Supreme Court uses shadow docket to empower religious privilege

A new U.S. Supreme Court order siding with religious parents challenging California’s transgender student privacy policies signals an alarming expansion of religious privilege at the expense of LGBTQ+ students and public school protections.

In an emergency order issued earlier this week in Mirabelli v. Bonta, the court’s conservative majority vacated a lower court stay that had allowed California to enforce policies protecting transgender students from being forcibly “outed” to parents by public school employees without student consent. The order applies to the specific Christian parents challenging the policies and blocks the enforcement of protections for transgender students while the case continues in the lower courts. The ruling came through the Supreme Court’s “shadow docket,” meaning the justices intervened on an emergency basis without full briefing, oral arguments or a final decision from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

“This is another troubling example of the Supreme Court rushing to privilege religious objections while bypassing the normal judicial process,” says the Freedom From Religion Foundation Anne Nicol Gaylor Legal Fellow Kyle J. Steinberg. “The court is signaling that religious beliefs about gender identity may be used to override policies designed to protect vulnerable students.”

California’s policy generally allows students to control when and how their gender identity is disclosed, recognizing that involuntary disclosure can expose LGBTQ+ students to rejection, harassment or abuse. The state argues that forcing schools to disclose confidential information about gender identity could cause irreversible harm.
But the Supreme Court’s majority said the parents bringing the challenge, who cite religious beliefs about sex and gender, were likely to succeed in their claims that the policies burden their religious rights and interfere with their authority to direct their children’s upbringing.

Justice Elena Kagan, joined by the court’s other two liberal justices, sharply criticized the majority’s decision to intervene so early in the litigation. “The court is impatient: It already knows what it thinks, and insists on getting everything over quickly,” Kagan wrote in dissent, warning that the justices were effectively prejudging a complex constitutional dispute without the benefit of full consideration.

The order builds on the court’s recent decision in Mahmoud v. Taylor, which elevated religious objections in public-school contexts involving LGBTQ+-related materials. The new ruling suggests the court may continue expanding religious exemptions in cases targeting LGBTQ+ rights in education.

“The Constitution does not give parents a religious veto over school policies meant to protect students,” says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. “Public schools must serve all students, including youth who may not feel safe disclosing their identity at home.”

FFRF emphasizes that public schools have a responsibility to provide a safe learning environment for all students and to avoid privileging religious beliefs in ways that harm vulnerable populations.

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 42,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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What is the FFRF Action Fund?

The executive board of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a 501(c)(3) incorporated as a national group in 1978, established FFRF Action Fund as its legislative, advocacy affiliate in 2022. FFRF Action Fund works as a 501(c)(4) affiliate.

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Freethought Radio – March 5, 2026

Moroccan feminist/activist/freethinker Ibtissame (“Betty”) Lachgar is in prison for wearing a T-shirt that insulted Islam. Hear about her harrowing story and about how you can help to free her.

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FFRF praises Rhode Island AG for clergy abuse investigation

The Freedom From Religion Foundation commends Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha for releasing a long-awaited report detailing decades of clergy sexual abuse and for taking steps to hold the perpetrators accountable.

The 284-page report, made public on Wednesday, March 4, found that at least 75 clergy within the Catholic Diocese of Providence sexually abused more than 300 children in Rhode Island for more than 75 years. Investigators emphasized that the true number of victims is likely much higher and documented how church officials repeatedly transferred accused priests and shielded them from law enforcement rather than protecting children.

The report described diocesan records as “damning,” since they include evidence of sending accused priests on retreats and “sabbaticals” rather than protecting abused children. The report also details how the diocese failed to report suspected abuse, instead allowing accused priests “to remain in ministry, where they continued to have access to and frequently did abuse more children.” The state’s investigation also outlines reforms to improve investigations and remove barriers that prevent victims from seeking justice.

The report represents an important step toward transparency and accountability for survivors. FFRF and other victim advocacy groups for years have called on state attorneys general and the U.S. attorney general to launch similar investigations, as some nations and states have done. Pennsylvania led the way after an investigation there resulted in a sweeping grand jury report in 2018. Several states inaugurated investigations at the time.

The investigation followed a multiyear probe by the attorney general’s office and relied on decades of church records obtained through an agreement with the diocese. The report documents widespread abuse and systemic failures by church leadership to report allegations or remove abusers from ministry. FFRF notes that public reports like Rhode Island’s are critical to exposing the full scope of clergy abuse and ensuring that survivors are heard.

“Sunlight is essential,” says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor, who wrote the first nonfiction exposé on clergy abuse of children, published by FFRF in 1988, and who inaugurated the standing “Black Collar Crime” section of FFRF’s newspaper tracking sexual abuse by members of the clergy before the phenomenon was widely tracked.

“It’s not just the heinous betrayal of trust and lifelong harm to victims,” Gaylor adds, “but the decades of systematic cover-ups. It’s way past time for congregation members to withdraw support and respect from an institution that has harbored molesters.”

