Featured Stories
Reason Foundation Issues Commentary: Protecting Teens Online Shouldn't Require Mandatory Facial Scans for Digital Users
LOS ANGELES, California, July 30 -- The Reason Foundation issued the following commentary by technology policy analyst Richard Sill:
* * *
Protecting teens online shouldn't require mandatory facial scans for digital users
While facial age estimation offers a convenient way to respond to youth online safety demands, the tool comes with serious privacy costs.
-
Laws aimed at protecting minors online are pushing social media companies to verify age more aggressively, and facial age estimation has become one of the most appealing tools for doing that. Platforms must distinguish between children,
... Show Full Article
LOS ANGELES, California, July 30 -- The Reason Foundation issued the following commentary by technology policy analyst Richard Sill:
* * *
Protecting teens online shouldn't require mandatory facial scans for digital users
While facial age estimation offers a convenient way to respond to youth online safety demands, the tool comes with serious privacy costs.
-
Laws aimed at protecting minors online are pushing social media companies to verify age more aggressively, and facial age estimation has become one of the most appealing tools for doing that. Platforms must distinguish between children,teenagers, and adults with more certainty, making selfie-based checks and backup ID requests look like practical ways to show compliance. However, this is quickly shifting a broad policy problem into a biometric one, where access to ordinary online services can depend on literally showing your face.
While facial age estimation may offer platforms a convenient way to respond to youth online safety demands, that convenience comes with serious privacy costs. Required facial scans lower the baseline of privacy for everyone, especially teens, and create a regime where access to everyday social spaces depends on individuals surrendering sensitive information about their faces and, in many cases, their identities. If lawmakers continue to enact youth safety laws that pressure companies to apply facial scans in ways that may conflict with existing biometric laws, they risk creating a system that may protect teens in ways while exposing them, and everyone else, to long-lived surveillance and data trails that are difficult to escape.
How facial scans work and where they are being used
On social media, age assurance is increasingly centering on age estimation, in which users capture a selfie or short selfie video with their phone, and the system estimates whether they appear above or below key thresholds like 13, 16, or 18 years old. Platforms use that result to allow changes, block accounts, or impose teen settings. Supporters, including many regulators and some youth online safety advocates, describe the method as faster and less burdensome than asking every user for an ID. Vendors also say they estimate age rather than identify people, delete facial templates quickly, and keep selfies only briefly for limited support or fraud purposes. Even so, platforms and vendors may keep logs showing when checks occurred, what methods were used, and how accounts were categorized, and those records can be tied back to account identifiers long after the facial data is gone.
Meta's implementation of Yoti, a digital identity and age assurance company, on Instagram and Facebook shows how this works. If Instagram believes an account holder is under 18 years old and the user tries to change that, it can send that user to Yoti for analysis of a selfie video. Yoti then estimates whether the person appears to be over 18 and sends that result back to Meta. Its tests have expanded across the United Kingdom, Europe, Canada, Australia, and Japan, and similar flows have begun appearing on Facebook in Australia. Yoti also presents facial age estimation as part of a broader age assurance system that can include document-based checks, while highlighting that it estimates age rather than identifying the person.
Data privacy and de-anonymization risks for users
Requiring facial scans for age estimation or verification raises several privacy concerns. It forces users to surrender body-derived information to access what is now part of ordinary online life. A selfie or selfie video may capture a user's face, surroundings, and sometimes other people, and the system then converts the face into a numerical representation, often described as a template or embedding, so it can estimate age. Even if that representation is deleted quickly, the scanning process still changes what the platform knows and what it can record about them.
The data trail can extend well beyond the initial scan, which also makes the system a cybersecurity target. Selfies can be stored for days or weeks, logs of checks and outcomes may be retained much longer for compliance and auditing, and failed checks may push users into uploading a government ID or other backup document. In practice, that can leave behind a long-lived record of who was checked, when they were checked, what they were told, and how they got through the process.
