations of Christian nationalism

The quote, which was falsely attributed to Patrick Henry, originated in a 1956 edition of a magazine known for espousing antisemitic and white nationalist beliefs.
U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law, speaks during a hearing on artificial intelligence, May 16, 2023, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)

July 6, 2023
By Jack Jenkins

WASHINGTON (RNS) — Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley is fielding allegations of Christian nationalism this week after he tweeted out a quote falsely attributed to a Founding Father claiming the U.S. was founded “on the Gospel of Jesus Christ” and later tweeted out a thread of other quotes along similar lines.

The controversy began on Tuesday (July 4), when Hawley marked the U.S. celebration of Independence Day with a tweet erroneously quoting Patrick Henry, the Founding Father known for his declaration “Give me liberty or give me death!”

“It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” read the quote. “For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here.”

As others were quick to note, Patrick Henry never said those words. Rather, as Willamette University professor Seth Cotlar pointed out, the quote appears to originate from a 1956 edition of The Virginian, a magazine known for espousing antisemitic and white nationalist views.

Prem Thakker, writing for liberal outlet The New Republic, derided the tweet as a “vessel to rear for Christian nationalism.”

Despite the criticism, Hawley has not yet deleted the inaccurate tweet. Instead, the Republican senator claimed in a tweet on Wednesday that liberals were “major triggered by the connection between the Bible and the American Founding,” and proceeded to post six quotes from early U.S. leaders that tied the founding of the country to Christianity.

Among them is a quote from an address delivered by John Quincy Adams in 1837, in which he declares, “Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission on earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity … ”

Hawley also cited Daniel Webster as saying “I have heretofore argued to show that the Christian religion — its general principles — must ever be regarded among us as the foundation of civil society.”

The quotes — which, unlike the original tweet, appear to be correctly attributed — promote a historical argument popular among purveyors of Christian nationalism that the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation.

It’s also an argument Hawley has increasingly embraced in public, such as during a speech titled “Biblical Revolution” at the National Conservatism conference in September.

“We are a revolutionary nation precisely because we are the heirs of the revolution of the Bible,” Hawley said during the speech.

He later added: “Without the Bible, there is no modernity. Without the Bible, there is no America.”

Hawley’s office did not respond to a request for comment about the misattributed quote, or field questions regarding his views on Christian nationalism.

America was never a Christian nation: Constitutional attorney demolishes right-wing myths about the Founding Fathers


America was never a Christian nation: Constitutional attorney demolishes right-wing myths about the Founding Fathers

PAUL ROSENBERG, SALON - COMMENTARY
 

FOR MY TAKE ON THIS SEE MY BLOG POSTS:

American Fairy Tale

The Origin of American Conspiracy Theories

 RNS Press Releases

Religion News Foundation receives $4,087,800 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc.

The grant supports RNS efforts to strengthen and broaden its work, expand its audience, increase revenue and improve key aspects of its operations.

July 12, 2023

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The grant supports RNS efforts to strengthen and broaden its work, expand its audience, increase revenue and improve key aspects of its operations.

Religion News Foundation (RNF) today announced the receipt of a two-year operating grant of $4,087,800 from Lilly Endowment Inc. to support the work of Religion News Service (RNS), a wholly owned subsidiary of RNF, and build additional RNF/S capacity.   

The grant supports RNS efforts to strengthen and broaden its editorial work, expand and diversify its audience, increase revenue through multiple streams and improve key aspects of its operations. This grant helps reinforce RNS’s unique role in nonprofit journalism as it continues to find new opportunities amidst change in the journalism sector.  

“Our thanks to Lilly Endowment for its continued support of RNF/S. This grant is key to RNS continuing to produce high-quality journalism and expand its coverage. It also is key to helping RNS fulfill its mission to be the most trusted resource for news, features and commentary on religion and spirituality, where people come together to understand each other’s beliefs,” said Deborah Caldwell, CEO and Publisher of RNF/S.   

RNS seeks to drive the conversation about the myriad ways religion shapes our lives by reporting objectively, accurately, sensitively and in depth on religion and how it manifests in the world. 

