Tag Archives: State: Idaho

Spokesman-Review: Coeur d’Alene soon may join a growing number of Idaho cities to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation – a reaction to the Legislature’s steadfast refusal to add such protections to state law.

Idaho State Journal: Mayor Brian Blad cast the deciding vote Thursday night to defeat a proposed new ordinance designed to protect the LGBT community from discrimination when it comes to housing, employment or public accommodations.

AP: A transgender woman was banned from a western Idaho grocery store after customers complained she used the women’s restroom, police in Lewiston said.

DNews.com: Moscow Mayor Nancy Chaney and a score of residents were outraged by the City Council’s decision Monday to pass an antidiscrimination ordinance without taking public comment from many who had come out and waited hours for such a chance.

Pocatello is one step closer to passing an ordinance endangering women, children, and religious liberties and may vote on the “Bathroom Bill” as early as April 4.

Reality Check: It looks like we’ll have to update that list to 19, because Colorado mortgage banking company Cherry Creek Mortgage has just filed suit challenging the mandate as well. Cherry Creek Mortgage is owned by former U.S. Senator Bill Armstrong and does business in 27 states. The company has 730 employees and is represented by Alliance Defending Freedom in its lawsuit.

David Crary at Bay News 9 (AP): “Anti-abortion groups divided over legal tactics”
Steve Aden, who helps oversee abortion issues for the Christian legal group Alliance Defending Freedom, suggested that the 20-week bans had a better chance of reaching the high court than measures such as the heartbeat bill or the new Arkansas ban. However, he said the entire swath of bills conveyed a common message. “What they demonstrate,” he said, “is that there’s a tidal wave of sentiment at the grass-roots level that abortion is unconscionable and that states should do their utmost in restricting it.”

AP: The ruling cited two landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases – Roe vs. Wade and Planned Parenthood vs. Casey – to show a woman has an absolute right to an abortion before the point of viability, Hearn said.

NRLC on Pro-Life Blogs: A federal district court decision against the Idaho Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act issued March 7, 2013, opens the way to an ultimate consideration by the United States Supreme Court whether mounting medical evidence that unborn children are capable of feeling pain supports a compelling state interest allowing protection of such children from abortion.

AP: A federal judge has struck down Idaho’s law banning abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy based on beliefs held by physicians and others that the fetus is able to feel pain at that point . . . “The state may not rely on its interest in the potential life of the fetus to place a substantial obstacle to abortion before viability in women’s paths,” he said.

KIVITV.com: A tax break sought by an anti-abortion pregnancy center in Boise cleared the House on a near party-line vote. The measure to benefit Stanton Health Care by giving such clinics a sales tax exemption passed Tuesday on a 58-12 vote.

The Olympian: A tax break sought by an anti-abortion pregnancy center in Boise cleared the House on a near party-line vote.

The Spokesman Review: Add Twin Falls and Lewiston to the list of Idaho cities to ban discrimination based on a person’s sexual orientation. City councils in both cities voted Monday night for language adding sexual orientation to their non-discrimination policies.

KMVT.com (includes video): The Twin Falls City council approved an addition to its anti-discrimination policy for city staff members. One of the council members said this is a step forward for the city because they were behind in the time.

KLEWTV.COM: The Lewiston City Council voted on a policy change that prohibits discrimination against hiring a particular group of citizens. It’s a topic that’s often avoided due to its controversial nature. Members of the Lewiston City Council went back and forth Monday evening, discussing whether or not to add sexual orientation language to the city’s non-discrimination hiring clause.

MagicValley.com: Twin Falls city staff will study the issue of adding sexual orientation to the anti-harassment and discrimination policy for city employees, at the suggestion of a councilwoman.

KBOI2.com carries this video and report.

Idaho State Journal (AP): A lawsuit to force a group touting public schools chief Tom Luna’s education overhaul to reveal its still-secret financiers was returned to state court after Secretary of State Ben Ysursa argued a ploy to move the matter to federal court was a desperate delay tactic.

MagicValley.com (AP): A judge ruled Monday that a nonprofit group must disclose donors who financed more than $200,000 in campaign ads touting public schools chief Tom Luna’s education overhaul. Fourth District Judge Michael Wetherell ruled in favor of Secretary of State Ben Ysursa, who had filed the lawsuit against Education Voters of Idaho. Wetherell gave the group a deadline of 3 p.m. Wednesday to disclose its donors.

Brian Walsh at National Review: Today, a bipartisan group of over 100 legislators in nine states is announcing the nation’s first state legislative caucuses focused solely on religious freedom. These working groups of legislative leaders are being established in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, and Tennessee. This is the first installment in a national plan to form state religious-freedom caucuses in all 50 states by the end of 2013.

