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Many people from legal experts to court watchers to journalists to ordinary Americans on social media are criticizing Justice Neil Gorsuch for his majority opinion in a decision siding with a former high school football coach. That coach sued after the school district ordered him to stop praying after every game at the 50-yard line. Justice Gorsuch’s opinion, as many are noticing, appears to be based on facts that are false. Several are accusing Gorsuch of just plain lying.
Justice Gorsuch claimed the coach’s First Amendment rights were violated, and that he was merely engaging in “quiet personal prayer” as he knelt.
Gorsuch uses the word “quiet” 14 times, as The Washington Post’s Paul Waldman notes.
This is what Gorsuch calls a “quiet personal prayer” at the 50-yard-line at the end of games. He uses the word “quiet” 14 times in his decision, as though the coach was merely whispering under his breath and not leading a religious service every player felt obligated to attend. pic.twitter.com/P1Ubar0oHT
— Paul Waldman (@paulwaldman1) June 27, 2022
“Joseph Kennedy lost his job as a high school football coach because he knelt at midfield after games to offer a quiet prayer of thanks,” Justice Gorsuch writes as he begins his majority opinion. “Mr. Kennedy prayed during a period when school employees were free to speak with a friend, call for a reservation at a restaurant, check email, or attend to other personal matters. He offered his prayers quietly while his students were otherwise occupied. Still, the Bremerton School District disciplined him anyway. It did so because it thought anything less could lead a reasonable observer to conclude (mistakenly) that it endorsed Mr. Kennedy’s religious beliefs. That reasoning was misguided.”
“The contested exercise here does not involve leading prayers with the team,” Gorsuch continues (despite photos that appear to suggest otherwise), “the District disciplined Mr. Kennedy only for his decision to persist in praying quietly without his students after three games in October 2015.”
These are the photos of Coach Kennedy that Justice Sonia Sotomayor included in her dissent:
“They aren’t even trying to use reason anymore,” former U.S. Attorney Barb McQuade laments:
Justice Gorsuch characterizes as “private prayer” a public high school football coach’s kneeling praise to God on the 50-yard line immediately after each game.
They aren’t even trying to use reason anymore. https://t.co/XLzG2d57Bm
— Barb McQuade (@BarbMcQuade) June 27, 2022
And Vox’s Ian Millhiser makes clear what just happened: “The Supreme Court hands the religious right a big victory by lying about the facts of a case.”
Calling the decision “a big victory for the religious right,” Millhiser writes that’s “only because Gorsuch misrepresents the facts of the case.”
We know that Gorsuch’s characterization of the facts is inaccurate because we have photographic evidence. Here is a picture of the incident that Gorsuch described as a “short, private, personal prayer.” pic.twitter.com/kArxrbKLO4
— Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) June 27, 2022
On Twitter Millhiser adds that Gorsuch’s own opinion debunks his own opinion:
The first paragraph of Gorsuch’s opinion in the praying coach case is rebutted by the third paragraph of Gorsuch’s opinion in the praying coach case.https://t.co/wSHcHGHmsw pic.twitter.com/AS5K60ToRE
— Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) June 27, 2022
Don Moynihan, a professor at Georgetown’s McCourt School of Public Policy:
Generally, a person seeking a “short, private, personal prayer” as Gorsuch claimed does not go on national television and employ a lawyer to announce the whereabouts and timing of his next prayer session. (Via @imillhiser) https://t.co/ekp7UljaYQ pic.twitter.com/LFThwa99Sx
— Don Moynihan (@donmoyn) June 27, 2022
Here’s noted political scientist Norman Ornstein:
A flat out, knowing lie by Gorsuch. Joined by five others who also know it was a lie. Beyond shameful. Making a mockery of the Court. https://t.co/khiC6WC5rY
— Norman Ornstein (@NormOrnstein) June 27, 2022
Others also felt it necessary to correct the facts in the case:
Furthermore, let’s please call Gorsuch’s assertions what they were: demonstrably false. A lower court judge found the claimant’s case rested on factual distortions. And the photos in Sotomayor’s dissent further reveal the distortions upon which the Court’s decision rests. 2/2
— Rob Kirkpatrick (@wrappedupinboox) June 27, 2022
The biggest problem with the ruling is that Gorsuch repeatedly misstates the facts. He repeatedly calls it a “quiet & personal prayer.” It wasn’t. The coach didn’t pray alone. He invited others to join him. He was leading others in prayer. That’s not a “quiet & personal prayer.”
— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) June 27, 2022
Flatly false. Parents said that their children felt compelled.
Lying about the facts when they are there to read in the record does not help your case. Unless you are making it to proven liars like Alito and Gorsuch.
— (((DMCohen))) 🇺🇦 (@DMCohen4) June 27, 2022
One saving grace (no pun intended) from the praying football coach case is that, since Gorsuch just lied about the set of facts, it’ll be really easy to overturn* should any coach actually do what the coach did, instead of the fantasy coach Gorsuch ruled on.
— Elie Mystal (@ElieNYC) June 27, 2022
if a Muslim walked out to the fifty yard line and led a prayer service, Justice Gorsuch would shit his fucking pants
— Jeff Tiedrich (@itsJeffTiedrich) June 27, 2022
In the SCOTUS opinion released today, the majority based their decision on a pretend scenario it created rather than the facts of the situation that actually took place.
It matters that SCOTUS is literally making things up to justify its rulings. https://t.co/WMF4aBjl5d
— Leah McElrath 🏳️🌈 (@leahmcelrath) June 27, 2022
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