The days of government agencies getting away with discriminating against Christians are waning.
The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) last year rejected four advertisements for buses from WallBuilders Presentations, a non-profit Christian group in Texas. WMATA claimed the material violated a provision of the advertising guidelines (PDF), ads that “intended to influence members of the public regarding an issue on which there are varying public opinions.”
WMATA has approved ads for the abortion drug Plan B and the COVID vaccine, both of which have “varying public opinions.”
On WallBuilders’ behalf, First Liberty Institute filed a lawsuit in federal court. Judge Beryl Howell ruled that the guidelines were “not a reasonable restriction on speech.” He called them vague. “To be clear,” Judge Howell wrote (PDF), “WMATA is permitted to retain considerable discretion in evaluating the intent and purpose of an ad,” but these standards are not objective or workable.
Judge Howell ordered WMATA to run the previously rejected ads.
WallBuilders is back in court to make the judge’s ruling permanent. WMATA still has the same restrictions in the guidelines. The group wants the judge to strike down the issue and religious restrictions.
Would you believe that the ACLU agrees with WallBuilders on the First Amendment issue?
“When the government censors a private speaker’s message just because it conveys a religious point of view, it violates the First Amendment,” said Arthur Spitzer, Senior Counsel at the ACLU-D.C. “The court was right in issuing a preliminary injunction against WMATA, and now it’s time to strike their regulations once and for all.”
Photo credit: By MJW15 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, link