LJWorld: Claiming religious freedom is under assault, 120 legislators in nine states, including Kansas, announced on Tuesday the formation of caucuses that they said would be dedicated to protecting religion from government intrusion.

Walter Weber on Kresta in the Afternoon: The Ninth Circuit has broken new constitutional ground in its Sept. 11 decision in McCormack v. Hiedeman. According to the court, women have a constitutional right to engage in self-abortion – sort of . . . But at the heart of the McCormack decision is the question whether women have a constitutional right to self-abort. On that question, the Ninth Circuit opinion lays the groundwork for a “yes” answer, but does not quite get there.

Wall Street Journal: A federal appeals court on Wednesday narrowed a court order that prevented Idaho authorities from bringing criminal charges against pregnant women who seek abortions through procedures the state deems “unlawful” — namely by buying medications online to terminate a pregnancy. | McCormack v. Hiedeman, Nos. 11-36010, 11-36015 (9th Cir. Sept. 11, 2012)

Operation Rescue at Opposing Views: An ambulance arrived at the Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in Boise, Idaho, this afternoon and transported a woman to St. Luke’s Hospital in Boise where she was admitted to the Emergency Room. The cause of the medical emergency and condition of the woman is currently unknown; however, activists confirm that abortions were performed today at that Planned Parenthood facility.

Boise State Public Radio: A spokesman for the university says the school will listen to the voices of students, faculty and staff on the issue, but adds administrators don’t usually decide what restaurants to have on campus, it’s up to Aramark.

Spokesman-Review: When should a parent lose custody of a young child for refusing consent for a medical procedure? How likely must the harm to the child be for that to happen, and what if the potential harm is unlikely but dire? And should doctors and police who seize custody and perform the procedure over parents’ objections bear any liability?

Human Events: I’m sure this all entirely coincidental. It’s just one of those random acts of Fate. Who knows when Atropos may cut the thread of our destiny, and where the loose ends might land when they fall?

Legal Pad: Put an Idaho law criminalizing abortions before two of the more liberal members of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and you might expect some fireworks. But Judges Harry Pregerson and Betty Fletcher were mostly quiet Monday during arguments in McCormack v. Hiedeman, 11-36010, despite vigorous arguments by advocates on both sides. | Audio of Oral Arguments

William McGurn at the Wall Street Journal (via Google): It’s on. On the Idaho ballot, that is. Come November, Idahoans will vote on three referenda aimed at repealing what may be the nation’s most sweeping education reform, including new limits on collective bargaining for teachers. Think of it as the sequel to Wisconsin, where similar reforms led to a similar effort—the attempted recall of Gov. Scott Walker.

LA Times: The plaintiff aborted her fetus at home after about 20 weeks, using pills purchased over the Internet from an out-of-state doctor. She represents a discomfiting situation for both sides of the debate as her civil suit takes on the state’s strict laws.

Fox News: southeastern Idaho lawyer who is also a doctor will be allowed to intervene in a legal challenge to the state’s so-called fetal pain abortion law in a case that could set national precedent.

Christian Post: “Public schools should encourage, not shut down, the free exchange of ideas. Removing the voice of faith from schools sends a message to all students that religion is something to be ashamed of,” said ADF Litigation Staff Counsel Matt Sharp. “The school district is off to a good start in allowing this performance to occur, but it needs to revise its unconstitutional policy so that this doesn’t happen again.”

Idaho Reporter: Matt Sharp, an attorney for the Alliance Defense Fund, was prepared to sue the school over not allowing the student to perform.

An Idaho elementary school has agreed to allow a student to perform sign language to a song in a talent show after originally prohibiting the performance because the principal said the song was “too religious.” The school district has also agreed to review the policy on which the original denial was based, though that policy is currently still on the books.

One News Now: “He has, however, enjoined Idaho’s first trimester law so that at the moment we have no restrictions on first-trimester abortions in the state,” Ripley adds.

The Spokesman-Review: The Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund recently sent letters to universities and colleges in 23 states taking issue with policies that it claims place unconstitutional restrictions on student speech and prevent religious student groups from receiving activity fees that go to nonreligious student groups.

The Republic: The Alliance Defense Fund contends the university “can resolve this problem by simply adopting an exemption from its non-discrimination policy for religious student groups that select their members and leaders on the basis of their religious beliefs,” attorney David Hacker said in his letter. “Failing to take this action would unnecessarily make the university vulnerable to a federal lawsuit.” [more]

MySanAntonio.com (AP): The Alliance Defense Fund issued a statement Thursday saying Idaho’s oldest public university is among more than 160 schools nationwide with policies that violate students’ religious freedoms.

AP: The first challenge to the constitutionality of the so-called fetal pain anti-abortion laws enacted in several states has come from an unlikely place.

