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Entire Hitching Post Controversy Is False: ACLU Finds Chapel Falls Under Religious Exemption

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The ACLU, which fights civil rights violations across the nation, says Idaho’s Hitching Post chapel is exempt from a non-discrimination ordinance.

By now, the entire nation likely know of a little wedding chapel in the tiny town of Coeur d’Alene. Thanks to the nation’s top anti-gay law firm, The Hitching Post has become the iconic victim of “homosexual bullies” who want to destroy traditional marriage and the First Amendment – if you listen to the homophobic, ignorant, Fox News watching masses, Mike Huckabee, and the American Family Association.

LOOK: Mike Huckabee’s False, Fear-Mongering Facebook Rant About ‘Hitching Post’ Gay Marriage Story

The Alliance Defending Freedom, the anti-gay law firm that has defended laws mandating life in prison for gay people, has spun a tall tale so ridiculous that the religious right bought it immediately.

But, as The New Civil Rights Movement reported earlier this week, the “facts” spewed by many, are lies.

LOOK: Almost Everything You’ve Been Told About The Idaho Wedding Chapel Story Is A Lie

And now, even the ACLU states the wedding chapel’s ministers, who have been marrying couples for decades and cite their faith for their refusal to marry same-sex couples, won’t have to. 

That’s what the entire argument that has captivated much of America, even managers at Walmart, has been about.

The Alliance Defending Freedom, as far as we can tell, are falsely claiming that at least one and maybe two same-sex couples have tried to get Donald and Evelyn Knapp, the owners of The Hitching Post, to marry them.

But there’s zero proof of that, and the City of Coeur d’Alene states no one has filed a complaint. The City of Coeur d’Alene also states the Knapp’s business falls under the religious exemption clause of the non-discrimination ordinance, and wonder why the Knapps never asked.

Fortunately, the ACLU (that’s their logo at the top) has made clear this manufactured anti-gay attack by the ADF is totally false.

“The American Civil Liberties Union of Idaho says it will not challenge a northern Idaho wedding chapel’s refusal to conduct gay marriages because the chapel falls under a religious exemption,” the AP reports. “Interim Executive Director Leo Morales said in a news conference Thursday that the Hitching Post became a religious corporation in Idaho nearly a month ago. Morales says the ACLU believes that under that exemption, the chapel does not have to comply with the city of Coeur d’Alene’s ordinance banning discrimination based on sexual orientation because the chapel only provides religious services.”

Will the Alliance Defending Freedom withdraw its suit and apologize to the City of Coeur d’Alene, which has been flooded with 33,000 emails attacking them?

The Southern Poverty Law Center reports that despite the facts, the anti-gay hate group American Family Association is milking this for all it’s worth — and it’s worth a lot.

The American Family Association – one of the biggest anti-LGBT organizations in the country with an estimated $20 million annual budget – says “homosexual bullies” are threatening to pressure the city of Coeur d’Alene to fine or arrest Donald and Evelyn Knapp, who operate the private wedding chapel.

…

The city of C’oeur d’Alene has asked the Knapps to withdraw the lawsuit, since they filed for religious exemption two weeks ago and would thus not be required to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies.

All those developments haven’t stopped American Family from making the Hitching Post case its cause célèbre, with a new “action alert” posting on its web page. “Once again, homosexual bullies have targeted Christian-owned businesses in their attempt to silence all opposition to their sinful lifestyle,’ the AFA message says.

That has resulted in a deluge of 33,000 e-mails and an estimated 300 phone calls to the office of Coeur d’Alene Mayor Steve Widmyer, city spokesman Keith Erickson told Hatewatch today. The e-mail messages “all read the same,” and are cut-and-paste scripted from the AFA web site, Erickson said.

One of American Family’s senior officials, Bryan Fischer, is the former director of the Idaho Values Alliance, a former AFA state affiliate. He has said homosexuality gave the world Adolf Hitler and was responsible for the extermination of six million Jews. Fischer also has called for criminalizing gay sex which, he claims, would end “gay indoctrination” public schools. He has also advocated forcing gay people into therapy to “cure’’ homosexuality which he likens to intravenous drug use.

 

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OPINION

‘Needs to Fasten His Seat Belt’: Trump Trial ‘Full Steam Ahead’ After Judge Denies Motion

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April 3, 2024

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New York State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan has denied Donald Trump’s “last-ditch bid” to delay trial in District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s 34 count criminal felony case alleging the ex-president falsified business records to hide what some have called “hush money” in an effort to protect his campaign in the 2016 election.