“RNS has led the way in covering some of the most significant issues impacting our world, remaining one of the few media outlets that provide in-depth, long-term coverage of issues including Christian nationalism, spiritual and religious innovation, key public policy concerns and the fracturing of congregations. RNS’s achievements are possible because of the support of Lilly Endowment and a dedicated board and staff,” said Paul O’Donnell, RNS’s Editor-in-Chief.   

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Lilly Endowment Inc. is a private foundation created in 1937 by J.K. Lilly Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. While those gifts remain the financial bedrock of the Endowment, it is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion and maintains a special commitment to its hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana. A principal aim of the Endowment’s religion grantmaking is to deepen and enrich the lives of Christians in the United States, primarily by seeking out and supporting efforts that enhance the vitality of congregations and strengthen the pastoral and lay leadership of Christian communities. The Endowment also seeks to improve public understanding of diverse religious traditions by supporting fair and accurate portrayals of the role religion plays in the United States and across the globe. 

Secular Coalition for America confronts Trump’s attacks against atheists

‘He has used nonreligious people as a punching bag, as he has with many other groups for many years,’ said the director of the coalition.

July 12, 2023
By Fiona André

(RNS) — The Secular Coalition for America, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for the separation of religion and government, has issued a letter in response to derogatory remarks about atheists made by former President Donald Trump last month at the Faith and Freedom Coalition gala in Washington.

Trump, the keynote speaker of the three-day Road to Majority conference, declared, “Together, we’re warriors in a righteous crusade to stop the arsonists, the atheists, globalists and the Marxists,” stirring up the estimated crowd of 2,000 conservative evangelical leaders. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence also attended the conference’s 14th annual gathering.

In their letter, the 21 groups that form the Secular Coalition for America denied having any links with Marxism or promoting globalism. They also reasserted the coalition’s commitment to fighting hatred targeting religious minorities worldwide and called for more respect and tolerance regarding atheist citizens.

“Just because we don’t go to church, doesn’t mean we are unpatriotic,” read the statement.

The attack didn’t surprise Steven Emmert, the coalition’s executive director, but the affiliations the former president suggested are what struck him.

“He has used nonreligious people as a punching bag, as he has with many other groups for many years. This just seemed like an odd collection of people to go after. I mean, we are opposed to arsons as well,” Emmert said.

Trump has long enjoyed the support of conservative evangelical voters. In 2020, he won 76% of the white evangelical vote, 59% of whom said his administration had served evangelicals’ interest, according to a 2020 Pew Research Center poll.

The appearance at the gala, his eighth, signaled Trump’s eagerness to win over evangelical leaders again as he faces a crowded race for the 2024 Republican Party presidential nomination. In his 90-minute speech, the former president reminded his audience of all his efforts to serve the religious right, particularly his realization of a conservative majority on the Supreme Court.

Trump’s declaration goes alongside a growing disdain Republican politicians have shown toward nonreligious people over the past years, said Emmert. A longtime advocate for the separation of church and state, he noted that the coalition worked more easily with Republicans in Congress 25 years ago than today. But overlooking atheists as an electorate is a political mistake, Emmert said, as 17% of atheists consider themselves independent voters.

“Nonreligious people made up nearly 30% of the population. We are not exactly some fringe group,” he said.

Emmert said the atheist-Marxist affiliation is a common trope dating back to the 1950s, noting Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s 1950 Wheeling, West Virginia, speech, in which he called for an “all-out battle between communistic atheism and Christianity.”

“I mean, I think that’s always been (Trump’s) goal, to bring us back to the 1950s, on several levels,” said the director, who hopes conservative leaders will become more aware of their nonreligious constituents.

The Washington-based organization comprises groups such as the Ex-Muslims of North America, the American Humanist Association and the Society for Humanistic Judaism. It counts over 100,000 members.

US Supreme Court ruling in favor of mail carrier celebrated across religious spectrum

Many U.S. religious minorities said the ruling was a much-needed corrective to the challenges they face in balancing their work with their sincerely held religious practices.

Gerald Groff, a former postal worker whose case was argued before the Supreme Court, stands during a television interview near a "Now Hiring" sign posted at the United States Postal Service, March 8, 2023, in Quarryville, Pa. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

June 29, 2023
By Yonat Shimron


(RNS) — In siding with an evangelical Christian mail carrier who quit the U.S. Postal Service after he was forced to deliver packages on Sundays, his Sabbath, the Supreme Court on Thursday (June 29) did something rare: It brought a whole panoply of U.S. religions together.