In October 2025, hackers accessed a third-party verification vendor and exposed over 70,000 user IDs and personal documents of users of the chat and media platform Discord. The records came from users who had been flagged as under 18 after a face-based or similar age check and then uploaded their ID on appeal to prove they were over 18. Discord began using that verification process to comply with the United Kingdom's Online Safety Act, which had taken effect three months earlier. Age-check records, ID uploads, and related logs create an ongoing data security risk after the original assurance step is over. Compliance systems can also become a honeypot when age screening depends on third-party vendors and support workflows.
Facial age estimation also does not fully eliminate the risks associated with facial recognition. The underlying templates are designed to capture stable aspects of a face that allow comparison and inference, and research on facial embeddings shows that these representations can support re-identification and, in some cases, face reconstruction when they are preserved and matched across datasets. When those templates, selfies, or logs are tied to account identifiers and combined with signals like friend networks, location data, and content history, they can help build a far more detailed picture of a user's identity and behavior online.
The normalization of facial age checks also shifts expectations around online anonymity and pseudonymity. When access to a service or otherwise legal content depends on submitting a face image, users have fewer ways to participate without connecting their identity to their real-world identity, which can chill anonymous access and raise First Amendment concerns. Teenagers have First Amendment rights online, too, including the right to access otherwise legal speech and to use platforms to speak and receive information. That pressure affects everyone, but it may be felt most strongly by teenagers, who are the group most often asked to prove who they are and how old they are before they can continue using a platform. It also burdens adults who must scan their face simply to prove they are old enough, especially when a system mistakenly flags them as under 18 and forces them to appeal.
Legal practices and emerging tensions
Biometric privacy laws already treat face data as sensitive and place meaningful limits on how companies can collect, store, and use it. In Illinois, Texas, Washington, and other states, businesses generally need consent before collecting biometric information, and they must limit disclosure and destroy the data once the original purpose has been met or the retention period has ended. These restrictions frame facial data as sensitive information that should be tightly controlled rather than held indefinitely or reused for related purposes. They also make companies think carefully about how long to keep biometric records and what exactly they do with them after age checks are completed.
At the same time, youth online safety laws are putting more pressure on platforms to identify minors with greater certainty. California's Age-Appropriate Design Code and similar state measures encourage businesses likely to be accessed by minors to estimate users' ages with reasonable certainty or apply child-friendly defaults to everyone. Proposed state and federal youth safety laws, such as the KIDS Act currently in Congress, add more pressure by requiring reasonable age assurance without requiring a specific method. International rules have also helped make facial age estimation more common because United Kingdom and Australian laws have both encouraged age assurance tools that include facial scanning. As a result, companies have more reason to adopt facial age estimation as a practical compliance tool, especially when they want a method that works at scale.
Together, these laws push companies in opposite directions. Biometric rules push them to collect less face data and keep it for shorter periods, while youth safety laws push them to assure age more aggressively and retain records showing what steps were taken. Facial age estimation keeps gaining traction even though it raises the privacy concerns that biometric laws are meant to reduce. In theory, strong biometric and privacy laws could limit these systems and push platforms toward the least intrusive methods. But in practice, the unresolved space between proving age and collecting less data is exactly where companies are building new, more invasive age assurance infrastructures.
Lawmakers should proceed carefully
Facial age estimation may help platforms satisfy age-related rules, but it does so by making face scans a more routine part of online access. Lawmakers should avoid enacting laws that pressure companies to use facial scans as a default to estimate age, especially for teenagers. Facial scans, like government ID requirements, create serious privacy risks by requiring people to hand over sensitive personal information just to access ordinary online spaces. Turning age assurance into a biometric checkpoint risks making online access less private, less secure, and less open than the problem lawmakers are trying to fix.
* * *
Richard Sill is a technology policy analyst at Reason Foundation.
