These laws often give secular, public-facing businesses the right to refuse customers or perform services. Meanwhile, in US states, the group has worked to craft legislation and defend “religious freedom” laws. In Jamaica, ADF attorneys defended anti-sodomy laws. In Romania, ADF pushed for a referendum to oppose same-sex civil unions. In India, the executive director applauded a supreme court decision ruling gay sex illegal (that was struck down in 2018). In Belize, the group sided with another organization pushing to criminalize gay sex. Their brief argued, “equal dignity does not mean that every sexual orientation warrants equal respect”. In the last decade, ADF attorneys argued in favor of state-sanctioned sterilization for trans people at the European Court of Human Rights. ![]() Photograph: Eric Baradat/AFP/Getty Images That is something that all who care about free speech should be able to celebrate.”ĪDF defended Baker Jack Phillips, who refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. On every occasion, when challenged with the robust legal protections which exist for speech, the university body has relented. Laurence Wilkinson, legal counsel for ADF International said: “Our London office has been glad to support students facing censorship. Last month, after a series of anti-abortion protests at Cardiff University in Wales, it was reported that ADF International had been reminding universities of their responsibilities to protect freedom of speech. And this American group is busy abroad too. In another, the group successfully argued the arts and crafts company Hobby Lobby should not be required to pay for birth control included in private insurance plans, because of the owner’s Christian faith.ĪDF counts the former Trump-appointed US attorney general Jeff Sessions as an ally, and its founders are a who’s-who list of opponents of gay rights. The group argued baking was his form of artistic expression, and won. One of its most famous recent cases was of a baker in Colorado who refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. The group’s work against LGBTQ+ people has led experts on extremism at the Southern Poverty Law Center to label them a hate group. In the 25 years since it was founded, it has brought 10 cases before the US supreme court, including some of the most consequential cases of the last decade on contraceptive and gay rights.ĪDF is, “an aggressive, strategic legal group that is about Christian supremacy and hegemony in the US and in the world,” said Frederick Clarkson, a senior research analyst with Political Research Associates. “No amount of hormone therapy can ever fully undo those physiological advantages.”īut the lawsuit is just one arrow in ADF’s quiver, a conservative Christian powerhouse working internationally to remake laws governing family, sex and marriage in a vision which “keeps the doors open for the Gospel”.ĪDF, which reportedly received more than $55m in contributions in 2018, claims to have more than 3,400 affiliated attorneys and judges worldwide. ![]() ![]() ![]() “Girls deserve to compete on a level playing field and the Connecticut policy now allows males to compete in the girls category if they identify as female,” Holcomb later told the Guardian.
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