Iconoclasm – and Us

Eduardo Echeverria: If “white” equates to “racist,” then our institutions, though democratic, merely reflect determinism and, therefore, empty actions of moral responsibility.


Iconoclasm refers to the practice of breaking religious images (Gk. Eikonoi). American culture is currently under iconoclastic attack not mostly for its religious images. Rather, if you turn on the TV, you will see attacks by mobs attempting to destroy the historical monuments of “secular” icons of American culture, such as Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, Grant, Theodore Roosevelt, and confederate generals.

How should we judge whether to remove these historical monuments? Alan Jacobs, a leading scholar of English literature, writer, and literary critic, helps us to think about this question with a pair of vital distinctions. He draws a crucial distinction in his book How to ThinkA Survival Guide for a World at Odds between “those who held what we now believe to a profoundly mistaken view, or tolerated such a view, simply because it was common in their time, and those who were the architects of and advocates for such a view.”

Jacobs considers the example of Margaret Sanger (1879-1966), the founder of Planned Parenthood. He argues that Sanger fits the latter category because she was a passionate advocate for eugenics that she linked to the practice of contraception. Sanger stated, “Like the advocate for Birth Control, the eugenicists, for instance, are seeking to eliminate the race toward the elimination of the unfit.” Jacobs argues that Sanger did not just “hold eugenicist ideas.”

Another example to which he applies his vital distinction is the historical figure of John C. Calhoun (1782-1850), who was a pro-slavery advocate. Jacobs argues, “Calhoun did not merely accept slavery, he was the single most passionate and influential advocate for slavery. He believed that slavery is a ‘positive good’, railed against ‘the fell spirit of abolition’, and called those who believe that slavery is sinful ‘this fanatical portion of society’ who wish to perform their insidious ‘operations’ on ‘the ignorant, the weak, the young, and the thoughtless.”

In sum, both Sanger and Calhoun “did not just hold the views of their time that most of us now find deplorable; they made those views.”

Furthermore, the great Hungarian-British intellectual, Michael Polanyi (1891-1976), argues in his 1958 Lindsay Memorial Lectures, The Study of Man, that we may commit three fallacies when criticizing historical actors: fallacies of rationalism, relativism, and determinism.

The first fallacy is committed when we “apply our own standards, without allowing for the difference in the historical setting of the acting persons.” Examples of those who committed this fallacy are the “historians of the eighteenth century, like Voltaire and Gibbon, [who] tended to judge the past in this narrow-minded manner.” Other examples currently abound in the recent iconoclastic attacks. On this view, unless there is no trace of racism in secular icons, such as Jefferson, his Memorial should be destroyed. Of course, Jefferson had slaves, as did others, e.g., Washington, and so the question is whether he merely held the view of his time or was an architect of slavery.

Clearly, owning slaves is in profound tension with the foundational principle of equality, and hence the deep truth about our God-created humanity, that Jefferson, the architect of the Declaration of Independence, expressed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.” Lincoln helped to fulfill the “abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times,” asserted by the architect of the Declaration, or the “promissory note,” as Martin Luther King Jr. put it. Lincoln rescued it from the charge of contradiction with the Emancipation Proclamation.

Those who commit the fallacy of rationalism neglect not only the cultural differences in the historical setting between them and us, but also the clarifying distinction between holding and making the views of their time. We commit this fallacy, argues Polanyi, from a lack of “regard for the limitations imposed on a person’s responsibility by the acceptance of his native intellectual framework.” This fallacy abounds among the iconoclasts of our time.

The second fallacy – of relativism – is committed when people “judge past actions by the standards of their own time.” Polanyi adds, “When taken to its limit, [this approach] would sanction absolute conformity [to the times] and render thereby any criticism of the standards of a time meaningless.” Thus, on this view, the historical actors, such as Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and others, would be immune from criticism because they are not only influenced by but also bound to, the standards of their time. This fallacy presupposes that there are no objectively valid truths about human beings – such as that all men are created equal – and hence no truths independent of the standards of a time. This is cultural relativism and those who oppose rationalism sometimes embrace it.

The third fallacy – of determinism – is committed with “a materialist conception of history in which all actions appear determined by impulses of power and profit. Interpreted on these lines, all actions are devoid of moral meaning, and man is deprived altogether of responsibility to ideal obligations.”

Shelby Steele describes this materialistic conception by adding the deterministic impulse of race. Racism is a social determinism of “structural or systematic racism.” Steele explains:

Determinism was the idea that moved racism from the level of discriminatory events to the level of “impersonal” and “structural” forces that worked by the “invisible hand” to stifle black aspiration when real racists were nowhere to be seen. When racism is defined as a determinism, then whites and American institutions are part of a cultural pattern (“white privilege”) that automatically oppresses blacks; and blacks are automatically victims of this same pattern.

Being white as such is sufficient to condemn you to being a racist according to this social determinism. But this would mean that American institutions, like the police, and “ennobling conditions that free societies aspire to,” though democratic, merely reflect the social determinism of racism, depriving people “of responsibility to ideal obligations,” and emptying actions of moral responsibility.

Jacobs and Polanyi provide a helpful perspective in these challenging times for avoiding iconoclastic attacks against America.

COLUMN BY

Eduardo J. Echeverria

Eduardo J. Echeverria is Professor of Philosophy and Systematic Theology at Sacred Heart Major Seminary, Detroit. His publications include Pope Francis: The Legacy of Vatican II (2015) and Revelation, History, and Truth: A Hermeneutics of Dogma. (2018).

EDITORS NOTE: This Catholic Thing column is republished with permission. © 2020 The Catholic Thing. All rights reserved. For reprint rights, write to: info@frinstitute.org. The Catholic Thing is a forum for intelligent Catholic commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own.

CONSERVATIVE MOMMA VIDEO: Shaun King’s War on Jesus

This new edition of The Glazov Gang features Conservative Mommawho discusses Shaun King’s War on Jesus, and she asks: What lives did Jesus not die for exactly?

Don’t miss it!

And make sure to watch our Special 5-Part Series featuring Conservative Momma, where she focuses on The Lockdown and America’s Enemies:

Part 1: Gatherings Aren’t Safe! Unless They’re For a Leftist Cause!

Part 2. The Leftist “Enforce-the-Lockdown-Forever” Syndrome.

Part 3: A Globalist’s Promise: Let Me ‘Take Care’ of You.

Part 4: The Mainstream Media on Corona — when hating Trump is the top (and only) priority.

Part 5: Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely — it’s not about what to ban, but what NOT to ban.

Subscribe to the Glazov Gang‘s YouTube Channel and follow us on Twitter: @JamieGlazov.

©All rights reserved.

PODCAST: The Annex Best Thing for Israel by Caroline Glick

President Trump has already done more than any administration in modern history for Israel. But this week, he and his White House team are weighing a move that could change the status quo of America’s ally forever.It’s a conversation that’s been going on since President Trump moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem in 2018. With Israeli’s new coalition government finally in place, it may finally be time to move forward with America’s support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sovereignty plan. For the administration, it’s not a question of whether the president supports the idea — Donald Trump has been ready to restore Israeli control to Judea and Samaria since he took office. The question, at least in most people’s minds, is when the policy would make the most political sense.

Caroline Glick, a senior columnist at Breitbart News, joined “Washington Watch” Tuesday night from Israel to talk about the move, which, as she points out, is more than 50 years in the making. The crux of Netanyahu’s sovereignty plan is to officially restore the country’s control over the Jewish communities inside Judea and Samaria, where a half-million Israeli’s live — and the Jordan Valley, which is Israel’s eastern frontier with Jordan. For the last 53 years, these areas, which include some important biblical heritage sights, have been under military rule — not civil law like the rest of Israel. It’s not a matter of giving away land, Caroline explains. “And it’s not annexation,” she points out, “because under international law, these are parts of the territory that was allocated for the Jewish state by the League of Nations 100 years ago.” It’s essentially “an administrative move.”

Israel has had sovereignty over this area for decades, but they haven’t exercised it because of the international opposition. Now that President Trump has relocated the embassy to Jerusalem, there seems to be a growing sense that this is the right time to move forward in other ways. For too long, Caroline said, people have been afraid of the Arab world’s reaction. “There was this idea that to gain peace, Israel has to surrender to all the demands of the Palestinians. And that meant surrender all of its rights to Judea and Samaria and Jerusalem in order to get peace from the Palestinians.”

But from a moral and factual perspective, that was wrong. The world was trying to pretend that the state of Israel was somehow a new country — not the “reconstitution of the biblical Jewish commonwealth.” They wanted us to believe “that the Jews who live here have nothing to do with the Jews that were here at the time of the temple — which is a lie, of course. And therefore, we’re not going to recognize Israel capital in Jerusalem. We’re going to say that their capital is in Tel Aviv, the city that was only established in 1989.”

President Trump understood how ridiculous that was. He knew the reason that all of the past peace plans had failed because they were built on the lie that the Jewish people don’t have a legitimate claim to Israel. It’s the same concept, she explains, as Judea and Samaria. The Jews aren’t “occupiers” of a foreign land. It’s their land. “That’s the cradle of Jewish civilization. That’s the cradle of the Judeo-Christian civilization. It’s not only where Judaism was born and where we’re King David was born, and where Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were. It’s also where Jesus was born in Bethlehem. And so when you say that Judea actually has nothing to do with the Jews, you’re denying Jewish history.”