* * *
Original text here: https://reason.org/commentary/protecting-teens-online-shouldnt-require-mandatory-facial-scans-for-digital-users/
Boston Foundation: Free for All Endowment Fund Awards $330,000 to Twenty-One Organizations, Expanding Community Access to Classical Music and Cultural Experiences
BOSTON, Massachusetts, July 30 -- The Boston Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
The Free for All Endowment Fund awards $330,000 to twenty-one organizations, expanding community access to classical music and cultural experiences
The Boston Foundation today announced that 21 organizations will share $330,000 in grants from the Foundation's Free for All Endowment Fund to support access to music and other cultural programming in Greater Boston.
Since its inception in 2016, the Free for All Endowment Fund has granted over $1.6 million to large and small organizations to ensure that
... Show Full Article
BOSTON, Massachusetts, July 30 -- The Boston Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
The Free for All Endowment Fund awards $330,000 to twenty-one organizations, expanding community access to classical music and cultural experiences
The Boston Foundation today announced that 21 organizations will share $330,000 in grants from the Foundation's Free for All Endowment Fund to support access to music and other cultural programming in Greater Boston.
Since its inception in 2016, the Free for All Endowment Fund has granted over $1.6 million to large and small organizations to ensure thateveryone in Greater Boston--children, adults, and families--has regular and permanent access to the rich world of classical, orchestral music and related cultural programming. Organizations applying for grants are working to expand their programs and outreach to connect with a broad range of audiences across Greater Boston. Nearly 60 organizations applied with requests totaling over $1.3 million for this cycle. The $330,000 in grants make this the largest grantmaking year to date for the Fund.
"Organizations are responding to the loss of federal arts funding and other challenges with renewed determination to broaden both who is represented in classical music and where and how audiences can experience it," said Catherine T. Morris, Director for Arts and Creativity at the Boston Foundation. "We are excited to amplify and support these organizations and ensembles, celebrate their remarkable programming, and recognize their commitment to their communities they serve."
Nine of this year's twenty-one grantees had never received a grant from the Free for All Endowment Fund. This year's grants ranged from $10,000 to $50,000.
Learn more about the Fund at https://www.tbf.org/nonprofits/grant-making-initiatives/free-for-all-fund.
2026 Free For All Endowment Fund Grant recipients:
Adam Theater, Inc.
Afghanistan Freeharmonic Orchestra
Angkor Dance Troupe Inc.
Apollo Ensemble of Boston
Back Bay Chorale, Ltd.
Boston Landmarks Orchestra
Castle of Our Skins
City Strings United
Coro Allegro, Inc.
Eureka Ensemble Corporation
Fort Point Arts Community
Kwong Kow Chinese School, Inc.
La Donna Musicale
Latin American Music Festival
Me2/Orchestra, Inc.
New England Philharmonic
Project STEP, Inc.
Sarasa, Inc.
Shelter Music Boston
White Snake Projects
WholeTone Academy Collective
* * *
Original text here: https://www.tbf.org/news-and-insights/press-releases/2026/july/free-for-all-grants-2026
TPPF Challenges City of Austin's Tree Ordinance
AUSTIN, Texas, July 29 -- The Texas Public Policy Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
TPPF Challenges City of Austin's Tree Ordinance
*
AUSTIN - The Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) filed a lawsuit challenging the City of Austin's enforcement of its Tree Ordinance.
Plaintiff Michael Petrick is facing punishment for trimming tree branches in his own yard. The City Arborist assessed a nearly $9,000 fee despite the fact those trees are largely intact and still alive.
TPPF argues that the City's actions constitute an uncompensated taking of private property and impose unconstitutional
... Show Full Article
AUSTIN, Texas, July 29 -- The Texas Public Policy Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
TPPF Challenges City of Austin's Tree Ordinance
*
AUSTIN - The Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) filed a lawsuit challenging the City of Austin's enforcement of its Tree Ordinance.
Plaintiff Michael Petrick is facing punishment for trimming tree branches in his own yard. The City Arborist assessed a nearly $9,000 fee despite the fact those trees are largely intact and still alive.
TPPF argues that the City's actions constitute an uncompensated taking of private property and impose unconstitutionalpermit conditions without any nexus to actual public harm.