FFRF will be giving its “Clarence Darrow Award” this year to Peter Isley, co-founder of  Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, who will accept it at its national convention in October in Milwaukee. FFRF urges other states that have not yet done so to follow Rhode Island’s example and applauds it for confronting this painful history and working toward accountability.

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 more than 41,000 members nationwide, including in Rhode Island, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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In Kentucky, a fifth bill that seeks to protect evolution education

National Center for Science Education
By Staff

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FFRF’s ‘Secular Spotlight’ looks at global authoritarianism’s faith connection

The latest episode of “Secular Spotlight” welcomes a bishop to discuss the rising authoritarian threat around the world — and its connection to fundamentalist ideology.

FFRF Director of Communications Amitabh Pal and Governmental Affairs Director Mark Dann speak with Bishop Joseph Tolton, founder and president of Interconnected Justice, about the global racial dynamics shaping politics in the United States and across Africa. Tolton argues that anti-Blackness, authoritarianism and extremist religious ideology are intertwined forces influencing elections, LGBTQ-plus rights, resource extraction and democratic backsliding.

“It is very clear that in both the American political context and, broadly speaking, the pan-African political context there is a malignant cancer on the terrain of both of those environments and contexts — and that cancer is an extremist form of Christianity seeking to undermine America’s democracy while simultaneously undermining the democratic order of African nations,” Tolton observes. 

You can catch the latest episode of “Secular Spotlight” on FFRF’s YouTube channel, as well as by watching on your smart TV after downloading FFRF’s free app, Freethought TV, which also highlights FFRF’s other video programming. Previous episodes include a reflection on the Minnesota ICE crisis featuring Minnesota state Rep. Andy Smith, as well as a deep dive into the 2026 National Prayer Breakfast. See our full playlist for more videos!

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to promoting the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters of nontheism. With more than 41,000 dues-paying members, FFRF is the largest freethought association in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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Freedom from Religion Foundation asks Elmwood to stop LifeWise Academy use of school property for religion classes

BG Independent News
By Jan McLaughlin

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Questions Mount Over Viral Claims of Apocalyptic Iran War Briefings in the Military

The Debrief
By Ryan Whalen

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FFRF urges governors to reject federal voucher program

The Freedom From Religion Foundation has sent a letter to all state governors urging them to opt their respective states out of the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit (FSTC) program, a nationwide voucher scheme approved in last summer’s reconciliation bill.

Passed as part of Congress’ “One Big Beautiful Bill” in 2025, the FSTC program is the first nationwide voucher program and could cost over $50 billion in tax dollars in funding for students in primarily religious private schools. Currently, as many as 27 states have announced their participation in the program, while only four — including FFRF’s home state of Wisconsin — have been confirmed to reject it.

To counter this program, FFRF’s lobbying arm, the FFRF Action Fund, earlier this month contacted its tens of thousands of advocates asking them to urge their governors not to opt into the program. 

The end result of scholarship granting organization donors “funneling taxpayer funds into private schools will be even more financial struggles for public schools in your state,” FFRF Anne Nicol Gaylor Legal Fellow Kyle J. Steinberg writes. 

FFRF points out that the FSTC program is a loss to the federal government because the federal government would have to reimburse Scholarship Granting Organization (SGO) donors through federal tax credits without collecting additional revenue. The dilution of federal dollars means that funds must be reallocated from other public services, which could cost states federal support for public education. 

Opting into the program allows third-party organizations to dictate the allocation of education funding in the state. While these organizations are technically authorized to award scholarships to private and public school students alike, the vast majority of permissible funding purposes — tuition, fees, books, room and board and uniforms — only apply to students of private institutions. Notably, these private institutions are not subject to anti-discrimination laws. In addition to segregating students along religious and other lines, this means that students who are most expensive to educate, such as those with disabilities, could simply be excluded from attending. 

Additionally, the beneficiaries of these funds are likely to be private religious schools. According to the most recently available data, 66 percent of U.S. private schools have a religious affiliation, and 77 percent of students enrolled in private schools attend one with a religious bent. In other words, opting into the FSTC program is a workaround that sends taxpayer dollars to fund religious education while eroding support for public schools, which educate 91 percent of U.S. children.

There is also an academic cost to pay for this program. Studies of voucher programs in three different states found that students attending private schools using vouchers performed worse academically than their public school counterparts. 

Finally, FFRF warns that the program will simply serve as a giveaway to wealthy families who do not need subsidies and as a windfall for wealthy donors who do not support public schools and are looking for a tax shelter. States with voucher programs have, in recent years, removed voucher eligibility guidelines entirely, moving to so-called “universal vouchers” that are available to even the wealthiest families who already send their children to private schools. It is reasonable to expect a similar expansion of this federal program in the future, leaving needy students even further behind. 

“The FSTC program is harmful to your state, its public education system, and its students,” concludes FFRF’s appeal to the nation’s governors. “By ignoring the very real costs of allowing third-party organizations such great control over education funding, your state’s public education system and student success are placed in jeopardy. We urge you to reject participation in this program for 2027 and each year thereafter.”

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 more than 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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Freedom From Religion Foundation asks Ohio school district to stop religious time on school property

Ohio Capital Journal
By Megan Henry

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