A federal judge in New York has ruled a photographer with religious objections to photographing same-sex weddings cannot deny services under the state’s accommodations clause.
The Dec. 13 ruling rejects a request by plaintiff Emilee Carpenter, whose upstate New York-based photography company asked the judge to grant a preliminary injunction against the state’s anti-discrimination law.
“Right now, I’m facing pretty severe threats from New York state, which are really scary,” said Carpenter in a short video regarding the case.
“It’s $100,000 fines, it’s jail time, it’s ultimately the closure of my business, and as an entrepreneur, that’s extremely terrifying knowing that my livelihood could be stripped out from under me because I’m being forced to create a message that I disagree with,” Carpenter added.
A judge from the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York ruled that the state has a “compelling interest” to ensure individuals without regard to sexual orientation are granted equal access to publicly available goods, ensuring the “accommodation clause is narrowly tailored, as applied to Plaintiff, to serve that interest,” according to Judge Frank Geraci Jr., appointed by former President Barack Obama.
NUMBER OF US ADULTS WHO IDENTIFY AS CHRISTIAN DROPS 12% IN 10 YEARS
EmileeCarpenter4.jpeg“New York’s public accommodation laws are neutral. By only bringing an as-applied challenge, Plaintiff virtually concedes that the laws are facially neutral,” the judge added. “She raises no non-conclusory factual allegations that the laws were enacted with any kind of religious (or anti-religious) motivation.”
Carpenter’s legal team, the conservative Alliance Defending Freedom, says it plans to appeal the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit.
“The court’s decision continues down a dangerous path of the government compelling artists to speak messages that violate their religious beliefs — or imposing steep fines, closing their businesses, or throwing them in jail,” said ADF Senior Counsel Jonathan Scruggs.
ADF claims the same logic applied to Carpenter’s rejection mirrors a result over a case in the Denver-based Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, in which a 2-1 decision by a panel ruled in July the government can compel a Colorado web designer, Lorie Smith, to work on projects over messages she disagrees with because she provides “custom and unique” expression services.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Attorneys representing Smith have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear her case after the 2-1 decision by the panel on the 10th Circuit this summer.
Chief Judge Timothy Tymkovich’s dissented in the ruling, saying, “The majority fails to protect Ms. Smith from [Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act’s] Orwellian diktat that regulates businesses based on the subjective experience of customers.”
