Washington, D.C. — After the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a California church’s challenge to restrictions on public gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic by a 5-4 vote, Maggie Siddiqi, director of the Faith and Progressive Policy Initiative at the Center for American Progress, issued the following statement:
The right to religious freedom is not a license to spread the coronavirus and put communities at risk. The Supreme Court’s decision rejects the push by a small group of far-right, extremist organizations to distort the meaning of religious freedom into a license to override any government regulation. It is heartening that the court did not allow such groups to use the current pandemic, which has already cost more than 100,000 lives in our country alone, to advance their ideological agendas. The vast majority of faith communities across the nation are helping lead the effort against the coronavirus.
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