"This is exactly the sort of thing that makes housing too expensive in Austin," said TPPF Director of Litigation Chance Weldon. "It shouldn't cost you thousands of dollars every time you engage in harmless yard maintenance."
"In Texas, the maximum fine for first-degree murder is $10,000. Austin is trying to charge our client nearly that much for trimming his own trees." added TPPF Attorney Laura Beth Latimer, "No wonder Austin's cost of living is out of control."
Read more about Michael Petrick v. City of Austin.
***
Original text here: https://www.texaspolicy.com/press/tppf-challenges-city-of-austins-tree-ordinance
Lumina Foundation Issues Commentary: America's Learning Opportunities Shouldn't Be This Hard to Find
INDIANAPOLIS, Indiana, July 29 -- The Lumina Foundation issued the following commentary by Strategy Director Chris Mullin:
* * *
America's learning opportunities shouldn't be this hard to find
We don't need better pathways. We need a better map.
"Where can I learn to fix boat engines?" my teenage son asked one day.
It sounded like a simple question. He wasn't looking for a four-year degree. He plans to study marine science and wants practical mechanical skills--for the obvious reason that boats break, but also because repairing marine engines could provide income while he's in college.
I
... Show Full Article
INDIANAPOLIS, Indiana, July 29 -- The Lumina Foundation issued the following commentary by Strategy Director Chris Mullin:
* * *
America's learning opportunities shouldn't be this hard to find
We don't need better pathways. We need a better map.
"Where can I learn to fix boat engines?" my teenage son asked one day.
It sounded like a simple question. He wasn't looking for a four-year degree. He plans to study marine science and wants practical mechanical skills--for the obvious reason that boats break, but also because repairing marine engines could provide income while he's in college.
Iassumed the answer would be easy to find. After all, I spend my days working with education data.
But I was wrong. That surprised me because the United States has one of the richest education and workforce ecosystems in the world. Whether someone wants a bachelor's degree, a short-term certificate, an apprenticeship, or specialized workforce training, there are thousands of opportunities to build new skills, advance a career, or simply pursue a passion.
Yet finding those opportunities can be surprisingly difficult.
I searched college websites. Workforce training directories. Apprenticeship listings. State resources. Federal databases. I never found a marine engine maintenance program, and I live in Florida--a state surrounded by water on three sides.
If someone who works in education policy for a living struggles to answer that question, imagine the experience for a learner or parent trying to navigate the system for the first time.
The problem isn't that opportunities don't exist. The problem is that our information about those opportunities is fragmented. My search for the right program isn't unusual. It's the result of how we've organized education and workforce information.
Today, students must navigate separate systems for higher education, workforce training, apprenticeships, and career and technical education. More than 5,600 colleges participate in federal student aid programs. Tens of thousands of workforce training programs receive federal support. States invest heavily in career and technical education. Each system collects valuable information--but largely in isolation from the others.
For decades, we've treated this fragmentation as inevitable, but we know it doesn't have to be.
The irony is that Americans continue to believe deeply in education and training. Lumina Foundation's latest State of Higher Education study found that nearly nine in 10 adults without a degree believe at least one type of credential is valuable. Fifty-seven percent have considered enrolling in education or training during the past two years, and among those, 85 percent say they're likely to enroll within the next five years.
So, the demand is there, but every day someone can't find the right opportunity is another day employers struggle to fill jobs, colleges miss prospective students, and learners miss opportunities to advance their careers.
That challenge becomes even more urgent when you consider that more than 43 million Americans have attended college without earning a credential. Every year, millions of learners stop out while more than a million work to return. Helping them reconnect with learning opportunities shouldn't require detective work.
For decades, policymakers, researchers, and education leaders have called for a more integrated view of America's education and workforce systems. The vision has been remarkably consistent, but progress has been slow.
Working alongside Intentional Futures, we asked a different question.
Instead of imagining an entirely new federal data system, what if we simply connected the ones we already have?
The result is America's Trusted Talent System (ATTEST): An Action Plan.
