Indiana legislature tweaks religious freedom law with added LGBT protections
Updated: In an attempt to make its religious freedom law more palatable, Indiana legislators passed new legislation on Thursday which would specifically protect people from some discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.
According to the Indianapolis Star, tweaks added would give new protections for LGBT customers, employees and tenants, and the terms “gender identity” and “sexual orientation” will appear in the law. However, it neither repealed the religious freedom law, nor gave full civil rights protections to gays, lesbians and transgender individuals, the newspaper reports. The bill also exempts churches and other nonprofit religious organizations from bill’s measures.
The bill passed through both the state house of representatives and the state senate on Thursday afternoon. It was signed Thursday night by Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, report CNN and the Indianapolis Star. Pence, a Republican, had signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act into law last week.
Indiana was was one of five states which had laws banning same-sex marriage that were overturned on federal appellate review. In October, the U.S. Supreme Court denied their cert petitions. Pence has denied that the religious freedom law is an offering for groups that supported banning same-sex marriage.
The legislature’s announcement was met with approval from some quarters, but also with criticism from both sides.
Attorney Eric Miller, president of Advance America, released a statement (PDF) saying that the proposed changes would weaken and ruin the new law. He and other activists had urged Pence to veto any revisions to the legislation, the Indianapolis Star reports.
“Among the things that will happen, Christian bakers, florists and photographers would now be forced by the government to participate in a homosexual wedding or else they would be punished by the government,” he wrote. “That’s not right!”
On the other hand, the changes were called “insufficient” by the CEO of the Indianapolis-based company Angie’s List, a consumer ratings website. After the passage of the law last week, the company announced that it had scrapped its planned 1,000-job expansion in Indiana.
“Employers in most of the state of Indiana can fire a person simply for being lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or questioning,” CEO Bill Oesterle said in a statement, the Indianapolis Star reports. “Our employees deserve to live, work and travel with open accommodations in any part of the state.”
After signing the legislation into law, Pence released a statement, saying: “There will be some who think this legislation goes too far and some who think it does not go far enough, but as governor I must always put the interest of our state first and ask myself every day, ‘What is best for Indiana?’ I believe resolving this controversy and making clear that every person feels welcome and respected in our state is best for Indiana.”
Related articles:
ABAJournal.com: “Indiana enacts religious freedom law which opponents say would allow LGBT discrimination”
ABAJournal.com: “Arkansas governor says he won’t sign religious freedom bill without changes”
Updated on April 3 to report that Gov. Pence signed the bill into law.
