Sen. Mike Lee: Religious Liberty Amendment Rejection ‘A Discouraging Development’
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Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) lamented the 1,376 without his religious liberty amendment Tuesday night, calling the move a “discouraging development in our country’s storied history of protecting the free exercise of religion.”
Lee said in a statement following the vote.
Despite the support of every voting Republican but one, and even a Democrat, the Respect for Marriage Act just passed without my amendment, which would have prevented the government from retaliating against religious individuals and institutions for their sincerely held religious beliefs regarding marriage.
This is a discouraging development in our country’s storied history of protecting the free exercise of religion. While I’m disappointed that my amendment was not included, I remain committed to preserving the religious liberties enshrined in our Constitution.
— Mike Lee (@SenMikeLee) November 29, 2022
The same-sex marriage bill passed 61-36 with the help of the same 12 Senate Republicans who initially voted with Democrats to advance the bill. The legislation will now go back to the House for a vote as early as next Tuesday, where it was first passed over the summer with the help of 47 Republicans.
Before the main vote, the Senate rejected Sen. Lee’s amendment 48-49, although 12 GOP senators who voted with Democrats to advance the bill voted in favor it.
Lee’s amendment was conservatives’ greatest hope of shoring up religious liberty protections in the bill, and would have prohibited the federal government from punishing individuals, organizations, nonprofits, and other entities based on their sincerely held religious beliefs or moral convictions about marriage by prohibiting the denial or revocation of tax exempt status, licenses, contracts, benefits, etc.
Who wouldn’t want to deny the federal government the authority to retaliate against religious individuals and institutions in a way that is categorically abusive? pic.twitter.com/gzNxMGPxhW
— Mike Lee (@SenMikeLee) November 29, 2022
Religious liberty amendments from Sens. James Lankford (R-OK) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) were also rejected 45-52 in simple majority votes.
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Header featured image (edited) credit: Sen. Lee/Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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Churches/institutions and people already have protections of religious freedoms. What they can’t have is a world where they willingly make an application to the Internal Revenue Service, asking for 503c tax benefits under statutory/administrative process and then expect to maintain freedoms protected by the constitution in that statutory realm.
Any church that has not willingly subjugated itself, in exchange for tax benefits, can absolutely enforce ecclesiastic law within their organization, i.e., refusing the sodomites entry. Those that willingly and knowingly made a deal with the devil for “tax benefits” for their cash donor’s (idolatry of the might buck) certainly can not.
In short, they rot by their own willing corruption.