The proposal doesn't replace existing systems. It doesn't require new legislation. It doesn't create a national student database or collect new student-level information.
Instead, it establishes a simple hub-and-spoke model that allows existing federal data systems--including the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), the Registered Apprenticeship Partners Information Database System (RAPIDS), and Perkins--to speak the same language while preserving their unique purposes. The Hub creates a shared inventory of providers, programs, and credentials that existing systems can reference, making it possible to understand the nation's education and workforce investments as one connected talent ecosystem rather than four separate ones.
That may sound like a technical improvement, but it's actually a student-centered one.
Imagine a high school student exploring career options, a veteran looking to transition into civilian work, a parent returning to school, or an employer searching for training partners. Instead of bouncing between disconnected websites and databases, they could navigate a single, coherent map of America's learning opportunities.
Providers would also benefit. Colleges and training organizations currently report much of the same information across multiple federal systems using slightly different definitions and timelines. ATTEST reduces that duplication by allowing core information to be entered once and reused across systems.
Most importantly, policymakers could finally answer fundamental questions we struggle with today:
Where are we developing talent?
Where are the gaps?
Are public investments aligned with workforce needs?
At a time when artificial intelligence, demographic shifts, and rapid changes in the labor market are reshaping education and work, those questions matter more than ever.
I often think back to my son's question.
Somewhere, there is probably an excellent marine maintenance program. Maybe several.
Neither of us could find one, and that shouldn't happen in a country with as many learning opportunities as ours.
America doesn't need fewer pathways.
It needs a better map.
And building that map is something we can begin today.
* * *
About the Author
Chris is an education expert empowering people and communities, and a Lumina strategy director. The second edition of his book, Higher Education Finance Research: Policy, Politics, and Practice, will be available in October 2026.
* * *
Original text here: https://www.luminafoundation.org/news-and-views/americas-learning-opportunities-shouldnt-be-this-hard-to-find/
Judge Hears Arguments in Challenge to Lowell Data Center Expansion
BOSTON, Massachusetts, July 29 -- Conservation Law Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
Judge Hears Arguments in Challenge to Lowell Data Center Expansion
*
Advocates and Lowell, Massachusetts residents stand together before a hearing on their lawsuit challenging the expansion of the Markley data center. Photo: Adilson Gonzalez Morales
July 29, 2026 (Boston, MA) - Attorneys presented arguments on Wednesday in Middlesex County Superior Court on behalf of Lowell residents seeking to temporarily halt the expansion of Markley Group's data center while their lawsuit proceeds.
The
... Show Full Article
BOSTON, Massachusetts, July 29 -- Conservation Law Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
Judge Hears Arguments in Challenge to Lowell Data Center Expansion
*
Advocates and Lowell, Massachusetts residents stand together before a hearing on their lawsuit challenging the expansion of the Markley data center. Photo: Adilson Gonzalez Morales
July 29, 2026 (Boston, MA) - Attorneys presented arguments on Wednesday in Middlesex County Superior Court on behalf of Lowell residents seeking to temporarily halt the expansion of Markley Group's data center while their lawsuit proceeds.
Theresidents are seeking to pause activities related to the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection's (MassDEP) air permit approval and prevent Markley from operating and constructing additional diesel generators and cooling towers while the lawsuit proceeds. The expansion calls for adding eight diesel generators - bringing the total to 27 - alongside 16 cooling towers.
"We didn't choose this fight - it was forced on us," said Lowell resident Alex Solange. "The noise shaking my house day and night, the dust and soot covering everything I own, and the trees dying in my yard left me no choice but to stand up. We may not have chosen this fight, but we did choose this neighborhood - and we're not willing to give it up."
The residents filed a lawsuit in April arguing that MassDEP failed to fully study the project's combined impacts, adequately address noise and health risks, consider cleaner alternatives to diesel power, or give residents a fair hearing. It also challenges MassDEP's private agreement allowing Markley to move forward while residents' administrative appeal was still pending.
