Mississippi’s Sweeping Religious Freedom Bill Heads To Governor’s Desk

In this photo taken on Dec. 30, 2014, Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant pauses as he discusses his 2015 legislative agenda with The Associated Press, in the Sillers Building overlooking the Capitol in downtown Jackson, Mi... In this photo taken on Dec. 30, 2014, Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant pauses as he discusses his 2015 legislative agenda with The Associated Press, in the Sillers Building overlooking the Capitol in downtown Jackson, Miss. Bryant is promoting his “Taxpayer Works Agenda” for Mississippi’s 2015 legislative session, including an income-tax cut for people with low to moderate earnings, a boost in tourism advertising, scholarships for community college students and a pay raise for Highway Patrol troopers. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis) MORE LESS
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The Mississippi House on Friday passed a religious freedom bill that would allow businesses and public employees to deny services to people based on the belief that marriage should be between a man and a woman, sending the legislation to Gov. Phil Bryant (R).

The bill, passed by the state Senate earlier this week, also allows businesses to deny services based on the belief that “sexual relations are properly reserved to such a marriage” and that the belief that gender is determined at birth.

Additionally, the bill would allow religious groups to fire someone whose “conduct or religious beliefs are inconsistent with those of the religious organization,” and let those organizations block adoptions due to religious beliefs.

The legislation allows clerks to refuse to give marriage licenses to same-sex couples, too.

Ben Needham, the director of Project One America, a LGBT advocacy project in the South run by the Human Rights Campaign, told Buzzfeed News that the Mississippi legislation is “probably the worst religious freedom bill to date.”

State Rep. Randy Boyd (R), one of the bill’s sponsors, has said that the legislation was aimed at protecting Christians from discrimination.

“This bill doesn’t stop anyone from getting what they want from the state. I have a problem with the discrimination of Christian belief,” he said, as quoted by CNN. “I don’t uphold discrimination but I believe the Christian belief is more discriminated against than other things. … I’m trying to get a happy medium here where people get their rights and other people aren’t pressured into doing anything they don’t believe in against their religious beliefs.”

Bryant has not indicated whether he will sign the bill, but told a CNN affiliate in Mississippi that the legislation “gives some people—as I appreciate it—the right to be able to say, that’s against my religious beliefs and I don’t need to carry out that particular task.”

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Notable Replies

  1. ISIS and Mullahs across the world should probably consider the USA as its/their headquarters, especially the southern states.

  2. Republicans sure are good at fixing non existent problems.

  3. This will be a tougher one to defeat, since most national/international businesses won’t care - after all, who wants to do business in Mississippi in the first place?

  4. The very second he signs the bill, someone should apply for a gay marriage license and when thet refuse to do their jobs, Mississippi gets dragged into court. Then another…and another…and another…and another…and another.

  5. once again the ‘fiscally responsible’ insist on throwing money at a problem that only exists in their own minds… Mississippi just lost a court case invalidating a law prohibiting adoption by same sex couples…

    do they think if they throw enough money away eventually they’ll win?

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