With America’s support, Israel can move forward and claim the right that was already there. And believe it or not, a lot of Israelis on both sides support it. Even on the political Left, Caroline explains, people in the country think it’s a reasonable plan. “Whether it’ll work or not is a completely different issue,” she acknowledges, “but it has a better chance of working than anything else because at least it’s based on reality. And Israelis appreciate that.”


Tony Perkins’s Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC senior writers.


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EDITORS NOTE: This FRC-Action podcast is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Seattle, Columbus, and Historical Fictions

Chief Seattle, who gave his name to the currently troubled city in the State of Washington, was pure Native American (father Suquamish, mother Duwamish). A mighty warrior, he essentially eliminated the rival Chimakum tribe in a battle on what is now the Quimper Peninsula. Like other native chiefs, he owned slaves. And he was a convert, probably in his fifties, to Roman Catholicism.

I learned about him more than 30 years ago, when I was researching my very first book, 1492 and All That, as controversy was raging about the 500th anniversary of Columbus’ first voyage to the New World. Seattle’s story shows how complex, to say the least, are our individual lives – and how false and disrespectful of those lives it is to use past historical figures in what are manufactured, simple-minded, ideological morality plays.

Native Americans are not supposed to have been violent, like “white men.” Or at least not against other Native Americans, because all those different peoples must have been One Harmonious Anti-White Thing, no?

And his tribe, as “people of color” (which for the moment seems to include Hispanic descendants of Spanish conquistadores), couldn’t have owned slaves or perpetrated “genocide” against another tribe.

And how could such a man, as a successful and mature adult, choose to become, of all things, a Catholic?

Yet he was hardly unique in these and many other ways. And, properly understood, is still a great and noteworthy figure whose name (and statue) should remain, undisturbed, in Seattle.

We’re all fallen creatures, in need of forgiveness and mercy, not least those who don’t know it. Shakespeare’s Hamlet had the old Christian wisdom and human decency exactly right: “Use every man after his desert, and who should ’scape whipping?”

I say this not out of any desire to deny Seattle’s – or anyone’s – sins, but to point out that he was more than those faults, even than the slavery. I said as much during a panel discussion on Columbus in the 1990s and was – still am – a bit shocked that one participant responded, “Well, slavery worked for them,” a black historian – who knew that the Indian cultures were not to be criticized.

Christopher Columbus is getting a bad rap, again, at this moment. And truth be told, he too indulged in a bit of the “noble savage” myth. In his report about his first voyage, he told Queen Isabella of the Tainos he encountered in the Caribbean: “They are very gentle and without knowledge of what is evil; nor do they murder or steal. . . .They love their neighbors as themselves, and they have the sweetest talk in the world, and are gentle and always laughing.”

Later, when the difficulty of two such different cultures meeting and mingling became clear, and his men were clashing with Native Americans, he sang a different tune: “I should be judged as a captain who went from Spain to the Indies to conquer a people numerous and warlike, whose manners and religion are very different from ours, who live in sierras and mountains, without fixed settlements.”

It’s curious that those who want to use such clashes to blame Columbus for every human evil that followed 1492 would never dream of giving him credit for all the marvelous things that have happened in the Americas since he joined two very different worlds previously unknown to one another.

We might even want to extend some credit to the overall legacies of St. Louis, Junipero Serra, Washington, Jefferson, Churchill, and many other fellow human beings currently being threatened with banishment from society.

Decent people do not judge others now living by groups – black, white, female, Jewish, Asian, etc. And it’s only right to try getting individual historical figures, even early Europeans who came to the Americas, in clear focus.

The great Dominican “defender of the Indians,” Bartolomé de las Casas knew Columbus personally and spoke of his “sweetness and benignity.” Cortez could be brutal, but ended in a monastery doing penance for his sins. Pizzaro was a psychopath.

Imagine, white people, even back then, differed from one another.

Columbus was something other than a “white” conqueror; despite the unprecedented difficulties he faced in the new cultures he encountered, there were remarkably few instances of his mistreating anyone and some touching moments of understanding. He was usually unsure of himself, as we ourselves often are. Las Casas said of him, “Truly. I would not dare blame the admiral’s intentions for I knew him well and I knew his intentions were good.”

In a way, this is no great surprise because Columbus was a serious, almost obsessive, Christian. Indeed, there’s considerable evidence that he had some sort of revelation about making his first voyage, even though he probably knew through his scientific studies that “the Indies” were farther than he let on. He finished his days dressed as an Observatine Franciscan.

These and similar facts are well known to historians. But you’d never know it from current public discussions.

I gave dozens of lectures at universities after my book on Columbus appeared  – a memorable one in a packed room at Princeton on October 12, 1992 organized by our friend Fr. John McCloskey, who was chaplain there at the time. I heard, quietly but multiple times, from history professors at whichever institution I happened to be visiting: We’re glad you said all that. We can’t.

My modest 1492 and All That was the only book of mine ever to be reviewed in the prestigious New York Review of Books. Oxford historian J.H. Elliott, who did the review, remarked at the time that it was regrettable that such a book even had to be written. But it did.

And still does. I’ve just agreed with Sophia Institute Press to do an updated and expanded second edition, which will appear on Columbus Day this year.

It’s almost forty years since the first edition, and we’ve not only learned nothing, we’ve forgotten what little we once knew and thrown away much of the human decency we still possessed. And there are many furiously busy today trying to make sure we never tell the whole truth. But when you cut the roots, it’s just a matter of time before the whole thing comes crashing down.

COLUMN BY

Robert Royal

Dr. Robert Royal is editor-in-chief of The Catholic Thing, and president of the Faith & Reason Institute in Washington, D.C. His most recent book is A Deeper Vision: The Catholic Intellectual Tradition in the Twentieth Century, published by Ignatius Press. The God That Did Not Fail: How Religion Built and Sustains the West, is now available in paperback from Encounter Books.

EDITORS NOTE: This Catholic Thing column is republished with permission. © 2020 The Catholic Thing. All rights reserved. For reprint rights, write to: info@frinstitute.org. The Catholic Thing is a forum for intelligent Catholic commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own.

VIDEO: The Lockdowns Crushed Minority-Owned Businesses the Most

Meanwhile, corporations receive massive windfalls thanks to government ‘relief’ efforts.


Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, minorities have disproportionately suffered from the virus’s health effects. A new study reveals that the government-mandated economic lockdowns have also hit minorities hardest.

In response to the outbreak and under the guidance of federal agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control, state and local governments imposed quarantine orders and mandated shutdowns for many businesses deemed “non-essential.” Whether one supports lockdowns as a public health measure or not, they undoubtedly resulted in tens of millions of Americans and counting filing for unemployment and a sharp economic downturn.

Like all government interventions into the economy, the unprecedented shutdown has not affected everyone equally. The government’s response to this crisis contained clear carve-outs and favoritism for politically connected large corporations, yet imposed disproportionate negative impacts on less politically influential minority-owned small businesses.

new paper from Professor Robert Fairlie of the University of California, Santa Cruz exposes this reality for all to see.

“The number of active business owners in the United States plummeted by 3.3 million or 22 percent over the crucial two-month window from February to April 2020,” Fairlie found in his analysis of nationally representative government survey data. “The drop in business owners was the largest on record, and losses were felt across nearly all industries and even for incorporated businesses.”

This is a troubling economic observation in and of itself, yet the data are even more concerning when broken down along racial lines.

“African-American businesses were hit especially hard experiencing a 41 percent drop. Latinx business owners fell by 32 percent, and Asian business owners dropped by 26 percent,” the professor reports. For context, white business owners only faced a 17 percent drop.

“Simulations indicate that industry compositions partly placed these groups at a higher risk of losses,” Fairlie continues. “Immigrant business owners experienced substantial losses of 36 percent. Female-owned businesses were also disproportionately hit by 25 percent.”

Remember that these abstract figures represent millions of actual people whose livelihoods were destroyed by the COVID-19 response. And as revealed in new reporting from the New York Times, the massive government programs passed as COVID-19 “relief” and “stimulus” efforts—we’re set to add a whopping $8 trillion in debt—are failing to help many of those who are most in need.

“Black-owned businesses also appear to be benefiting less from federal stimulus programs,” the paper reported. “Only 12 percent of black and Hispanic business owners polled between April 30 and May 12 received the funding they had requested.”

“It’s unfortunate that the businesses that need the funding, help and assistance the most are not receiving it,” the owner of a hair salon in the Bronx told the Times. “It’s like the Titanic. Where was the water coming up first? It was coming from the bottom. The people on the bottom were drowning first.”

Meanwhile, wealthy corporations are benefiting mightily from tax carve-outs in the congressional COVID-19 relief bill that was passed, the CARES Act.

Companies will receive more than $155 billion in benefits. This includes a whopping $862 million tax refund for the massive multinational corporation Boeing.

“The tax breaks were supposed to help ease companies’ red ink and keep paychecks flowing for workers,” Axios reports. “But most of the companies mentioned above, for example, have either furloughed employees or are pushing for buyouts.”

The lesson here is quite clear. When the government launches massive interventions into the economy and then passes 300+ page bills to “fix” the problem it helped create, political distortions will result in costs disproportionately borne by disadvantaged groups in society and benefits that skew toward the well-connected.

“I believe crony capitalism—the alliance between business and government—is the biggest problem of our age,” said economic historian Robert Higgs. “Crony capitalism, unfortunately, has a very active, organized, well-funded, and vocal constituency. It is the greatest threat to our prosperity and our freedom.”

