Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) decried the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold a web designer’s right to refuse customers if their requests violate her sincerely held religious beliefs.
The Supreme Court sided with Colorado-based website 303 Creative, which refused to build wedding announcement websites for same-sex couples, and held that the state’s anti-discrimination law would affect her business and violate her First Amendment rights. Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion, which Torres disagreed with during a television interview on CNN’s Inside Politics Friday.
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“He’s wrong, and he’s sending a message that you are free to discriminate as long as you do so under the guise of religious liberty,” Torres said of Gorsuch. “Look, we’re witnessing the most radical politicized Supreme Court that we’ve seen in recent history. As you might recall, Justice Thomas famously called on the Supreme Court to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges, which protects the right to marriage equality, and Congress had to take action to codify marriage equality in federal law in order to preempt what is increasingly a politicized Supreme Court. So I do worry that the threat to LGBTQ equality from the Supreme Court is real, and it’s going to continue.”
Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation CEO Sarah Kate Ellis similarly called the ruling “a victory for extremists in America” and those who “want to discriminate against LGBTQ people.” Ellis warned it could set a “precedent” during a Friday television interview on MSNBC.
Meanwhile, 303 Creative owner Lorie Smith said the ruling was “a victory for each and every one of us.”
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“I’m grateful for the court for affirming the government can’t force anyone to say something they don’t believe,” Smith said.
The Supreme Court voted 6-3 in Smith’s favor. Liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented.