The unanimous ruling in Groff v. DeJoy clarified that employers must do more than the minimum to accommodate workers’ requests related to religious observance.

The ruling mostly vindicates Gerald Groff, a former mail carrier from Pennsylvania, who sued the post office, saying the requirement that he work on Sundays violated his deeply held belief that Sunday was his day of rest. (U.S. mail is not usually delivered Sundays, but in 2013, the USPS signed a contract with Amazon to deliver the company’s packages, including on Sundays.)

Groff was represented by First Liberty Institute, the conservative Christian legal powerhouse based in Plano, Texas.

But in ruling in favor of the Christian mail carrier, the court also united a host of non-Christian religions in the U.S., who saw the decision written by Justice Samuel Alito as a much needed corrective to the challenges they face in balancing their work with their sincerely held religious practices.

Whether it’s accommodating Sikh health care workers who are required by their faith not to shave their beards or Jewish teachers who want to take time off for religious holidays not officially recognized by the public schools or colleges where they work, the ruling has the effect of forcing employers to accommodate their worker’s religious practices.

“The court’s ruling is going to help many people, from many different faith communities across the U.S.,” said Nathan Diament, executive director for public policy for the Orthodox Union, the nation’s largest representative Orthodox Jewish organization.

RELATED: Conservative Christians aren’t the only ones asking for accommodation in mailman case

The Orthodox Union was one of a diverse group of faith-based and religious liberty organizations that filed amicus or “friend of the court” briefs with the Supreme Court supporting Groff. They included the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, the American Center for Law and Justice, the Sikh Coalition, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the American Hindu Coalition, Becket Law and the Baptist Joint Commission.

Organizations opposing Groff’s petition included the Freedom From Religion Foundation, the Center for Inquiry, Americans United for Separation of Church and State and American Atheists. The latter argued the ruling would shift more work burdens onto atheists, humanists, nonreligious Americans.

In their ruling, justices clarified a decades-old Supreme Court decision that allowed employers to deny religious accommodations that would cause them more than a minor inconvenience.

Historically, Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act required employers to provide religious accommodations unless they create an “undue hardship” for the business. But the Supreme Court undercut this standard in 1997 when it ruled in Trans World Airlines v. Hardison that employers need only suffer minimal hardship to deny a religious accommodation. This low threshold, referred to as a “de minimus standard,” was often used to deny religious accommodations.

While the court did not overturn Trans World Airlines v. Hardison, it clarified that the burden for employers denying religious accommodation must be substantial.

“We think it is enough to say that an employer must show that the burden of granting an accommodation would result in substantial increased costs in relation to the conduct of its particular business,” Alito wrote in his ruling.

Over the past decade, the U.S. Supreme Court has increasingly sided with religious plaintiffs and has appeared to privilege religious claims — and specifically Christian religious claims — above all others.

It sided with a football coach in Washington state who was suspended from his public high school for refusing to stop leading Christian prayers with players on the field. It ruled in favor of two Christian families from Maine who were excluded from a private religious schools tuition assistance program. It sided with a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple based on his religious beliefs.

The Groff case is another win for Christians, but religious minorities were equally willing to celebrate this victory.

“For too long, American Muslims have been denied the right to perform daily prayers at work, wear hijab or kufi, or attend prayers on Fridays,” said Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “Today marks a new era.”

Joining CAIR in celebrating the ruling were a host of powerful conservative Christian legal groups and religious denominations, including Becket Law, the Alliance Defending Freedom and the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

The ruling also brought cheers from many religious minorities who embrace liberal social policy, saying diversity initiatives in workplaces often leave out religion.

“I hope that this causes workplaces, whether that’s a private company or a public university campus, to say we need to take religious identity as seriously as we take other dimensions of identity,” said Eboo Patel, founder and president of Interfaith America, a nonprofit dedicated to building religious diversity. “No matter how uncomfortable we are with religion, no matter how little we might know about religion, it’s time to engage, it’s time to lean into this and let’s consider it an asset and not a risk.”

RELATED: Co-workers could bear costs of accommodating religious employees in the workplace if Supreme Court tosses out 46-year-old precedent