"My backyard pool used to be a place where my family and friends could cool off on hot days," said Lowell resident Eileen Castle. "Now, I won't fill it. I'm concerned about emissions from the generators and the mist from the cooling towers that comes into my yard. There are also 2 water towers next to my home. This facility keeps piling burdens on a neighborhood already carrying too much. We shouldn't have to choose between protecting our community and staying in the homes we've lived in for decades."
Lowell residents have organized as Honest Future for Lowell, a grassroots group supported by Slingshot, which provides training, resources, and organizing support to communities most impacted by environmental pollution.
"The Markley data center's impacts on this community have gone unaddressed for too long," said Mireille Bejjani, co-executive director at Slingshot. "This lawsuit is aimed at one aspect of the problem, but unfortunately it won't fix the whole situation. That's why Honest Future for Lowell is building power among neighbors and calling on the City of Lowell to step up and protect its residents."
The residents are represented by Yale Law School's Environmental Justice Law and Advocacy Clinic, Fitch Law Partners, and Conservation Law Foundation.
"Every day our clients are forced to endure already severe impacts from the data center operations," Stephanie L. Safdi of Yale Law School's Environmental Justice Law and Advocacy Clinic, told Judge William Barrett during Wednesday's hearing. "The problem here is that our clients never got the hearing that the law entitles them to."
Judge Barrett considered the request for an injunction and a ruling is expected later. The case is Fortes et al. v. Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection et al.
***
Original text here: https://www.clf.org/newsroom/judge-hears-arguments-in-challenge-to-lowell-data-center-expansion/
Health Foundation: Plans to Improve Vocational Pathways to Support Young People Into Work Welcome But Must Be Backed by Wider Reform
LONDON, England, July 29 -- The Health Foundation issued the following statement by David Finch, interim director of health and inequalities:
* * *
Plans to improve vocational pathways to support young people into work welcome but must be backed by wider reform
Responding to government plans to improve vocational pathways and support young people into work, David Finch, Interim Director of Health and Inequalities at the Health Foundation, said:
'It is encouraging to see the government's recognition of the importance of creating clearer vocational pathways into employment, including a new bursary
... Show Full Article
LONDON, England, July 29 -- The Health Foundation issued the following statement by David Finch, interim director of health and inequalities:
* * *
Plans to improve vocational pathways to support young people into work welcome but must be backed by wider reform
Responding to government plans to improve vocational pathways and support young people into work, David Finch, Interim Director of Health and Inequalities at the Health Foundation, said:
'It is encouraging to see the government's recognition of the importance of creating clearer vocational pathways into employment, including a new bursaryto reduce financial barriers to taking up apprenticeships.
'Good employment can support young people's health. Creating clearer routes into a successful career can help prevent a future generation of young people becoming disconnected from learning and work.
'But the delivery challenge should not be underestimated - successive governments have struggled to create a coherent vocational system that leads to higher level skills. The success of these measures will depend on effective design and implementation, backed by sufficient investment.
'Over the long term, more fundamental reform is needed to ensure our benefits and education systems are fit for purpose, including addressing fragmented support for young people entering work and the shortage of suitable entry-level jobs, to give young people the best possible opportunities.'
* * *
Original text here: https://www.health.org.uk/media-office/press-releases/plans-to-improve-vocational-pathways-to-support-young-people-into-work-welcome-but-must-be-backed-by-wider-reform
Freedom From Religion Foundation: Speaker Johnson Worrisomely Says Christian Legal Ministry Guides House Leadership
MADISON, Wisconsin, July 29 -- The Freedom From Religion Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
Speaker Johnson worrisomely says Christian legal ministry guides House leadership
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is expressing concern after House Speaker Mike Johnson declared at a highly influential Christian legal organization's annual summit that it shapes his governance.
Johnson, speaking recently to hundreds of Alliance Defending Freedom supporters in San Diego, repeatedly described the group as "home," praised its mission of advancing conservative Christianity through the
... Show Full Article
MADISON, Wisconsin, July 29 -- The Freedom From Religion Foundation issued the following news release:
* * *
Speaker Johnson worrisomely says Christian legal ministry guides House leadership
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is expressing concern after House Speaker Mike Johnson declared at a highly influential Christian legal organization's annual summit that it shapes his governance.
