“First Amendment Defense Act” (FADA) is Reintroduced in the Senate

New York, March 8, 2018–The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project is dismayed that the deceptively named “First Amendment Defense Act” (FADA) was reintroduced into the U.S. Senate today by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and 21 Republican co-sponsors, including Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Ted Cruz (Texas) and Orrin Hatch (Utah). Not only is this bill unnecessary to the protection of religious liberty in the United States, its language would be harmful to the constitutional rights of millions of Americans

Comments Submitted to the Department of Health and Human Services Regarding Religious Exemptions to Contraceptive Coverage

Following the Supreme Court\u27s decision to vacate and remand the cases in Zubik v. Burwell, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a request for information on alternative ways to accommodate religious nonprofits from compliance with the contraceptive mandate of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), CMS-9931-NC. The following comment, from the Law, Rights, and Religion Project, explains that the ACA\u27s existing religious accommodation complies with federal law, and that expanding the accommodation in a way that harms employees and their families would risk violating the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. Further, this comment highlights the effects an overly-broad accommodation of religion would have on communities of color

Columbia Law Experts Denounce Federal Guidance Allowing Religious and Moral Discrimination in Contraceptive Coverage

Columbia Law School’s Public Rights/Private Conscience Project (PRPCP) condemns the Trump administration for issuing sweeping new rules today that roll back the Affordable Care Act (ACA)’s birth control benefit, by broadening exemptions for employers who claim religious or moral objections to offering birth control to their workers. These regulations place the religious and moral views of employers above the health and wellbeing of their workers and gut the contraceptive coverage provision of the ACA by dramatically reducing access to affordable birth control. Rather than protecting religious freedom for all Americans, these regulations are part of the current administration’s ongoing effort to advance a limited set of conservative religious beliefs while limiting the liberty and equality rights of women, LGBTQ people, people of color, and religious minorities

EEOC Proposed Guidance Shows We Can Protect Religious Freedom & LGBTQ Rights

While the President and Congress consider acts to expand religious exemptions at the expense of LGBTQ and other rights, a proposed federal regulation demonstrates that we can — and should — protect both religious and LGBTQ communities

Unmarried and Unprotected: How Religious Liberty Bills Harm Pregnant People, Families, and Communities of Color

Increasingly, the long-standing national commitment to equality is being undermined by competing claims to religious liberty. Advocates, politicians, and the media have all documented the “wave of religious-freedom bills” introduced in recent years, “almost all inspired by objections to homosexuality and same-sex marriage.” In the 2015-2016 legislative session, dozens of bills were introduced at the state and federal levels that would have created exemptions to otherwise generally applicable laws, including antidiscrimination protections, for persons whose sincerely held religious beliefs conflict with those laws. The most extreme version of these bills would allow religious objectors to engage in a wide range of harmful behavior, including denial of employment, housing, public benefits, and access to social services, free from legal consequences

Religion, Discrimination, and Government Funding: Enforcing Civil Rights Law After \u3cem\u3eMasterpiece Cakeshop\u3c/em\u3e and \u3cem\u3eTrinity Lutheran\u3c/em\u3e

A memorandum published by the Law, Rights, and Religion Project at Columbia Law School (formerly the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project) that clarifies the responsibility of state and local human rights agencies and commissions to robustly enforce civil rights laws — particularly in the context of government-funded social services — in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Inc. v. Come

Trump’s Executive Order Barring Refugees is Unconstitutional: Order Expresses a Religious Preference in Violation of the Establishment Clause

NEW YORK, January, 30 2017 — Columbia Law School’s Public Rights/Private Conscience Project joins with thousands of lawyers, law professors, and legal organizations across the country in announcing that President Donald Trump’s recent Executive Order writing a religious preference into U.S. policy is unconstitutional

Proposed New York State Health Regulation Contains Troubling Exemption: The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project Responds to a Proposal on Abortion Access

A proposed New York State regulation requiring insurance plans to cover “medically necessary” abortions contains a broad religious exemption that would undermine the state’s longstanding commitment to reproductive health. The exemption — which is not required by New York’s Constitution or laws — defines the term “religious employers” to include large nonprofits and even some for-profit companies. In the face of a national movement to enact anti-LGBTQ and anti-choice religious exemptions, the regulation would set a harmful precedent by accommodating religion at the expense of other fundamental liberty and equality rights

Five Key Questions to Ask About the New Executive Order on Religious Liberty

In February, a draft of an Executive Order (EO) on religious liberty was leaked from the Trump Administration. This order would have had sweeping effects on the enforcement of federal law by all government agencies. In addition to harming LGBTQ communities, it would have had ramifications for unmarried pregnant and parenting women, patients seeking contraceptive care, religious minorities, cohabitating adults and others. President Trump is expected to sign an updated draft of the EO this week. The Public Rights/Private Conscience Project (PRPCP) has outlined five questions to ask when analyzing and reporting on the new order

Trump and Cabinet Nominees Seek to Restrict Muslim Rights, Break Down the Wall Between Church and State

A new document issued by the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project (PRPCP) at Columbia Law School outlines the numerous areas in which the Trump administration will seek to advance particular conservative Christian tenets, restrict the rights of religious minorities, and break down the barrier between church and state. Enactment of the administration’s policy priorities would call into question the careful balance that currently exists between the First Amendment and other fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution. The report, entitled Church, State & the Trump Administration, highlights the ways in which the new administration’s early executive actions and cabinet nominations, as well as his campaign rhetoric and proposed policies, indicate hostility toward religious liberty guarantees of the First Amendment and an intentional disregard for other fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution. The report will continue to be updated in the coming weeks as the administration takes further action