Trump had requested the trial be delayed until the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on his presidential immunity claim, but Judge Merchan told Trump’s attorneys they waited too long to make the request, and denied it in full as “untimely.”

“This Court finds that Defendant had myriad opportunities to raise the claim of presidential immunity well before March 7, 2024,” Merchan wrote.

Legal experts praised Merchan’s ruling.

“This case is going to trial in 12 days. Trump needs to get ready to face it,” wrote national security attorney Bradley Moss.

“Criminal accountability in NY is nigh,” said professor of law, MSNBC/NBC News legal analyst, and former FBI General Counsel Andrew Weissmann. “The 4/15 NY criminal trial is going forward, so Donald needs to fasten his seat belt — it’s taking off.”

READ MORE: Why Trump Still Has a ‘Nikki Haley’ Problem at the Ballot Box

“Another day, another one of Trump’s motions to dismiss has been denied. His New York criminal trial is moving full steam ahead,” noted attorney Aaron Parnas.

“Let’s just pause for a moment to dilate on the inanity of this motion, even apart from its untimeliness,” wrote attorney George Conway, posting his overview of the case. “Trump is arguing that paying off a porn star was somehow part of his official responsibilities as President of the United States.”

“Not only that,” Conway continued, “he’s arguing that paying off the porn star *before* he became president, and then later reimbursing the intermediary who made the payment and covering up the reimbursement on the books of his **personal, private** company, was somehow part of his official responsibilities as President of the United States.”

“The motion wasn’t made earlier because it’s as demented as he is,” Conway concluded.

Watch MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin explain Judge Merchan’s ruling below or at this link.

READ MORE: Jack Smith’s ‘Blistering’ Response to Judge Cannon Could ‘Remove Her From the Case’: Experts

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OPINION

Why Trump Still Has a ‘Nikki Haley’ Problem at the Ballot Box

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7 hours ago

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April 3, 2024

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President Joe Biden and Donald Trump are the presumptive nominees of their parties, but unlike Democratic primary voters, Republican primary voters don’t seem to have gotten the message.

Comparing the percentage of the each party’s vote in primary states so far, Joe Biden is frequently beating Donald Trump. The results show a pattern that could signal trouble for the ex-president. Trump’s problem isn’t Nikki Haley per se, it’s that in some states there appears to be a Republican enthusiasm gap for Trump, and GOP voters may be voting for Haley to send a message.

In state after state after state, when Nikki Haley was officially on the ballot and after she suspended her campaign on March 6, Republican primary voters have been voting for her, and continue to vote for her, and those vote percentages with a few exceptions have been in the double digits.

On Tuesday, voters went to the polls in Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York and Wisconsin to pull a lever for their party’s only current candidate. In each state President Biden won a larger percent of the Democratic vote than Donald Trump won of the Republican vote. (Note: all data is from the Associated Press via Google and may change as votes are counted.)

“In New York, 70-year-old Steve Wheatley, a registered Republican, said he wishes there were more candidates to choose from. He said he voted for Nikki Haley even though ‘she has no shot’ because of the lack of options,” the Associated Press reports.

READ MORE: Jack Smith’s ‘Blistering’ Response to Judge Cannon Could ‘Remove Her From the Case’: Experts

With nearly all of the vote counted in the Empire State on Tuesday, Donald Trump won just 82.1% of the vote – and just 131,671 votes⁩ – while Nikki Haley walked away with almost 13% – and more than 20,000 votes. New York GOP voters even handed former New Jersey governor Chris Christie 4% of the vote.

By comparison, in New York Joe Biden won 91.5%, with 276,770 votes, according to the AP. That’s more than double Trump’s number of votes.

University of South Carolina professor and political scientist David Darmofal has been pointing this out.

“There were both Democratic & Republican primaries yesterday in AZ, IL, KS, & OH,” he wrote on March 20, “and President Biden received a higher percentage of the vote in his primary than Trump did in his primary in all four of these states.”

Let’s look at Wisconsin.

In 2020, Joe Biden won Wisconsin by less than one percent — 49.45% to 48.82%, which was barely more than a 20,000 vote difference.

On Tuesday, voters had a far different response.

READ MORE: Debunking Bartiromo: No, Biden Order Doesn’t Allow ‘Illegal Immigrants’ to Vote

Trump won the Wisconsin GOP primary with just 79.2% of the GOP vote, or 475,375 votes. Nikki Haley, again, walked away with nearly 13%. On the Democratic side, President Biden won by a much larger margin, and with far more votes than Trump: 88.6% of the vote, or ⁦510,447 votes.

