This free-speech case could help the Supreme Court wreck LGBTQ rights for decades

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, a case that could determine the future of LGBTQ rights nationwide.

The case involves Lorie Smith, a Christian woman in Colorado who makes wedding announcement websites. Smith wanted to post a message on her professional website stating that she wouldn’t make websites for same-sex marriages because it would be against her faith.

When she found out that such a notice would violate Colorado’s anti-discrimination laws, she preemptively sued her state’s government, saying that the laws violated her First Amendment right to free speech. Her lawsuit sought to block enforcement of the law.

A district court ruled against Smith in 2019 saying that she lacked legal standing to oppose the law because the state hadn’t actually investigated her, and so she hadn’t been harmed by it – factors usually required in order for a person to claim legal standing to oppose a law.

She appealed to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, and it also ruled against her in a 2-1 ruling, stating that such laws are “essential” to maintaining “democratic ideals.”

Smith’s case sounds very similar to the 2018 Supreme Court case of Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, which involved a cake shop owner who refused to make a cake for a same-sex marriage because it violated his rights to free speech and religious freedom. Both Smith and the cake shop owner sued over the same law and both are legally represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian and anti-LGBTQ legal group. But Smith’s case differs in two key ways.

First, no…

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