“A free-market thwarts lobbying by taking the power that corporations seek away from government,” former Libertarian presidential candidate Mary J. Ruwart once said. “The only sure way to prevent the rich from buying unfair government influence is to stop allowing government to use physical force against peaceful people. Whenever government is allowed to favor one group over another, the rich will always win, since they can “buy” more favors, overtly or covertly, than the poor.”

The facts offered by this new paper and emerging COVID-19 data confirm theoretical predictions and offer a warning as to the unequal costs associated with mandating another lockdown if a “second wave” of COVID-19 emerges.

“Since bills keep piling up even when revenue isn’t coming in, many of these small [minority-owned] businesses face an uphill climb as it is,” the Wall Street Journal editorial board notes. “If they’re now getting back to work, and if they think they’ve taken the necessary precautions to do so safely, then the last thing they need is a politician ordering them to close shop for another month or two.”

Government lockdowns amid public health crises are ultimately a question of cost-benefit analysis. Whether one supports future pandemic lockdowns or not, we should all keep in mind that Americans do not bear the consequences of big government equally.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Bias of “Value of a Statistical Life” Measurements

EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

MISSOURI: Muslim who once threatened to behead a rival with ‘the sword of Islam’ launches petition to rename city of St. Louis

Umar Lee is a convert to Islam from St. Louis, was once enough of an Islamic supremacist to write to a rival: “i could cut your neck with the sword of islam and watch you squeal like a bitch like daniel pearl.” In an email exchange with me, he endorsed the death penalty for apostasy. He is also an unstable personality who briefly returned to Christianity in 2013, only to become a Muslim again abruptly and under circumstances that were never explained. He has also been on record for years as a hater of America, writing back in 2009 that it was not permissible for Muslims to join an infidel army.

Now he is enjoying another moment in the spotlight due to the Leftist/jihadist alliance. Given the aggression and fanaticism of the Leftists who are tearing down statues these days, and the ignorant cowards on the other side who neither know their own history or are inclined to defend it, he may well get his wish. Make no mistake: this call to rename St. Louis is not based on Louis IX’s antisemitism. As far as Umar Lee and his cohorts are concerned, that is likely a mark in his favor. The problem with Louis IX is that he was a Christian, and not any ordinary Christian, but a Crusade leader. That will not do in our woke new world. Watch for the unveiling of Saladin, Missouri.

“Petition calls for St. Louis to be renamed, removal of statue on Art Hill,” by Sam Masterson, KMOX, June 19, 2020:

ST. LOUIS (KMOX) – A petition has been made with hopes of changing the city’s name in St. Louis and taking down a statue of its namesake, Saint Louis IX in Forest Park. The creators say the city’s name is “outright disrespect” to Jewish and Muslim residents and they’re asking for support.

The petition on Change.org was started this week, after the statue of Christopher Columbus in Tower Grove Park was taken away. Local writer Umar Lee is a co-signer of the petition.

“For those unfamiliar with King Louis IX he was a rabid anti-semite who spearheaded many persecutions against the Jewish people. Centuries later Nazi Germany gained inspiration and ideas from Louis IX as they embarked on a campaign of murderous genocide against the Jewish people. Louis IX was also vehemently Islamophobic and led a murderous crusade against Muslims which ultimately cost him his life,” the petition states.

The statue of Louis IX, which now sits on top of Art Hill in front of the St. Louis Art Museum, was unveiled in 1906. It served as the symbol of St. Louis until the Gateway Arch was completed in 1965.

Louis IX is the only King of France to be canonized in the Catholic Church. He became king when he was 12-years-old and is credited with changing the judicial process in France, with trials no longer being settled by combat, but instead by evidence and Roman law.

He was also known as a devoted Catholic, who ordered the burning of some 12,000 manuscript copies of the Talmud and other Jewish books.

“I ask all people of good faith committed to the modern values of equity and coexistence to sign this petition to rename the City of St. Louis to something more suitable and indicative of our values,” the petition states….

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

SPECIAL VIDEO REPORT: The Truth Behind BLM — Pushing LGBT, Marxism, abortion!

People around the world have rallied under the Black Lives Matter banner, believing it’s about racial equality. But in fact, its true agenda is far more sinister. Even more disturbing is the way Catholic clergy are seeking to find common cause with this movement.

WATCH: Special Report: The Truth Behind BLM

VIDEO BY:

Christine Niles

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EDITORS NOTE: This Church Militant video is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Trump Administration Accomplishments on Life, Family, and Religious Freedom

To date, the administration of President Donald Trump has taken significant action on issues of concern to social conservatives — life, family, and religious liberty:

2017

  • On January 23, President Trump reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy, which blocks funding for international organizations that perform or promote abortion. This new program is known as Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance (PLGHA), which now covers $8.8 billion in family planning and global health funds that go to organizations abroad (none of whom may perform or promote abortion).
  • On February 22, the Department of Education, in conjunction with the Department of Justice (DOJ) rescinded President Obama’s guidance that required public schools to allow transgender students to use the bathrooms and showers of their choice.
  • On April 7, President Trump’s nominee Neil Gorsuch was confirmed to the Supreme Court. Justice Gorsuch has already developed a reputation as an originalist who will rule the right way on religious liberty issues. Gorsuch is representative of President Trump’s judicial nominees overall.
  • On May 4, President Trump signed an Executive Order Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty (known as the “Religious Liberty Executive Order”), broadly setting forth religious liberty as a policy priority of the administration, and requiring all federal agencies to take action to protect it. The order also more specifically addressed conscience protections, forthcoming guidance from the DOJ, and religious liberty in the context of free speech.
  • On August 25, President Trump announced changes to the Obama administration’s Department of Defense (DOD) policy which had allowed military personnel to serve even if they openly self-identified as transgender. (A DOD study found the Obama administration’s policy to be detrimental to military readiness, lethality, and unit cohesion.)
  • On September 7, DOJ filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court defending the religious freedom rights of baker Jack Phillips in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. This filing is representative of other actions defending religious freedom taking place throughout the Trump administration DOJ.
  • On October 6, DOJ issued guidance and an implementing memo (as instructed by the Religious Liberty Executive Order) to all federal agencies explaining religious freedom law and how religious liberty must be protected. This guidance laid out a broad defense of religious liberty based on multiple statutes and provided each federal agency with guidelines for protecting religious liberty.
  • Also on October 6, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) proposed two regulations to deal with the Obamacare “HHS contraceptive mandate” that had for years violated conscience and religious liberty. These new regulations exempt organizations that have moral or religious objections to purchasing insurance that includes coverage of contraceptives and abortion-causing drugs and devices.

2018

  • On January 16, DOJ filed an amicus brief with the District Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on behalf of the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. The Archdiocese had wanted to promote a religious message during the Christmas holiday but, had been denied advertising space within the District’s public transit system.
  • On January 18, DOJ filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue defending the First Amendment rights of parents and students who attend a religious school, to participate in a private school scholarship program.
  • On January 18, HHS announced a new Conscience and Religious Freedom Division within its Office of Civil Rights (OCR). This new division was established to enforce federal laws that protect conscience rights and religious freedom.
  • On January 19, HHS issued a new proposed regulation on conscience protections related to abortion. Specifically, the regulation proposed to implement 25 laws that protect pro-life healthcare entities against discrimination by federal agencies — or state or local governments receiving federal funds — due to their objections to participating in abortion, sterilization, and other morally objectionable procedures.
  • On January 24, Sam Brownback was confirmed as U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom. In choosing Brownback for this role, President Trump demonstrated the administration’s commitment to religious freedom by choosing someone with gravitas and experience on the issue.
  • On March 23, 2018, the White House and DOD issued a new policy allowing existing personnel to remain in the military while preventing those who have been diagnosed with “gender dysphoria” or had undergone gender transition surgery from joining the military. Those who are transgender and stable for 36 months could join so long as they serve in accordance with their biological sex.
  • On April 26, Mike Pompeo was confirmed as Secretary of State. In choosing Pompeo for this position, President Trump chose someone who cares deeply about religious liberty and will make it a priority to see the issue advanced through this administration.
  • On April 30, during a press conference with Nigeria’s president, President Trump raised the issue of religious freedom and the killing of Christians in that country — bringing attention to an issue that had largely been neglected by other government officials.
  • On May 22, HHS issued a new proposed regulation reversing the Title X family planning regulations implemented by President Clinton. The proposed regulation would restore the separation of abortion services from the federal Title X family planning program, which President Reagan first implemented. The proposed regulation would also ensure parents are more involved in the decisions of minors to obtain services from Title X clinics. It reverses the discriminatory abortion referral requirement the Clinton regulations implemented and is poised to put a dent into Planned Parenthood’s roughly $60 million annual revenues from the Title X program.
  • On June 13, DOJ announced the Place to Worship Initiative, designed to increase enforcement and public awareness of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUPIA). This federal law protects places of worship and other religious uses of property. Through this initiative, federal prosecutors will receive training about legal protections for houses of worship.
  • On July 24-26, the State Department held the first-ever Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom. Political and civil society leaders from around the world gathered in Washington, D.C. for a three-day summit to discuss religious freedom issues and solutions. The Potomac Declaration, issued at the Ministerial, made a strong statement about the state of religious freedom around the globe and provided a plan of action for promoting global religious freedom. The U.S. also announced the International Religious Freedom Fund (to provide emergency assistance to victims of religiously motivated discrimination and abuse around the world) and the Genocide Recovery and Persecution Response Initiative (which has provided nearly $373 million to help persecuted ethnic and religious minorities in northern Iraq restore their communities). The U.S. was among 25 countries who signed a statement condemning terrorism and the abuse of religious believers by non-state actors.
  • On July 30, DOJ announced a Religious Liberty Task Force to fully implement religious liberty guidance and policy across all components of the DOJ.
  • On August 1, the Trump administration relied on Executive Order 13818 (which builds on Global Magnitsky Act authority) to sanction two Turkish officials over the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson due to his Christian faith. This Executive Order ultimately resulted in Pastor Brunson’s release.
  • On September 24, HHS terminated a $15,900 contract with Advanced Bioscience Resources to procure fetal tissue from aborted babies for research. The termination of this contract led HHS to announce an audit of all acquisitions and research involving human fetal tissue to ensure consistency with statutes and regulations.
  • On October 6, President Trump’s nominee Brett Kavanaugh was confirmed to the Supreme Court. Kavanaugh is the second constitutional originalist the president saw confirmed to the Court.
  • On November 7, HHS finalized its two regulations to protect conscience and religious liberty from long-running problems with the Obamacare “HHS contraceptive mandate.” These two final regulations exempt organizations with either a moral or religious objection to purchasing insurance with coverage of contraceptives and abortion-causing drugs and devices. The regulations took effect on January 14, 2019.
  • On November 9, HHS proposed a new regulation to address an abortion surcharge hidden in many plans purchased on the Obamacare exchange. This proposed regulation would enforce the requirement that abortion surcharges are to be collected separately from other insurance premiums. This requirement was not closely followed under the Obama administration, leading HHS to now more strictly enforce the separation of abortion payments from other payments.
  • On December 26, DOJ filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court defending a publicly-displayed cross-shaped veteran’s memorial that had been challenged as a violation of the Establishment Clause. This position is representative of the Trump administration’s originalist approach to the Constitution concerning First Amendment rights and other issues. Such an approach results in legal analysis that interprets the law rather than injecting policy preferences into it.