Bill Kristol and Andrew Egger at The Bulwark on Wednesday noted, “the 89 percent of the Democratic vote Biden took in Wisconsin was better than Trump did anywhere last night: 79 percent in Connecticut, 82 percent in New York, 84 percent in Rhode Island, 79 percent in Wisconsin. These are remarkably soft numbers for a now-unopposed candidate, especially given the fact that—unlike on the Democratic side—there’s zero ongoing organized Republican effort to use the primaries to send Trump a message. A fifth or so of GOP voters are still just showing up to pull the lever for somebody else instead.”

In Rhode Island on Tuesday, Trump won 84.5% of the GOP vote, with Haley taking 10.6%. Trump had a slightly better percent than Biden: 84.5% vs. 82.6%, but Biden won nearly twice as many votes: 20,906 vs. ⁦10,808. Rhode Island Democratic voters also dinged Biden with a 14.5% “uncommitted” vote.

In Connecticut, Biden won 84.9% with 55,638 votes. Trump won 77.9, with ⁦34,708 votes. And Haley took 14% of the GOP vote there.

READ MORE: Florida in Play? Biden and Strategists Say Yes as Court Puts Abortion, Marijuana on Ballot

 

 

 

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OPINION

Debunking Bartiromo: No, Biden Order Doesn’t Allow ‘Illegal Immigrants’ to Vote

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10 hours ago

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April 3, 2024

By

Fox News Business host Maria Bartiromo is promoting the thoroughly debunked claim an executive order signed by President Joe Biden allows “illegal immigrants” and “felons” to vote.

Bartiromo, in pushing the false claim, told Fox News viewers, “Republicans are warning that there’s a Biden order, executive order, which allows illegal immigrants and felons to vote.”

There is no such order.

“It doesn’t appear that Joe Biden can win on his policies,” Bartiromo said Wednesday. “A Wall Street Journal poll this morning shows Trump leading Biden in six out of seven swing states, that’s Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada and Pennsylvania. In Wisconsin, the two are tied in a head-to-head matchup. So how does Biden win? Republicans are talking about the potential of an election that is tampered with. Republicans are warning that there’s a Biden order, executive order, which allows illegal immigrants and felons to vote.”

READ MORE: Jack Smith’s ‘Blistering’ Response to Judge Cannon Could ‘Remove Her From the Case’: Experts

The conspiracy theory appears to have come from Mississippi’s Republican Secretary of State Michael Watson three years ago, a conspiracy theory Watson himself resurfaced last month.

Fox News several weeks ago reported Watson had sent the U.S. Dept. of Justice a letter “asking it to stop enforcing a Biden executive order that he warns is being used to attempt to register ineligible convicts and illegal immigrants to vote.”

“As you are aware, on March 7, 2021, President Biden issued Executive Order No. 14019 which sought to turn the Department of Justice agencies from their historical missions of law enforcement to voter registration and get out the vote operations,” Watson wrote, according to Fox News. “These efforts are an intrusion into state matters and are a misuse of federal revenue and resources. In addition, it appears that these efforts have led to agencies under your charge attempting to register people to vote, including potentially ineligible felons and to co-opt state and local officials into accomplishing this goal.”

The fact-checking website Verify makes clear: “No, Biden’s executive order doesn’t allow ineligible people to vote.” It also says it’s “not true” that Biden’s order “would make it easier for ineligible people to vote.”

READ MORE: ‘Says You!’: Kirby Smacks Down Doocy

A USA Today fact check arrives at the same conclusion: “No, Biden didn’t (and can’t) allow immigrants in US illegally to vote.”

“Experts said the claim is nonsense. Biden has issued no such order, and he does not have the power to decide who votes.” Also, the paper notes, “in 1996, Congress made it illegal for non-citizens to vote in federal elections.”

When he was a state lawmaker Watson voted against making it easier for college students to register to vote, and in 2021, as Mississippi Secretary of State, Watson said “he is worried that the nation will suffer if more ‘woke’ and ‘uninformed’ college students become registered voters,” the Mississippi Free Press reported at the time. The news outlet took a deep dive into Watson’s extensive claims, also debunking them.

MSNBC’s Ari Melber in 2021 highlighted Watson’s remarks, and called them, “just one of many occurrences of GOP officials unintentionally revealing they don’t want everyone to vote.”

Watch Bartiromo below or at this link.

READ MORE: Florida in Play? Biden and Strategists Say Yes as Court Puts Abortion, Marijuana on Ballot

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