OPB News: An Idaho woman arrested for inducing her own abortion is taking her case to federal court. Jennie Linn McCormack was charged last year under an obscure Idaho law for ending her pregnancy with RU-486.

One News Now: “With that in mind, the decision of the Supreme Court not to review this case is certainly regrettable, especially in light of the fact that the court’s already stated that the Bible may be constitutionally used in appropriate study of religion, history, ethics, and otherwise,” Cortman notes. [more]

Christian Post: “Every student deserves a quality education. Banning classical religious texts denies students the right to learn what they need to know about world history and the world in general,” stated Senior Counsel David Cortman. “For that reason, the decision of the Supreme Court not to review this case is regrettable, especially in light of the high court’s existing precedent stating that even ‘the Bible may constitutionally be used in an appropriate study of history, civilization, ethics, comparative religion, or the like.’

MySanAntonio.com (AP): “When government officials ban the objective study of all religiously-themed texts — like the Bible, the Iliad, and the Odyssey — it does nothing but dumb-down public education,” said senior counsel David Cortman.

Wisconsin Rapid Tribune: The Alliance Defense Fund called the decision “regrettable” in a statement Monday.

Times-News MagicValley.com: The Idaho Senate passed a bill today that would require women to receive an ultrasound before undergoing an abortion. The bill passed on a 23-12 vote.

HTRNews.com: Idaho stepped closer to requiring women to undergo a fetal ultrasound before terminating a pregnancy . . .

Idaho Press-Tribune: A proposed bill that would amend existing state abortion laws to require women seeking the procedure to first undergo an ultrasound is causing controversy as it makes its way through the Idaho Legislature.

LaTimes.com: In a cause celebre for the right, an Idaho couple seeks a hearing on an EPA warning that a dry lot for their dream home is protected ‘wetlands.’

Religion Clause: In State of Idaho v. White, (ID App., Dec. 14, 2011), an Idaho state appeals court rejected defendant Cary White’s claim that his marijuana use is protected by the Idaho Free Exercise of Religion Protected Act.

Washington Times: Idaho Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter said the Republican governors of the Midwestern states who back the stalled Keystone XL oil pipeline should bypass the federal government altogether and make the agreements necessary to get the $7 billion project up and running.

Newsweek, The Daily Beast: Jennie McCormack was arrested for terminating her pregnancy with an abortion pill. The case that could transform the reproduction wars.

Idaho Press-Tribune: But the Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund claims the school district was pressured by gay rights activists who don’t want parents to know if their kids are joining a club that promotes equal rights for homosexuals, bisexuals and transgender people. The Alliance Defense Fund has also sued the Idaho Public Charter School Commission on behalf of the now-defunct Idaho Classical Academy charter school in Nampa in an attempt to allow the school to use religious texts in the classroom.

NPR: Chantell and Mike Sackett say the EPA violated their right to due process when it said they were building a house on a wetland and ordered them to restore the land.

Idaho Statesman: The Alliance Defense Fund, an Arizona-based firm that presses faith-based cases in court, issued a statement Monday saying the district was “duped” by gay rights activists into ditching the proposed parental consent policy. “School districts do not need to give in to activist demands that parents be left ignorant about what their children are exposed to,” said Jeremy Tedesco, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, in a statement.

Lambda Legal: Lambda Legal and the Idaho Safe Schools Coalition today applauded a Boise-area school district for approving a student club policy that eliminated a new requirement that students get parental permission to participate in clubs and other restrictions that would have harmed lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students and violated their rights.

Christian Post: Two Idaho homeless shelter residents failed in their attempt to sue a Christian mission shelter for allegedly forcing them to participate in religious activities.

An Idaho woman prosecuted for terminating her own pregnancy with abortion pills she ordered online won a temporary court order on Friday barring enforcement of the decades-old law under which she was charged.

ADF Attorney Dave Cortman appeared on The Real Side with Joe Messina to discuss the Nampa Classical Academy litigation. | MP3 audio 12:48 mins

ADF Attorney Matt Sharp on Drive Time with the Bill Bunkley to discuss the Nampa Classical Academy case. | MP3 audio 11:47 mins

Boise Weekly: The article mentions that Moffett is suing the board over the revocation of the charter. His lawyer is David Cortman of the Alliance Defense Fund, a group that defends so-called “Christian” causes “One of our claims in the case is, the closing down of the school, under the alleged guise of financial reasons, is a reaction to the teaching of religious books,” said Cortman.

LaTimes.com: The latest example is a battle between the Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative public-interest law firm, and the Idaho Public Charter School Commission. The commission threatened to revoke the charter of a school if it used any “religious document or text” — including the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Koran and the Bible — or even made those works available in the classroom.

