FFRF Action Fund had no trouble choosing its “Theocrat of the Week”: This would be U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of Amarillo, Texas, who issued a ban on a medication abortion pill late on Good Friday.
The Christian religious extremist has unleashed chaos upon the land with his overreaching ruling in a trumped-up legal challenge by judge-shopping anti-abortionists challenging the Food and Drug Administration’s 23-year-old approval of mifepristone. Mifepristone, the first in a two-drug regimen used for medication abortion, has a stellar safety record. Religious ideology, not science, is behind Kacsmaryk’s ruling.
Medication abortion is the most popular form of abortion in the United States, with more than half of abortion patients in the country choosing it. The judge used inflamed rhetoric in his ruling, such as saying that “FDA mandates a two-step drug regimen: mifepristone to kill the unborn human, followed by misoprostol to induce cramping and contractions to expel the uniform human form the mother’s womb.”
FFRF Action Fund’s“Secularist of the Week” is Nebraska state Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh, chosen for her ongoing “Don’t legislate hate” campaign to stop a bill against trans children from passing. Kavanaugh in late February vowed to filibuster every bill her colleagues introduce if they support a measure to ban gender-affirming care for anyone under age 19. She has been filibustering 12 hours a day for seven weeks.
“I would like to see all of our policymakers stepping out of the bathroom, stepping out of the doctor’s room and getting back to policy,” Cavanaugh told NPR on April 10.
Getting judges and legislatures out of exam groups and bedrooms pretty much sums up the theme for this week’s secularist and theocrat picks.
FFRF Action Fund, a lobbying group created by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, will name a weekly “theocrat” and “secularist” of the week at its website.
FFRF Action Fund is a 501(c)(4) organization that develops and advocates for legislation, regulations and government programs to preserve the constitutional principle of separation between state and church. It also advocates for the rights and views of nonbelievers, endorses candidates for political office, and publicizes the views of elected officials concerning religious liberty issues.