2019

  • On January 18, HHS notified California that its law requiring pregnancy resource centers to post notices about how to obtain an abortion violated the pro-life Weldon and Coates-Snowe Amendments. This marks the first time that the Conscience and Religious Freedom Division at HHS found a state in violation of these laws. This demonstrates the administration’s commitment to enforcing conscience protections and its pro-life priorities.
  • On January 19, at the request of 169 members of Congress and 49 senators, President Trump sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in which he promised to veto any legislation that weakens current pro-life Federal policies and laws. This letter was a message to the new Democrat majority in the House that longstanding pro-life protections like the Hyde Amendment and safeguards protecting the conscience rights of health care providers are not negotiable.
  • On Februa ry 22, HHS announced final rule changes governing the Title X family planning program. Consistent with federal law, these rule changes ensured that Title X clinics would be financially and physically separate from abortion facilities and would not refer patients for abortions. Since the implementation of the rule, Planned Parenthood and several pro-abortion states voluntarily decided to withdraw from the program rather than quit performing abortions or referring patients for abortions.
  • On March 8, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback criticized China’s poor religious freedom record in a speech he delivered in Hong Kong.
  • On April 12, the Trump administration’s policy on military service by those with gender dysphoria went into effect. This policy will help halt the deterioration of military readiness, lethality, and unit cohesion caused by social experimentation in the military.
  • On May 2, HHS announced a final rule to expand the structure in which federal conscience laws are enforced. In 2011, President Obama issued a rule that enforced only three federal conscience provisions. The new regulation under President Trump covers 25 existing statutes, which will be enforced by the new Conscience and Religious Freedom Division, part of the HHS OCR.
  • On May 5, at the World Health Assembly, the Trump administration issued a joint statement on behalf of the United States and eight other nations calling on other countries to join an effort to focus on women’s health issues that unify rather than create dissension among members (like abortion and sexual and reproductive health). This statement was the first action taken under the administration’s new Protecting Life in Global Health Policy (PLGHP), which seeks to build a global coalition to promote women’s health while also protecting unborn life and strengthening the family. This policy works in conjunction with the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance (PLGHA) program, which restricts funding for organizations abroad that perform or promote abortion.
  • On May 24, HHS proposed a new regulation that clarifies that discrimination on the basis of sex in section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act was to be interpreted under the plain meaning of the word. Therefore, it does not include “gender identity” or “termination of pregnancy” as set forth by a 2016 Obama administration regulation. The HHS regulation will continue to enforce existing civil rights protections; however, it makes clear that the federal government will not force physicians to participate in gender reassignment surgeries or abortions.
  • On June 5, after an extensive audit into fetal tissue research, the Trump administration announced a major change in the enforcement of research contracts. HHS would no longer conduct intramural (internal) research using tissue from aborted babies and would greatly increase the ethics rules and safeguards that govern extramural (external) fetal tissue research contracts. All new external contracts will be subject to a congressionally authorized ethics advisory board, making it much more difficult for fetal tissue research contracts to be awarded by the National Institute of Health.
  • On July 16-18, the State Department held the second Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced a new global initiative, the International Religious Freedom Alliance, meant to provide a way for like-minded countries to work together to advance religious freedom. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai gave a compelling speech condemning the use of technology to track and control the lives of religious minorities. The United States was among 14 signatory countries on a statement of concern about technology and religious freedom. The U.S. was also one of 34 countries that signed a statement of concern on counterterrorism as a pretext for the repression of religious freedom; one of 27 countries that signed a statement condemning blasphemy, apostasy, or other laws that restrict religious freedom; and was one of 46 countries that signed a statement that called upon government officials to condemn attacks on places of worship and to work with religious communities to protect these places. At this event, the State Department and USAID also announced new religious freedom training programs for foreign service officers.
  • On July 16, the State Department placed targeted sanctions on Burmese military officials for their human rights and religious freedom violations committed against the Rohingya Muslim population.
  • On July 18, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and HHS Secretary Alex Azar issued a joint letter on International Partnerships that called states to join a coalition of countries that seek to advocate against pro-abortion policies at the World Health Organization and the United Nations (UN).
  • In August 2019, DOJ filed amicus briefs with the Supreme Court in two important religious liberty cases, R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and Bostock v. Clayton County/Altitude Express, Inc. v. Zarda. Through these filings, DOJ advanced a biologically binary definition of sex and those who operate accordingly, whether because of science or religious belief.
  • On August 15, the Department of Labor (DOL) proposed a new regulation that would clarify the scope and application of religious exemptions for federal contractors. Under the Obama administration, the scope of religious exemption at the DOL was severely narrowed. The current DOL relied on the history of our nation’s preservation of religious liberty, the First Amendment, and Supreme Court decisions to re-invigorate the exemption to its historical and constitutional parameters.
  • On August 28, the HHS OCR issued a notice of violation to the University of Vermont Medical Center for forcing a nurse to participate in an abortion despite a conscience objection. This marks the third time that the HHS Religious Freedom Division under President Trump has investigated a conscience complaint related to participating in or promoting abortion.
  • On September 10, the State Department placed targeted sanctions on Russian officials for their religious freedom violations and torture of Jehovah’s Witnesses.
  • On September 23, President Trump hosted a meeting during the U.N. General Assembly and gave a speech solely on the topic of religious freedom. During the speech, he announced a U.S. policy initiative to protect places of worship, pledging an additional $25 million in funding to protect religious sites and relics. President Trump also announced the U.S. would form a coalition within the business community to protect religious freedom. This is the first time a U.S. president has hosted a meeting focused solely on religious freedom at the UN.
  • On September 24, President Trump discussed the need to protect religious freedom during his UN General Assembly speech, in which he also discussed China and Iran — two major violators of religious freedom.
  • On September 25, HHS Secretary Alex Azar delivered a statement at the UN General Assembly stating that there is no international right to abortion, and that the U.S. does not support ambiguous terms like “sexual and reproductive health” in UN documents.
  • On October 7, the Department of Commerce blacklisted 28 Chinese companies whose surveillance technology products are used to systematically oppress and control — and violate the religious freedom — of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang, China.
  • On October 11, 2019, Attorney General Barr delivered a striking defense of religious liberty at Notre Dame Law School. He noted, “[t]he imperative of protecting religious freedom was not just a nod in the direction of piety. It reflects the Framers’ belief that religion was indispensable to sustaining our free system of government.” The Attorney General proceeded to remind the audience that religion gives us the “right rules to live by.” Barr highlighted the recent attacks on religious liberty, and that the DOJ under his leadership has been fighting back and protecting religious liberty.
  • On November 14, the U.S. government lead a statement on behalf of itself and 10 other countries at the Nairobi Summit, once again calling upon the international community to focus on areas of consensus instead of divisive issues like abortion and sexual and reproductive health.
  • On November 19, HHS issued a rule removing burdensome requirements that all grantees, including those that are faith-based, must accept same-sex marriages and profess gender identity as valid in order to be eligible to participate in grant programs. This included the adoption and foster care space, where these requirements had been used to shut down faith-based providers of foster care and adoption.
  • On November 27, President Trump signed the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act into law, which affirms Hong Kong’s semi-autonomous status and protects against Chinese government encroachment, which is a threat to Hong Kong’s religious freedom.
  • On December 19, the Treasury Department sanctioned two Iranian judges responsible for human rights violations. One of the judges was known to violate the rights of Iran’s Christian and Baha’i religious minority communities
  • On December 20, the center for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced a final regulation to address the abortion surcharge hidden in many plans purchased on the Obamacare exchange. This final rule aligns federal regulations with section 1303 of the Affordable Care Act, ensuring that consumers know their health care plan covers abortion and that funding for abortion is kept separate from all other covered services.