Johnson, speaking recently to hundreds of Alliance Defending Freedom supporters in San Diego, repeatedly described the group as "home," praised its mission of advancing conservative Christianity through thelegal system, and credited his years working there with molding his leadership as speaker.
"ADF really is like home to us," Johnson told attendees. "You're like family." He added that his years at the organization were "formative to us," explaining that "so much of what we do, we learned on the front lines of the culture war, keeping the door open for the spread of the gospel, and it informs still how we do our job today."
Such statements are extremely concerning to FFRF.
"Speaker Johnson has made explicit what many Americans have long suspected: He does not view himself simply as an elected official who happens to be religious," says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. "He views his leadership of the House as an extension of the mission of Alliance Defending Freedom, an organization dedicated to advancing conservative Christian ideology through the courts and government."
Founded in 1994 by leaders in the Christian right, Alliance Defending Freedom has become one of the country's most powerful Christian nationalist legal organizations. The group has played a central role in many Supreme Court cases that have expanded religious exemptions while restricting reproductive rights and LGBTQ equality, including Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis. The Southern Poverty Law Center has designated the entity as an anti-LGBTQ hate group because of its long record of attacking LGBTQ rights, a move that has prompted members of Congress to ironically go after the renowned civil rights organization.
At the Alliance Defending Freedom gathering, Johnson continued his longstanding effort to recast America's founding in explicitly Christian terms. Discussing the Declaration of Independence, he argued that the rights of Americans "don't come from the government" but "come from the King of Kings," replacing the Declaration's more inclusive reference to a "Creator" with a specifically Christian theological claim.
Johnson also warned that rejecting belief in God inevitably leads to "Marxism, socialism [and] communism," telling the audience that denying God means people lose their inherent dignity and ultimately their freedom. He described universities as places where students have been "indoctrinated" to reject America's Christian foundations.
"Speaker Johnson is using his constitutional office to promote an explicitly sectarian worldview," remarks Gaylor. "The House speaker represents Americans of every religion and of none. He should not be telling the country that our rights come from Christianity or suggesting that secular Americans are on the road to tyranny."
Johnson repeatedly framed political engagement at the summit as a religious struggle, describing Alliance Defending Freedom supporters as "fellow warriors" and praising the organization for standing on the "front lines" and the "tip of the spear" defending "God's truth." He urged supporters to pledge themselves to the cause just as the Founders supposedly had and predicted that the group's next chapter would be "the greatest season of this ministry since its inception."
The gathering underscored the Alliance Defending Freedom's extraordinary access to Republican leadership. Johnson was introduced not merely as the House speaker but as "one of us," with organizers highlighting his years as an attorney with the group and its spokesman before entering politics.
The event also featured Trump administration Assistant Secretary for Health Brett Giroir, who argued that transgender health care contradicts "the deeper moral order that is woven into creation itself," citing Genesis 1:27 and asserting that "male and female" reflect God's design. He encouraged pastors, rather than medical professionals, to play a central role in caring for youth experiencing gender dysphoria.
Alliance Defending Freedom President Kristen Waggoner, who has defended conversion therapy and has repeatedly misgendered transgender people, also interviewed West Virginia and Idaho's Republican attorneys general, reinforcing the organization's close ties to elected officials shaping national legal policy on one end of the political spectrum.
"The American people elected a speaker of the House, not a missionary-in-chief," Gaylor adds. "Mike Johnson is free to practice his religion, but he is not free to govern as though Congress exists to carry out the mission of Alliance Defending Freedom or any other religious organization. His oath is to the Constitution, which guarantees freedom of religion by keeping religion and government separate."
* * *
The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters relating to nontheism. With about 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.
* * *
Original text here: https://ffrf.org/news/releases/speaker-johnson-worrisomely-says-christian-legal-ministry-guides-house-leadership/
[Category: Religion]
