Hate group quietly working to shut the LGBTQ community out of every aspect of public life

How do we know that the Alliance Defending Freedom is a hate group? Simply take a look at some of the cases it has defended in front of the courts.

Zack Ford of ThinkProgress did and this is what he found:

When the SPLC designated ADF an anti-LGBTQ hate group, it published a thoroughly researched document outlining the many reasons it had earned that designation, notably including its support for criminalizing homosexuality in the U.S. and abroad. Last month, Media Matters released an even more comprehensive report cataloging ADF’s history of extreme, demonizing rhetoric directed towards the LGBTQ community. But ADF’s work also speaks for itself. 

ThinkProgress surveyed approximately 30 of the group’s current and most recent court cases and found a desire to shut LGBTQ people out of almost every aspect of public life.

In cases involving employment discrimination, the so-called right to discriminate specifically against the LGBTQ community, and attacks on transgender students in high schools, ADF has taken the lead in arguing for the point of view which would reduce the rights of the LGBTQ community and expose trans youth to danger. Particularly in the case of trans youth, ADF heavily pushes the false idea that they are a danger to other students:

 . . . when the Obama Justice Department sued North Carolina for enforcing its discriminatory HB2 law, ADF countersued on behalf an anonymous coalition of parents and students called “North Carolinians for Privacy.” They argued that the courts should rule against the federal government because “the female University Students are deeply concerned that allowing biological male students into their private facilities increases the likelihood that they will be assaulted or otherwise victimized.” 

This fear-mongering — that trans kids are inherently a threat to their peers — has been at the core of their other cases: 

Doe v. Boyertown Area School District, where ADF represented a group of parents and students challenging a Pennsylvania school’s transgender-inclusive policy. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled against ADF this summer. 

Maday v. Township High School District 211 and Students and Parents for Privacy v. United States Department of Education, a pair of cases in which ADF represented a group of parents challenging an Illinois school’s policy respecting transgender students. A federal judge denied ADF a preliminary injunction in December and the case is ongoing. 

Board of Education of the Highland Local School District v. United States Department of Education, in which ADF represented an Ohio school that refused to accommodate a transgender student. After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit agreed with a federal judge to protect the transgender student, the case was later dismissed after mediation. 

Privacy Matters v. United States Department of Education, in which ADF represented parents who objected to a transgender student at their Minnesota school. Curiously, ADF dropped the case after the Trump administration rescinded the guidance protecting transgender students, even though the school’s policies didn’t change. 

These cases do not account for the work ADF does spreading anti-trans propaganda in local church communities, peddling an anti-trans model policy to schools, drafting state legislation similar to HB2 to impose such policies writ large, and sending schools legal threats for having inclusive policies or disciplining anti-trans teachers.

Ford also said that even in cases in which ADF doesn't take the lead, it finds a way to interject:

Even when ADF isn’t the lead counsel on a case related to LGBTQ issues, it often finds a way to shoehorn in by representing groups who file amicus briefs (“friend of the court” briefs) in these cases. This gives ADF another opportunity to advocate against LGBTQ legal equality, and they even list these cases on their website as if they’re actually a party to them.

You can read Ford's entire article here. It is imperative that the LGBTQ community educate ourselves and others on the Alliance Defending Freedom or it will succeed in its goal of shutting us out.