2020

  • On January 16, HHS Secretary Alex Azar hosted 34 countries for a meeting on how to promote women’s health and protect the lives of the unborn. This meeting followed an invitation sent by Secretary Azar and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to 70 different countries inviting them to join a coalition to oppose international efforts to enshrine abortion as a human right.
  • On January 16, the Departments of Education and Justice issued guidance on constitutionally protected prayer and religious expression in public elementary and secondary schools. This guidance ensures that prayer in schools is properly protected and not unconstitutionally prohibited or curtailed.
  • On January 16, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) sent a memo to the heads of executive departments and agencies providing guidance on Executive Order (EO) 13798 “Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty.” In order to protect the ability of religious organizations to operate in the public square, this memo required the agencies to review the EO and publish policies on how they will comply.
  • On January 17, nine federal agencies (the Departments of AgricultureEducationHomeland SecurityVeterans AffairsJusticeLaborHealth and Human Services, and Housing and Urban Development, along with the U.S. Agency for International Development) proposed rules leveling the playing field for faith-based organizations wishing to participate in grant programs or become a contractor. The rules eliminated two requirements placed on faith-based organizations that were not placed on secular organizations.
  • On January 22, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services at HHS approved a family planning waiver for Texas to implement a state-run Medicaid program that excludes abortion providers like Planned Parenthood. This makes Texas the first state to receive Medicaid funding for a family planning program that does not include abortion providers.
  • On January 24, President Trump became the first sitting president to give remarks in person at the annual March for Life in Washington, D.C. In his address he stated the eternal truth that every child is a sacred gift from God and reiterated his effort to defend the dignity and sanctity of every human life.
  • Also on January 24, HHS Secretary Alex Azar announced live at Family Research Council’s ProLifeCon event that HHS issued a notice of violation to California for violating the federal Weldon Amendment by mandating all health insurers provide coverage for abortion. California’s abortion coverage mandate has deprived over 28,000 residents of plans that do not cover abortion. This marks the second time that HHS has issued a notice of violation to California for violating federal conscience laws and is the fourth enforcement action taken by the HHS OCR’s Conscience and Religious Freedom Division.
  • In February, the Trump administration filled the role of Special Adviser to the President on International Religious Freedom within the National Security Council. This role was authorized by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998, but has remained unfilled for over 20 years since that law’s enactment. President Trump is the first president to dedicate a full-time staffer to this role and fill it on a permanent basis.
  • On February 4, during his State of the Union address, President Trump called on Congress to pass legislation that would ban late-term abortions. To highlight the need for this legislation, he invited special guest Ellie Schneider, who was born at just 21 weeks gestation.
  • On February 5, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo launched the International Religious Freedom Alliance. The Alliance will unite government leaders from like-minded nations to strategize ways to promote religious freedom and protect religious minorities around the world.
  • On February 25, OMB issued a Statement of Administrative Policy strongly supporting two pro-life bills being voted on in the U.S. Senate: the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act and the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act. Had Congress passed these bills, the president’s advisors would have recommended that he sign both into law.
  • On March 24, DOJ filed a statement of interest in a case protecting women against men intruding on their sporting competitions. The statement made clear that athletic qualifications on the basis of “gender identity” were harmful to women’s sports.
  • On March 28, amid the coronavirus pandemic, HHS OCR issued a strong statement reminding health care entities of their obligation to treat persons with disabilities with the same dignity and worth as everyone else. OCR reiterated its duty to enforce current civil rights laws and has already worked with states like Alabama and Pennsylvania to remove discriminatory practices from their pandemic health plans.
  • On April 2, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback held a special briefing. He called upon China, North Korea, Iran, and Russia to release their prisoners of conscience in light of the contagious coronavirus. Many of these prisoners were imprisoned for their religious faith.
  • On April 3, after hearing from Family Research Council and other organizations, the Small Business Administration (SBA) issued a FAQ document confirming that churches and religious nonprofits are eligible for assistance like the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) in the coronavirus relief legislation known as the CARES Act. These clarifying protections ensure organizations would not be discriminated against based on their religious affiliation and would not have to give up their religious freedom in order to participate in these programs. In addition, the administration used an affiliation rule to ensure that large abortion providers like Planned Parenthood would not be eligible for coronavirus relief in the CARES Act.
  • On April 14, DOJ filed a statement of interest protecting the religious liberty of church-goers in Greenville, Mississippi. During the coronavirus pandemic, the city of Greenville banned all religious services, even those that were able to abide by social distancing standards with drive-in church services.
  • On April 17, the Department of Homeland Security included “clergy for essential support” in its list of personnel and entities deemed “essential” for purposes of responding to the coronavirus. This designation allows clergy and pastors more freedom to continue to operate and serve those around them in need at this time.
  • On April 27, Attorney General William Barr directed federal prosecutors to monitor and, if necessary, take action to correct state and local policies that discriminate against religious institutions and believers while battling the coronavirus pandemic.
  • On May 3, DOJ filed a statement of interest supporting the religious freedom of Lighthouse Fellowship Church in Chincoteague Island, Virginia. After the church held a 16-person worship service on Palm Sunday (following strict social distancing protocols), a criminal citation and summons were issued against the pastor pursuant to Governor Ralph Northam’s executive order which banned in-person religious services but allowed large gatherings for businesses like liquor stores and dry cleaners.
  • As of May 12, the Trump administration has overseen the confirmation of 193 federal judges, including two Supreme Court justices and 51 federal appeals court judges. Counting seven other judicial confirmations for roles outside the federal court system, President Trump has confirmed 200 judges so far during his time in office. An overwhelming number of President Trump’s judicial nominees have been constitutional originalists, who will interpret the law as written, rather than interpret it according to their personal policy preferences. As judges, these nominees will rule correctly on religious liberty and pro-life issues.
  • On May 15, the DOL issued guidance implementing the administration’s Religious Liberty Executive Order and the DOJ religious liberty guidance. The DOL guidance also cited tothe OMB memo from earlier this year which directed all grant-administering agencies to detail how they will protect religious liberty in the context of such grants, and included specific action steps to ensure that religious liberty is protected.
  • On May 18, USAID Acting Administrator John Barsa sent a letter to the UN Secretary General advocating that the UN not push abortion during the coronavirus crisis. Barsa noted that abortion is not an “essential service,” and there are many actual health needs at this time. Therefore, the United States, which stands with the international pro-life community under the Trump administration, does not look kindly on these efforts topromote abortion.

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EDITORS NOTE: This FRC-Action column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Islamic Republic of Iran depicts George Floyd as Shi’ite Muslim saint

This is entirely consistent with the other behavior of the Islamic regime in Iran. When it orders people to scream “Death to America” every Friday in mosques, the regime is making the destruction of America into a holy act. The murder of George Floyd touched off destructive riots and ongoing unrest in the United States — a manifestation of Allah’s judgment against the Great Satan. So of course George Floyd is a saint.

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Al Jazeera anchor enraged over call to combat anti-Semitism

France: Three Muslim teens charged for threatening to murder high-school girl for criticizing Islam

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

PLANNED PARENTHOOD: ‘Black Lives Matter’ [Video]

DETROIT (ChurchMilitant.com) – Planned Parenthood (PP) is the newest vocal supporter of the Black Lives Matter movement, despite the cognitive dissonance involved. The abortion giant has demonstrated no regard for human lives in general and black lives in particular.

At least two Planned Parenthood affiliates in different regions of the country are now publicly backing Black Lives Matter. Yet racial equality and respect for human life — particularly black lives — is exactly what Planned Parenthood is not concerned with, recognizes Stan Guthrie, author, minister, and contributing editor for Breakpoint, a Christian website whose content “cuts through the fog of relativism … with truth and compassion.”

Guthrie speaks for countless thinking people when figuratively scratching his head, he points out the clear hypocrisy.

Planned Parenthood Advocates of Oregon states:

Black and Brown communities in the United States have suffered murder, violence, trauma and overt and covert racism perpetrated by white people and white-led systems and institutions throughout our country’s entire history. This state-sanctioned violence and murder is not new, but it is intolerable and horrific and must stop. Black lives matter.

Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast says:

The over-policing of black bodies extends far beyond the actions of individual police officers. It is in our workplaces, our schools, our public institutions. It is in our health care system. It is that same policing of black bodies that makes the promise of reproductive freedom unattainable for so many black people in this country.

The first, obvious contradiction is that Planned Parenthood kills preborn babies. That is a prime money-maker for the abortion giant.

According to Planned Parenthood’s most recent annual report for 2018–2019, it committed 345,672 prenatal murders in the United States in fiscal year 2018. That means 1,768 babies every single day. Its approximately 3 million abortions since 2011 is 38% of all surgical abortions committed in the United States.

Black lives: ‘human weeds’ to ‘exterminate’

With regard to race, Planned Parenthood was founded by eugenicist Margaret Sanger.

“Birth control does not mean contraception indiscriminately practiced,” Sanger once said. “It means the release and cultivation of the better elements in our society, and the gradual suppression, elimination and eventual extinction, of defective stocks — those human weeds which threaten the blooming of the finest flowers of American civilization.”

Who she may have meant by “human weeds” was clarified in a letter of Dec. 10, 1939, to Clarence Gamble. Sanger explained the nature of her organization’s outreach to the African-American community, saying: “The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.”

