Despite its innocuous name, the Equality Act has attracted criticism from Americans alarmed by its potential consequences for religious liberty and women’s sports, in particular.
Democrats on Capitol Hill are apparently not interested in debate, however, and a group of senators from that party reportedly blocked female athletes from testifying about the likely harm of allowing males to compete with them.
“Eliminated from any meaningful participation”
For their part, progressives say the Equality Act would prevent discrimination. Many prominent conservatives, however, argue that it would do just the opposite by undermining religious rights and forcing females to compete with males in sports.
Furthermore, critics argue that the act should be defeated because it would require biologically male and female individuals to share gendered spaces including locker rooms.
Both sides dug into their respective positions during a Senate hearing on Wednesday, with Democrats glibly painting their critics as bigots harping on unfounded fears and using religion as a “weapon.”
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-IL) used his position to exclude testimony from Christina Mitchell, a prospective witness who planned to declare that “females will be eliminated from any meaningful participation and will be subjected to an increased risk of injury in contact sports” if the Equality Act becomes law.
Her daughter, Chelsea, and two other students — Alanna Smith and Selina Soule — were also left out of the hearing.
“The unfairness to little girls”
The students are involved in a Connecticut-based lawsuit challenging the inclusion of males in sporting programs for women and girls.
While the Trump administration’s Justice Department supported that lawsuit, President Joe Biden withdrew the case in keeping with his administration’s focus on LGBTQ issues.
In defense of the Equality Act, Durbin declared that it “would ensure that LGBTQ Americans are protected from discrimination in public accommodations, education, federally-funded programs, employment, housing … and jury service.”
Mary Rice Hasson, the Kate O’Beirne Fellow in Catholic Studies at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, on the other hand, insisted that the bill would “coerce people of faith to exit the public square unless they trade their religious beliefs for the reigning ideology of today.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) weighed in with his assertion that excluding testimony from female athletes proved that Democrats “didn’t want the American people to hear, to hear about the unfairness to little girls having girls’ sports destroyed because of the radical policies of today’s Democrats.”
The post Senate Democrats block testimony from female athletes during Equality Act hearings first appeared on Conservative Institute.
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