Fox News: “I suspect the Supreme Court is going to eventually write the final book of this case,” David Cortman predicted as he too walked across the abandoned field that was once Nampa Classical. Cortman is from The Alliance Defense Fund, an Arizona-based group that defends Christian causes. “The Supreme Court of the United States has held for decades now,” he explained, “that it is Constitutionally permissible to objectively teach the Bible in public schools for history or comparative literature.”

Teresa Collett at theUniversity Faculty for Life: The woman challenging the Idaho abortion laws says she brought her lawsuit after a district attorney tried to prosecute her for a self-induce abortion. The charges were dismissed, but form the basis for her claim that she fears injury from the enforcement of the Idaho laws. I have blogged previously about her claims related to the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Act here and here, but did not discuss her claim that a law prohibiting self-induced abortion is unconstitutional. This second claim raises several interesting policy and legal issues.

Lambda Legal: Last week, the school board issued a revised policy that now makes clear that student clubs are not prohibited from discussing “sexual orientation including such subjects as combating unfair treatment, prejudices, or stereotypes.” However, the policy retains the requirement for parental consent to join a club. Furthermore, it maintains a three-tier structure for student organizations (exempt, curriculum, and non-curriculum), relegating all non-curriculum clubs, including Gay-Straight Alliances (GSAs), to the third tier and significantly limiting their ability to access school resources.

The Republic: Officials from a former charter school in Nampa are asking a full panel of federal appeals court judges to reconsider an earlier ruling that dismissed the school’s lawsuit against Idaho.

ADF appeals 9th Circuit ruling that upheld Idaho ban on all religious,
classical Western Civ. texts from objective study in every public school, university

Ezra Klein at The Washington Post: To Northup’s point, its unclear whether the court will even take up this Idaho case for this exact reason: the woman bringing the case may not actually have the legal standing to do so. Her complaint does include a criminal prosecution for a previous abortion, but that was prior to Idaho’s 20-week ban taking effect.

LifeNews.com: A leading pro-life organization that is behind the innovative 20-week abortion ban based on the scientific evidence showing that unborn children feel pain during an abortion is welcoming the first lawsuit against it.

An Idaho woman prosecuted for terminating her own pregnancy with an abortion pill ordered over the Internet has filed suit challenging a decades-old law under which she was charged, as well as a new state ban on abortions after 20 weeks of gestation.

Idaho Mountain Express: : Opportunity and hard work often go hand in hand. It’s a concept not lost on Roger Burdick, new Chief Justice of the Idaho Supreme Court, and one he has frequently capitalized on.

Christian Post:
David Cortman, the defense fund’s senior legal counsel told the Idaho Press-Tribune, “In our opinion, the court failed to perform any meaningful analysis of any issue in the case including the seminal one: whether there is any educational purpose to ban all religious documents from objective teaching.” Cortman also accused the circuit judges of ignoring the right of local school districts to choose their own curriculum and texts. “Censoring classical books, including religious books, does not improve a student’s education,” he said in a statement. “It harms it.” [more]

OneNewsNow.com: “It’s certainly our hope that a majority of the Supreme Court will understand that it’s not permissible for any state agency at any level to completely ban an entire category of books,” Cortman contends. “It’s just another way of the dumbing down of our public education system.”

The New American: David Cortman, senior legal counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), the legal advocacy group representing Moffett and the charter school, told the Idaho Press-Tribune in an e-mail that he is prepared to appeal the case to the Supreme Court. “In our opinion, the court failed to perform any meaningful analysis of any issue in the case,” Cortman wrote, “including the seminal one: whether there is any educational purpose to ban all religious documents from objective teaching….” In addition, he charged, the 9th Circuit panel ignored the right of local school districts to choose their own texts and curricula. “Censoring books, including religious books, is not the proper way to educate children,” Cortman said in an ADF statement, adding: The court’s opinion requiring the removal of religious books to comply with the so-called “separation of church and state” conflicts with established U.S. Supreme Court precedent stating that “the Bible may constitutionally be used in an appropriate study of history, civilization, ethics, comparative religion, or the like.”

Citydesk: But a senior legal counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund told the Idaho Press Tribune that his group is prepared to take their case to the Supreme Court. David Cortman said the Ninth Circuit “ignored the right of local school districts to choose their own texts and curriculum.” Ultimately Cortman said he’s prepared to file a petition to submit the case for review by the high court.

Idaho Press-Tribune: “In our opinion, the court failed to perform any meaningful analysis of any issue in the case, including the seminal one: whether there is any educational purpose to ban all religious documents from objective teaching …” Cortman said.
He said the court also ignored the right of local school districts to choose their own texts and curriculum.