Sanger also said in her writings that immigrants, the “unfit,” the “delinquent and dependent classes,” and the “feeble-minded” should be controlled, if not weeded out.

Contraception, in her mind, was a great tool for doing so. She said it is a “powerful weapon against national and racial decadence.” Ostensibly, Sanger wanted her Birth Control League, the precursor of Planned Parenthood, to use birth control as a weapon against racial minorities as well as the mentally and physically handicapped.

Black Lives Still Targeted

It is no secret that Planned Parenthood tends to target minorities in impoverished areas of the country. “In 2014, 36% of all abortions were performed on black women, who are just 13% of the female population,” reported Jason Riley of the Wall Street Journal.

According to Illinois Right to Life and the 2010 Census, 79% of the Planned Parenthood surgical abortion facilities are located within walking distance of minority communities. And this is not without effect. In some cities, such as New York, black abortions outnumber black live births by thousands every year.

This is why groups such as Blacks for Life and BlackGenocide.org have sprung up to defend black babies from the abortion suction machine and black communities from the disproportionate number of babies lost each year due to abortion

As commentators note, Planned Parenthood and Black Lives Matter are certainly strange bedfellows.

RELATED ARTICLE: Vatican Hails BLM as ‘Non-Violent’

EDITORS NOTE: This Church Militant column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

VIDEO: The Vortex — Take Their Money, Mr. President. Choke ’em off.

TRANSCRIPT

The whole Washington, D.C. establishment (a.k.a., “the Swamp”) has gone completely in publicly to ensure President Trump does not remain president. General Colin Powell over the weekend added his voice to a growing chorus of Trump-haters within the Swamp to say he will not vote for Trump.

By the way, he added in an interview that he didn’t vote for him in 2016 either: So who cares what he thinks, really? And this is key: The U.S. hierarchy and especially its political arm is an active member of the D.C. Swamp. They have been for decades, and they hate Trump because it’s all being exposed.

It’s high time the Catholic Church in the United States loses its tax-exempt status. There are simply too many crooked shepherds who profit from the deal and who are not using the money they save to fulfill the Church’s mission. Accused homosexual bishops like D.C.’s Wilton Gregory — so gay that in Church circles he’s known as the African Queen — are enemies of Christ and His Church and uncover themselves more and more every day.

Gregory and the entire leadership of the U.S. hierarchy for decades has been fomenting revolution in politics, pretending to care for the poor. They care nothing for the poor, except to mobilize them and use them to keep the Party of Death in power, which in turn keeps giving the bishops money to keep the Swamp filled.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is a very active part of the D.C. Swamp, and that’s why the tax-exempt status needs to go away. You would be hard-pressed to find a more wicked, sinister cabal of liars and thieves — and that’s saying a lot in D.C.

The men who built the USCCB bureaucracy and who now keep it going developed secret pipelines to bring in homosexual men from South America and flood U.S. seminaries. They lied to the faithful, shredded documents, committed perjury, engaged in and/or covered up the rape of thousands of mostly teenage boys and they maintained their control to keep up these moral outrages partially through their tax-exempt status.

The Church as we see it in America today, in the hands of these corrupt shepherds, is little else than a crime syndicate that Donald Trump should break up. Major dioceses and archdioceses are sitting on enormous endowments and not telling the people they continue to soak. For example, the archdiocese of Detroit has an endowment in the hundreds of millions; yet it still applied for and received over $2 million in Wuhan economic-stimulus money.

Even rolling in that much cash, they still laid off a huge portion of staff and are now at the beginning of the most incredible shrinking of a diocese practically on record.

These thieves in miters have stashed away tens if not hundreds of billions of dollars collectively and yet still enjoy a tax-exempt status. For what? These Marxists work to undermine America and replace the nation-state system by ushering in a new world order, complete with its no-borders, globalist, save-the-planet, shrink-the-population, diabolical propaganda.

The latest example of their participation is D.C. Abp. Gregory’s quiet joining-of-forces to help destabilize President Trump by ordering his clergy to show up in cassocks at a protest in Lafayette Park yesterday, and then march on the White House at high noon.

There are a couple of issues here. Gregory hates cassocks, and the word is out in D.C. if you are a priest not to wear one around him, which is a little strange: You’d think he fancies a man in a frock. Second, the “Catholic protest” just happened, by sheer coincidence, out of the blue, to coincide with another leftist protest calling for the president to be deposed.

And the African Queen knows that the sight of priests dressed like priests mingled in with BLM and Antifa types and chanting and fist-pumping would potentially create a firestorm of TV news video as well as headlines like “Catholic Church Wants Trump Ousted.” And headlines like that would be little else than what the Marxist media has become so proficient in: fake news.

Authentic Catholics, as opposed to the ones lobotomized by bishops over the past 50 years, understand the stakes here. So too does Abp. Viganò, who published a letter to Trump saying essentially, “The moment has arrived, Mr. President. It’s good against evil, and you are the one in the Oval Office.”

Viganò also called gay Gregory a “false shepherd.” False shepherds run false churches that they poorly disguise as the true Church. But authentic Catholics can sniff out the smell of sulphur around this putrid lot in a heartbeat. Thousands of black Americans, most of them young men, have been gunned down in urban America — yet not a word about any of them.

Only 2% of black slayings came at the hands of police officers; so even if the police were all defunded, as Minneapolis is now saying it will, what about the other 98% of black Americans being killed? And what about the millions of black Americans who never make it past Planned Parenthood? That’s millions.

Why isn’t Wilton having his priests stampede the White House about all those black lives? Oh, wait — black babies have an ally in Donald Trump, so no need for a riot in cassocks.

Gay Gregory and all his brother Marxist bishops want Trump gone and are spinning the narrative that he’s to blame for all this. Inside operatives told Church Militant that the African Queen became enraged at the Knights of Columbus having invited Trump to the National Shrine and demanded they cooperate with his plan, ordering the local D.C. Knights to e-mail their pro-life list to try and get the troops mobilized to hit the streets.

President Trump, two things, please, for yourself and Catholics who are sick of the bishop tyranny:

  1. Turn off the spigot of funds flowing to the corrupt USCCB
  2. Get the Church’s tax-exempt status cancelled. They engage in politics, not religion.

EDITORS NOTE: This Church Militant video is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Molotov-throwing Lawyer was Trained by Palestinian Radicals

For several days I’ve been meaning to give you an update on the pair of Brooklyn lawyers, both new Americans, who were caught tossing an incendiary device into a police cruiser in a recent Antifa/Black Lives Matter riot in New York.

See my previous post here.

There is a lengthy discussion about the fools at the New York Times  where they are identified as being from immigrant families. He is Jamaican and Rahman was born in Pakistan according to the NYT. I wonder how many of our tax dollars went into educating this pair.

The New York Post published a video of Ms. Rahman extolling the virtues of violent protests.***

Here is Joshua Klein at Breitbart telling us more about where Fordham-educated attorney Urooj Rahman, 31, got her terror training.

Molotov-throwing Lawyer in Brooklyn Was Intern for Soros-funded Anti-Israel Group

One of the two lawyers accused of trying to torch an NYPD cruiser during protests that engulfed Brooklyn over the weekend spent a summer in the West Bank as a fellow and intern with radical Palestinian activist organizations.

Two attorneys, Colinford Mattis, 32, and Urooj Rahman, 31, reportedly were caught attempting to distribute homemade Molotov cocktail devices to protesters who were clashing with police near the 88th Precinct in Fort .

Rahman attempted to distribute Molotov cocktails to the witness and others so that those individuals could likewise use the incendiary devices in furtherance of more destruction and violence,” a witness was quoted as saying to authorities in a detention memo from federal prosecutors for the Eastern District of New York.

Rahman was captured in a photo obtained by the New York Daily News wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh on her face and holding a makeshift Molotov cocktail. The keffiyeh, a chequered black and white scarf, has become a symbol of Palestinian nationalism.

Rahman is a graduate from Fordham University law school. In 2014, she did a summer fellowship internship program at the Israel based Mada Al-Carmel’s Arab Center for Applied Social Research in a partnership program with Palestine Works.

The Mada Al-Carmel center is heavily financed by George Soros through his Open Society Foundations.

[….]

Rahman called for an “overhaul of policing in America” to end “gentrification’s violent effects on communities of colors,” echoing the central demand of some of the protest movement over George Floyd’s death.

Appearing before Judge Margo Brodie, Salmah Rizvi, a former high-level Obama intel official reportedly posted $250,000 bail to secure the release of Rahman.

Rahman reportedly had to return to federal custody after the U.S. Court of Appeals decided to reverse the decision by the District Court to allow her to post bail.

When she first posted bail, Rahman’s friend, Rizvi, told the court, “I earn $255,000 a year.” “Urooj Rahman is my best friend and I am an associate at the law firm Ropes & Gray in Washington, D.C.”

According to a report from Law360, the judge noted the strong evidence against Rahman, who was additionally accused of distributing incendiary devices to other rioters, but agreed to grant her bail due to the “willingness of family and friends to sign on as suretors.”

The Washington Free Beacon reported that Rizvi “served in intelligence posts in the Defense and State Departments during the Obama administration, where her high-value work would often inform the President’s Daily Briefs.”

To learn more about Rizvi, Rahman and the Soros connection, continue reading here.

On Friday the feds upped the charges against three bomb-throwers including Rahman. She and the two others face sentences of life in prison.

See the indictment here.

Bail was earlier revoked for Rahman and Mattis.  See here.

