First Liberty is fighting for Bangor Christian Schools. Maine officials are circumventing the Supreme Court by requiring faith-based schools to compromise their beliefs to participate in the state’s tuition assistance program.
Maine continues to single out religious schools. The state put in place a discriminatory requirement to deter religious schools from participating in the school choice program. As a result, Bangor Christian and other similar faith-based schools must violate their religious beliefs if they want to participate in Maine’s tuition assistance program.
This law circumvents the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling in Carson v Makin, our Treat Children Fairly case. The Court held that Maine can’t restrict access to its tuition assistance funding based on religion.
We won at the Supreme Court so families could choose the best education for their kids, including religious schools. But Maine is not getting the message that religious discrimination is illegal.
This isn’t just wrong. It’s unconstitutional—and it’s why we’re fighting this case in federal court.
Maine officials aren’t just sidestepping the Supreme Court’s ruling. They’ve also made their hostility and anti-religious bias clear.
The same day the Supreme Court issued Carson, Maine’s Attorney General issued a statement targeting Bangor Christian, expressing extreme hostility to its religious beliefs and vowing to exclude the school from the state program.
The Speaker of the Maine House of Representatives at the time also posted a hostile Tweet suggesting they designed the law to evade the Carson ruling. In that Tweet, the Speaker called the Carson ruling a “ludicrous decision from the far-right SCOTUS.”
Bangor Christian needs your support. Together, we can fight to make sure that all faith-based schools can equally participate in the state tuition program without facing religious discrimination.
*If contributions exceed the immediate needs of a specific project or case, First Liberty may redirect funds at its discretion to provide support for other religious liberty matters.
– First Liberty Senior Counsel, Lea Patterson
In February 2024, a federal district court denied our motion for preliminary injunction, in which we asked the court to stop the state from enforcing the restrictions while the case is pending.
This was a frustrating loss. But it doesn’t mean the case is over.
The district court’s opinion paves the way to take the case to a higher level. More importantly, the court held that Bangor Christian had the legal right to challenge Maine’s law in court.
And with your help, that’s exactly what we’re doing. We’re going to fight this case until our clients are treated fairly. Families in America should not be punished for choosing a religious education.
Maine can’t be allowed to continue to discriminate against religious schools. We must stand up to these hostile bureaucrats and stop their attempt to flout the Supreme Court.
But to win this fight, we need your financial support.
Will you join us on the frontlines in the fight to stop religious discrimination in Maine?
*If contributions exceed the immediate needs of a specific project or case, First Liberty may redirect funds at its discretion to provide support for other religious liberty matters.
 |
|
|
