California Governor Gavin Newsom has made it clear during COVID, he has no respect for religious liberty.
The radical Democrat should be fighting the fentanyl crisis, but instead, he’s passing laws that infringe on religious groups.
But now these Christian parents are standing up against one unconstitutional law, and they might just win.
Activist celebrated “the elimination of the personal belief exemption”
In 2015, former California Governor Jerry Brown signed SB277 into law and removed all non-medical exemptions to public school vaccination requirements.
“The science is clear that vaccines dramatically protect children against a number of infectious and dangerous diseases,” Brown wrote alongside his signature.
The governor recognized that “no medical intervention is without risks,” but he believed that the benefits outweighed the risks of compulsory vaccinations.
The bill would leave the discretion solely up to patients’ physicians and disregard potential conflict based on faith or other reasoning.
Cofounder of Vaccinate California—a nonprofit group pushing for vaccination standards—Leah Russin celebrated the bill.
“The elimination of the personal belief exemption will raise vaccination rates in our state, and protect our children and communities,” Russin said.
Now nearly 10 years later, that bill is being challenged.
Adherence to “religious convictions has required significant sacrifice”
Earlier this week, four mothers filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Southern California.
The lawsuit focuses on religious beliefs held by the mothers and their concern over the use of aborted fetal cells in multiple vaccines that are required on the childhood vaccination schedule.
Sara Royce, Sarah Clark, Tiffany Brown, and Kristi Caraway would like the federal judge to review the bill on concerns that it violates the U.S. Constitution.
Currently, the only non-medical exemptions to the vaccine schedule are for those enrolled in an individualized education program or for homeless children.
The mothers argue that they “have religious beliefs that forbid them from vaccinating their children, and their decision to adhere to their religious convictions has required significant sacrifice.”
However, the state’s “compulsory vaccination law requires all students to receive numerous vaccines to enter public or private school.”
Collectively the plaintiffs have over a dozen school age children, and only one child has been noted to have a medical exemption that qualifies.
Caraway is the mother of the child that has the medical exemption, and she claims that the exemption only came as result of a vaccine induced injury.
“People of faith should never be discriminated against through legislation”
The lawsuit states that SB277 violates the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment in the U.S. Constitution.
It argues that the “Plaintiffs’ children are unable to enjoy the benefits of a public and private education that their secular peers enjoy because of California’s compulsory vaccination requirements.”
The mothers feel that they have been forced into homeschool programs as a result of the law and that their children are missing out on many opportunities in the public school system.
Clark argues that vaccines “violate the Bible because they are foreign substances and are harmful to the body.”
Vice President and Legal Counsel for the Advocates for Faith and Freedom, Maria Gondeiro, said, “people of faith should never be discriminated against through legislation.”
“We are standing up for parents of all faith backgrounds who want access to a quality education and medical autonomy over their children,” she stated.
Informed American will keep you up-to-date on any developments to this ongoing story.