Endnote:  If one went behind the scenes to see the Leftists training their journalists, I expect the number one instruction is for them to tell the stories of the lives of individuals—poor immigrants, poor abused African Americans, poor____ (fill in the blank)—to play on the emotions of the reader or viewer.

Why aren’t we doing more of that—telling the sad stories of those abused and injured by the Leftists and their policies? 

***Just as I was wrapping up, the link to the video at the NY POST was not working, but here is the entire clip at Youtube:

EDITORS NOTE: This Frauds, Crooks and Criminals column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Raised in Unreality

This is another in a series of children’s propagandist story books distributed to libraries nationwide and in other countries, another facet of the many war strategies used against the west, overtly about Israel, but covertly about changing opinions and accepting Islam.  The facade of victimhood is usually at play; one need only be alert to recognize how it’s employed. 


Tasting the Sky, by Ibtisam Barakat, is a story told through the memories of a three-and-a-half-year-old girl in Ramallah, West Bank, the heartland of Biblical Israel and known through the centuries as Samaria.  it is categorized to be read by Middle Graders, ages 6 and up, who know nothing of the region’s history.   Without guidance, analysis and clarification, they would conclude that Israel is the interloper and Palestinians the natives, and by extension, western civilization is evil.  This is Islamic indoctrination, inappropriate for distribution.

It begins with a sketchy historical note that the conflict over the State of Israel, the background of the story, continues to this day, but the conflict’s origin is ignored.  For over fourteen centuries, Arabs have been following Mohammed’s decrees by attacking and slaughtering the Jews within the land and brutalizing Christians, Romans, Persians, Ethiopians, Berbers, Turks, Visigoths, Franks, Egyptians, Indians, and more, elsewhere.  Unable to deny 1400 years of Jewish presence in the land, the Arabs embellish the discord with lies of shared history, prophets, and archaeology.  But the land has only ever been the ancestral homeland of the Jews, who reestablished their national independence in Israel after 2,000 years, its legality endorsed by the United Nations, in 1948.  Israel also received the recognition of Yusaf Diya al-Khaldi Mayor of Jerusalem (1899), Lord Robert Cecil (1918), Emir Faisal, leader of the Arab World (1919); and Sir Winston Churchill (1920).

To devalue Israel’s legitimacy, the author alleges that the State of Israel was founded solely because of the Holocaust, but that is not the case.  “Zion” is the age-old name for Jerusalem; “Zionism” is love of Zion, and the national liberation movement begun in the late 1800s with the creation of 20 new Jewish cities in what was then called Palestine (a Roman appellation).  It is also the political movement of restoration and return founded by Theodor Herzl in 1897, decades before the Holocaust.  After World War I, when Iraq, Lebanon and Syria were created from the defeated Ottoman Empire, so were Palestine’s boundaries created and recognized as the Jewish homeland.  This is what Mohammed’s successors repudiate.  Israel’s capital, Jerusalem, established 1000 BCE, has held a majority Jewish population since the late 1860s.

Barakat’s personal story begins at age 19, returning home from Birzeit, West Bank, where activist students ignore the barbaric crimes of Islamist groups – lynching, beheading, whipping, crucifixion, castration, rape-to-death, burning alive and other unspeakable tortures – but fight with Israeli soldiers, protesting the “occupation.”  “Occupier” is legal terminology that does not apply to Israel, as Israel’s legal title and rights were established in the San Remo resolution, adopted by the Allied Powers after World War I, confirmed by the League of Nations, and incorporated into the UN charter. Calling Israel an occupier is equal to calling the Arabs occupiers of Arabia.   This is “projection,” attributing one’s own qualities or ideas to another.  After losing their aggressive war in 1967, they self-identified as Palestinians and occupy this land as their strategy.

In the book, Ibtisam is returning to Ramallah, once a Christian city, now renamed “Hill of Allah” by Arab forces that took the town in the first Arab-Israeli war, 1948-49.  When her bus is stopped at an Israeli checkpoint, she expresses fear for passengers’ showing their ID and tickets, although identification is commonplace at border crossings between jurisdictions.  Because Palestinians have proven an aggressive people, Israelis also check for weapons or passengers swathed in explosives, their parents’ sacrifices to Allah for monetary reward.  The naïve readers are influenced to fear.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) operate on strict commands that, as representatives of Israel, they must behave with humanity.  Passengers are not raped, tortured, or beheaded.  Rather, once cleared, they are free to proceed.  In fact, Palestinians have begun producing fictitious film enactments to blame Israelis for mistreatment because they cannot confirm their claims, Israelis being known for their morality.  The author even writes that one soldier attempts to return her fare because they will be rerouted to the  Military Rule Center, a detention center.

As her story unfolds, she is three years old when an Israeli soldier comes to their house and allegedly makes sexual gestures to her mother.  Mother tells Father that she fears rape if he returns, but I question why he didn’t rape her right then.  The accusation is possible but since Ibtisam’s story is fraught with fabrications, both the checkpoint accusation and this one might be projections.   Muslim men have endangered the streets of Germany, France, and London, and made Sweden the Rape Capital of the West and India, the Rape Capital of the World. Mother could assume the same of Israeli soldiers.

Israelis are held accountable for their actions under Israeli law; rape is not sanctioned as in Islam.  A noteworthy phenomenon: reports indicate the lack of Israel’s military rape, which “merely strengthens the ethnic boundaries and clarifies the inter-ethnic differences – just as organized military rape would have done.”   A Seattle university professor declared at a BDS event, “You IDF soldiers don’t rape Palestinian women because Israelis are so racist and disgusted by them that you won’t touch them.”  In any case, Father accepts Mother’s word and they leave.

As Ibtisam’s bus is en route to the detention center, she ponders her postal box, her foreign pen pals, and recalls her father’s nightmares as he relived his loss of freedom in 1967.  He’d told his children that the war came to them, not that five Arab nations initiated an offensive against the new Israel in 1948.  He excluded that the Arabs ignored the UN and Israel’s decision to designate Jerusalem an international city, home to Israelis and Arabs.  Instead, they forced the Jews out, destroying graveyards and at least 50 percent of the city’s synagogues.  Nineteen years later, 1967, following Israel’s warning that Nasser’s closure of the Straits of Tiran against Israeli shipping and his forces mobilized at the border would be casus belli, Israel preempted Egypt’s action by destroying its air force and initiating a ground offensive.  The result was Israel’s acquisition of the West Bank/Judea-Samaria, the Golan Heights, Sinai Peninsula, and Gaza.  Although Israel immediately offered to return land for peace, the Arab governments refused to talk or recognize Israel.  Father’s story is misleading; the reader misled.

The author recalls June 5, 1967.  She is three when Father returns from work without his usual treats, announcing that Israeli planes are targeting Palestinians, soldiers combing their homes and butchering everyone.  Again, this is untrue, but projection.  (Mohammed’s conquests included beheading the men and enslaving the women.)  The Arab countries initiate, and Israeli forces repel, the onslaught, yet the Israeli government nevertheless invites the Arab residents to remain safely in their homes and become citizens.  Some families stay, but many heed their own army’s orders to go to Jordan or the caves, expecting to return triumphant.  Mother and children escape with the rest; father leaves to see if he can be of help.

Yes, Ibtisam remembers gun shots, air raids, but she cannot name the aggressor, and the reader assumes they run to escape the Israelis.  The child knows they lost the war, her home, and her shoes. and they cannot return to Ramallah.  Her mother is 24,  with three children in tow, ages 8, 7, and 3,  and she soon gives birth to her fourth child.  Father is 44.  At the time of their marriage, Mother was 15, Father 35.  In a culture where there is no loving courtship, marriage is described as a series of rapes interrupted by childbirth.

When a little boy has drowned in the river, they say the water stole him.  We often see signs of Islamic projection.  The young reader cannot alone grasp that Muslims take no responsibility for their behaviors, attacks or plight, and lies are routine.   With the announcement that they “lost Palestine” comes the stinging victimization, not the realization that their wounds were self-inflicted.

Radio announcements of refugees who may return to the new Israel include Ibtisam’s family, but many are refused entry to their countries of origin, the surrounding countries that pursued war.

And because so much of the humanitarian aid is redirected to the Palestinian Authority, for weapons and payments to families of “martyrs” who are killed while killing Israelis, the dispossessed are destined for neglect for generations to come, their victimhood worsened, their futures bleak.  To this day, they blame Israel for “colonizing their land,” when there is no evidence that “Palestinians” were ever an identifiable people, with history, government, culture or language.  They were Arabs from surrounding lands or nomadic Bedouins.

Facts are facts: Jews (Hebrews) are the indigenous people of what the Romans called Palaestina.  Despite Israel’s overtures of peace, unilaterally returning land to Egypt and Lebanon, and signing a peace treaty with Jordan, Palestinians continue their attacks.  Do the young readers see Israel’s offers of peace and opportunities to prosper?  Do they know that the Palestinians refuse?

Back in Ramallah, the Israeli soldiers marching in formation down the streets, armed but carrying Israeli flags and “chanting” (singing), are a source of anxiety and entertainment.  When Ibtisam hears “sounds of war,” she does not know that they are the Palestinians’ ongoing, daily attacks against Israelis – throwing rocks and missiles at Israeli vehicles, firing rockets and mortar into Israel, or youths hurling firebombs at troops who then return fire with their weapons.   The Palestinians are consistent.  They will continue to attack until one day, with Allah’s help, they expect success.  Meanwhile, generations of people endure in stagnant misery and perceived victimhood.

