Ryan Tucker - Should the state decide who a church can hire?

Ryan Tucker, senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom and director of ADF's Center for Christian Ministries, joins Lars to discuss a case involving Yakima Union Gospel Mission and whether Washington can require a Christian ministry to hire people who do not share its faith.

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SPEAKER_01 0:05

Welcome back to the Lars Larson Show. Could any State be more anti-Christian than this? Imagine this. You've got a law on the books that says that if you are part of a religious organization, you need not hire people who don't believe in your faith. And you say, well, Lars, duh, of course you're not going to hire people who don't believe in your faith. Well, the problem is the State Supreme Court decided to take that law 72 years on the books and simply throw it out and say, yes, you do. Even if you're a Christian organization, even if you're out there trying to help out people who are living on the streets and who are homeless, you are forced to hire people who actually reject the faith that is the center point of the Union Gospel Mission. I don't think it makes any sense, but I'm not a lawyer either. Ryan Tucker is. He's senior counsel at the Alliance of Defending Freedom and director of ADF Center for Christian Ministries. Ryan, welcome to the program. How are you?

SPEAKER_00 1:04

Thank you, Lars, for having me.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

What in the world is going on that you have the Yakima Union Gospel Mission that wants to serve the homeless? And then along comes the state of Washington that says, and you have to hire people who don't buy your Christian faith.

SPEAKER_00 1:20

Yeah, it's absolutely shocking, isn't it? The state has a non-discrimination law in place. And for years, religious organizations have been able to hire individuals aligned with their beliefs with no problem. The problem, as you mentioned, is that the state Supreme Court not long ago got in an exemption in that law that allows religious organizations to do just that. So the question right now is well, under the First Amendment, does the government get to decide who's qualified to share a religious organization's message and who it hires, or does the religious organization common sense tells you it's the religious organization, the U.S. Constitution tells you that as well.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

Well, and why when the court made that decision, I mean, usually a Supreme Court, whether it's the U.S. Supreme Court or the State Supreme Court, uh, is going to say we are protecting somebody's rights. Whose rights are being protected when they say the religious organization that has as the center point of its faith and the reason it exists at all is its belief in this case in Christianity. But you got to hire non-Christians uh if you're gonna employ people. Who in the world are they protecting in this case?

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Well, it's really not the people of faith. I mean, look, the the Woods decision involved an individual who went to the mission and said, Look, I don't agree with your beliefs on biblical sexuality. I want you to change them, but yet I still want the job. And in that particular case, that organization said no. Uh that resulted in a lawsuit that resulted then in a state Supreme Court decision. That put our client, the Union Gospel Mission of Yakima, on notice. Say, look, the the the state can come after you, and what you're doing shockingly now is in violation of state law. So they were forced to file a federal lawsuit to defend themselves.

SPEAKER_01 2:59

And can you get to there if if this was decided first by a state supreme court? Because at the end of the day, no matter where you live in America, uh the the the First Amendment and your protection of faith, uh your God-given rights to believe in the faith you choose to believe in are protected by the First Amendment, no matter what the state constitution or state laws says, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 3:22

Absolutely, and that's why, you know, we're in federal court. Um this is actually our third time today we had arguments at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit before the full panel. There were 11 judges there this morning who asked uh a lot of lively questions, but at its core, you're 100% correct. The U.S. Constitution protects the right of religious organizations, of ministries, to have the right to decide who is religiously qualified to serve.

SPEAKER_01 3:47

And in fact, I mean look, there are times the Ninth Circus Court does not impress me. I think they still hold the record for being the most overturned federal appeals court in America. But they've improved quite a bit after Donald Trump got a few judges uh on in his first term in office. I mean, can we count on the Ninth Circus Court to actually come up with the right decision on this one?

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Well, I hope so. I mean, you're right. The the the Ninth Circuit makeup has changed uh over the last several years, so we're certainly hopeful there. But I mean, it's it's a common sense argument, right? I mean, think about it. You know, the state is is it shouldn't require a synagogue, for example, to hire a Christian more so than a like a religious school to hire an atheist. It's really uh insane. It's it's it's almost comical. So we're hopeful that those that may be ideologically against some of our positions will at least look at this and say, wait a second, this is not right, it's unconstitutional, and we need to rule in favor of the mission.

SPEAKER_01 4:42

And by the way, when they when the other side argues in favor of forcing the religious organization, in this case, a Christian group called the Union Gospel Mission of Yakima, are they arguing? Is that are they arguing on behalf of the state of Washington? Is this the state going against the faith of the majority of its citizens?

SPEAKER_00 5:03

Yeah, unfortunately, that's absolutely right. It's not just the mission, too. I mean, you've got, you know, FBU there in Washington. You have others that have come under fire from either uh the the governor when he was the attorney general before, or even now, they're continuing to take these positions that are are definitely antithetical to uh people of faith and and what they believe. And we're hopeful that the that we can correct the situation in Washington before it starts to seep into other areas.

SPEAKER_01 5:32

You know, I'm Ryan Tucker's with me, senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom. I would think you'd have Amicus briefs from every other faith group in the entire state saying, hey, if you lose on this one, it's gonna it's gonna be a loss for all of us, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 5:45

We were we yeah, absolutely. We were fortunate to to gain um and outgain, frankly, the other side and the number of uh friend of the court briefs, as you mentioned, amicus briefs. Those are people that aren't necessarily parties to the lawsuit, but have chimed in and said, wait a second, this impacts us. And so, I mean, think about it. If if a religious organization is not able to hire like-minded people, they will be destroyed from the inside out. So this is an existential threat to the viability of religious organizations. I think not just in Washington, but really nationwide. This is this is a big, big issue that the Ninth Circuit has before it.

SPEAKER_01 6:18

Is it possible to rewrite that 72-year-old statute so that it would uh survive another challenge before the state Supreme Court, the one that was thrown out?

SPEAKER_00 6:28

A funny thing is, I mean, the if you go pull up the statute and read it, it currently protects religious organizations. So why the state Supreme Court decided to like reinterpret it to simply limit it to only protect a small portion of a religious organization, I have no idea. But we're hopeful that this court, as it did earlier this year, there was actually a really great decision that was released by the Ninth Circuit, a three-judge panel back in January. The state, uh, because they took a loss, they asked for the entire court to review it. And that's what we did today. And I'm hopeful that they'll replicate, hopefully, what uh the Ninth Circuit has already held.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

See, that's and and I guess one of the things about this, Ryan, is I wish state legislatures and the U.S. Congress would say every time we have a law that gets thrown out that does is a common sense law like this, but they've thrown it out because of some interpretation by the courts say, okay, we'll fix those pieces of the law and we'll put it back on the books. It may get challenged again, but the idea is that at least you fix that protection so the protection is still there. Because having a law like that on the books that isn't going to actually be enforced to me doesn't make any sense at all. Hey, Ryan, thanks very much for the time.

SPEAKER_00 7:39

Thank you so much for having me, Lars. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 7:40

You bet. That is Ryan Tucker. Ryan is the senior lawyer at the Alliance Defending Freedom and Director of ADF Center for Christian Ministries. Glad to get your phone calls and your emails. If you want to jump into the best conversation in talk journalism, it's here every day at 866. Hey Lars. That's 866-439-5277. Send your emails to talk at LarsLarson.com. And you're listening to the Radio Northwest Network, providing honestly provocative talk on a daily basis for the Pacific Northwest.