When Jamel Abdel Nasser dies, Father exclaims, “Now we are all orphans.”  It is likely that Father, if not mother also, has his roots in Egypt.  “Barakat” is a Muslim name, and common to Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh; its definition is “blessings.”  When the women of the family gather for the boys’ circumcision, dressed in “the styles of hundreds of years,” the embroidery may indicate their country’s design, or that of the nomadic Bedouin.  It cannot represent a Palestinian country that never existed.

Ibtisam’s family has survived whole, parents and six children, but there are others who have endured much hardship.  She does not  speak of the many victims of the Palestinian leadership’s greed and complete disregard to the people’s suffering.  During the same years since 1948, while Israelis create a prosperous nation, are happy, and live in comparative freedom and security, generations of Palestinians wallow in poverty, hardship, self-pity and resentment – squandered lives with the fear of another war looming over their heads.    This book has hidden many truths, and a new generation of readers grows up to take on Mohammed’s legacy of war, to side with the tyranny of Islam and resent the freedoms of Israel and America.   Rather than reading propaganda, American children should be learning more about the humble beginnings and magnificence of America’s ideals and, by extension, Israel’s.

©All rights reserved.

VIDEO: MIAMI, FL — Muslim cleric says Christianity responsible for riots and looting, Islam is the solution

Yes, nothing could be clearer than that the rioters and looters are deeply committed Christians. In reality, of course, this is wildly absurd, but Kablawi is not interested in facts. He is interested in reinforcing the idea, increasingly widespread nowadays, that the US, its traditions, its culture, its heritage, its dominant religion, are at fault for all the ills in the country and the world today, and that the solution to all our problems is Islam. There are many non-Muslims, ignorant of the true history of the West and filled with the anti-American, anti-Christian, anti-Western propaganda that our colleges and universities relentlessly pump into them, who will be susceptible to this.

“Miami Imam Dr. Fadi Yousef Kablawi: Christianity Is Responsible For The Looting In America; Darwin Called To Exterminate Dark-Skinned People He Saw As Half-Humans; Muslims Should Not Attend BLM Protests,” MEMRI, June 5, 2020:

In a Friday, June 5, 2020 sermon delivered at the North Miami Islamic Center, which is known also as Masjid As-Sunna An-Nabawiyya North Miami, Imam Dr. Fadi Yousef Kablawi said that he is saddened by Muslims who participate in Black Lives Matter protests because “every life matters.” He said that Christianity is the main problem in America and the West today since Christians believe that Jesus died for their sins and that as a result, they believe that they can commit crimes such as looting and repent for them later. He stated that the solution to America’s problems is Islam. Later in the sermon, Imam Kablawi said that according to Darwinism, the European race must “exterminate the savage race” of people with bigger lips and darker skin. The sermon, titled “This Is How We Should Look at the George Floyd Issue as Muslims,” was streamed live on the mosque’s Facebook page. Dr. Kablawi, who is a dentist and originally from Jordan, had written an article in Ghurabaa Islamic Magazine in 2010, saying that the Jews incurred the anger of God. In November 2019, Salman Rashid, who is affiliated with the North Miami Islamic Center, was arrested for plotting an ISIS attack against the deans of Broward College and Miami Dade College.

Imam Dr. Fadi Yousef Kablawi: “You look at Muslims going to support the cause of Black Lives Matter – every life matters! Every life matters. And it hurts when you see Muslims raising signs like that. Every life matters. If you are going to stand against injustice, you stand against injustice that could be committed against every individual.

[…]

“That is the very problem I see in America – Christianity. Seriously. And Europe is not any better. Christianity – the way it got corrupted – is the main reason for what we see happening in this country. Christianity.

[…]

“[Jesus] – that’s their god, as they claim – he was killed. But he was not killed for a bad reason, he was killed for your sins. So it does not matter what you do, as much looting as you do – at the end of the week, you are forgiven.

[…]

“Go [to church] on Sunday and confess or repent and you are good. As long as you believe that Jesus Christ died for your sins, you are fine. You tell me how such a religion will create good citizens.

[…]

“So what’s the solution for this aspect? Islam. Islam.

[…]

“Christianity – we already established – is the cause of the problem. The way they implemented it… But Christianity – the pure, original one that came from Allah – is Islam. It is the religion of Allah. But the way they changed it and corrupted it is the [reason] they are now suffering.

[…]

“[Charles Darwin] said that the Europeans, this civilized race – [in order for them] to be able to continue to improve and to become more civilized – they must exterminate the savage race. That is Darwinism. So the fact that people have bigger lips, darker skin, or this… And he believes that we come from monkeys… Your father is a monkey, not my father! Your dad is a monkey, and I refuse for my dad to be a monkey or to admit that. Who is happy to say his dad is an ape, are you crazy? But anyway, the fact that people still have big lips and all that, they are closer – that’s what he says… They are in a stage between humans and beasts – animals. I’m telling you brothers. This is Darwin.”

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

HHS Scraps Obama Rules on Gender Identity, Abortion

Federal health officials announced a final rule Friday scrapping an Obama-era regulation that forced medical workers to perform abortions despite their religious beliefs.

The Obama administration’s 2016 regulation, already vacated by a court ruling, also redefined sex-based discrimination in health care to include questions of gender identity.

The old rule would have imposed nearly $3 billion in costs on the economy, the Department of Health and Human Services said in announcing the change. Prompted by the Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare, the rule had not been implemented after being halted in court.

When Congress passed the Obamacare law in 2010, it included a section broadly prohibiting discrimination among health insurance plans.


The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more >>


Under the  Obama administration, HHS tried to apply that provision to both abortion and gender identity in the 2016 rule. The rule defined gender identity as “one’s internal sense of gender, which may be male, female, neither, or a combination of male and female.”

The real-world effects of prioritizing gender identity in health care became clear after a 32-year-old pregnant woman went to the emergency room complaining of abdominal pains and claiming to be a man.

The attending nurse treated the patient as a man, based on the electronic medical record, and the end result was a stillborn baby in a case first reported by The New England Journal of Medicine in May 2019.

“That’s one example where confusion over what the meaning of sex is—whether it’s based on biology or based on gender identity—can have some real-world and in this case tragic consequences. That’s why clarity is so important,” Roger Severino, director of the HHS Office for Civil Rights, told The Daily Signal.

“This [new] rule will establish clarity over the confusion that was unleashed by the Obama administration’s previous definition, which included male, female, neither, both or some combination, which is very difficult to administer in a health care setting.”

The new rule will enforce the provision by returning to the government’s interpretation of sexual discrimination according to the plain meaning of the word “sex” as male or female and as determined by biology, HHS said.

The 2016 regulation did not recognize sexual orientation as a protected characteristic, and the Trump administration’s rule doesn’t change that.

“The Obama administration itself thought that was a bridge too far. And this final rule leaves undisturbed that judgment from the Obama era,” Severino said. “So if people take issue with that, they should also take issue with the Obama administration as well.”

The Trump administration’s HHS says it will continue to enforce federal civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination in health care on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability, age, and sex.

The final rule keeps a section that ensures physical access for individuals with disabilities to health care facilities, as well as communication technology to assist those who have impaired vision or hearing.

Regulated entities still will have to provide written assurances of compliance to HHS.

“Truth matters and words have meaning,” said Ryan T. Anderson, a senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation, asserting in a written statement that the Trump administration was right to rescind the previous rules:

In addition to being an unlawful abuse of agency power, these rules would have caused serious harm. They would have required doctors, hospitals, and health care organizations to act in ways contrary to their best medical judgments, their consciences, and the physical realities of their patients, or face steep fines and become easy targets for unreasonable and costly lawsuits.

All people should be treated with dignity and respect. Therefore, federal law should not outlaw reasonable disagreements about the best medical care for gender dysphoria. Nor should federal law force anyone to violate their pro-life conscience or the privacy and safety of others in the name of political correctness.

The revised rule provides protections for non-English speakers, including the provision of translators and interpreters.

However, the final rule relieves Americans of approximately $2.9 billion in regulatory costs over five years by eliminating a mandate for regulated health care entities to insert “notice and taglines” to patients and other consumers in 15 or more languages in almost every mailing. Those costs got passed down to consumers.

In December 2016, a federal court preliminarily enjoined the Obama administration’s attempt to redefine sex-based discrimination. The court said the provision likely contradicted existing civil rights law, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and the Administrative Procedure Act.

In October 2019, a second federal court agreed. That same month, the initial federal court vacated the Obama HHS rule and remanded the provisions it found unlawful back to the department.

The court action stemmed in part from an Obama administration  rule regarding abortion. Existing laws said doctors and nurses can’t be compelled to perform an abortion if it would violate thier religious beliefs or conscience.

“Other federal laws prohibit discrimination against health care providers who refuse to participate in abortion,” Severino said. “If not performing abortion is sex discrimination, then of course you have clear conflicts of federal law protecting conscience.”

Also Friday, the Department of Housing and Urban Development began to undo an Obama administration regulation by proposing a rule to allow men’s and women’s shelters to make their own sex-specific housing policies.

“The Trump administration is also correct to unwind an Obama-era housing regulation that imposed a gender identity mandate at the expense of privacy and safety,” Anderson said. “The proposed HUD rule allows shelters to determine their own policy on single-sex housing, thus protecting female-only spaces.”

COLUMN BY

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Lucas is also the author of “Tainted by Suspicion: The Secret Deals and Electoral Chaos of Disputed Presidential Elections.” Send an email to Fred.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Trans Teen Revolution


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This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.