The Trump-Pence administration continued its attack on women’s reproductive rights and religious freedom today by issuing final rules that would allow employers and universities to cite religion as justification to deny women access to birth control coverage.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State tonight opposed President Donald Trump’s nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. The organization said Kavanaugh’s demonstrated track record of hostility toward church-state separation should make him ineligible for the position.

Citing flagrant defiance of federal law and the US Constitution, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) and the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), along with their co-counsel Macey Swanson LLP, filed suit today in the US District Court for the Northern District of Indiana against the US Departments of Health and Human Services, Treasury, and Labor, and the University of Notre Dame.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State today expressed disappointment over a US Supreme Court ruling in favor of a Colorado bakery that sought to discriminate against LGBTQ people on the basis of religious beliefs. But the organization said it was relieved that the narrow ruling does not create sweeping new rights to discriminate.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) today sent a demand letter to the University of Notre Dame and filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the U.S. Department of Justice, seeking information on the school’s contraceptive coverage for its employees and students.

Church-State Watchdog Told Court That Business Can’t Cite Religious Beliefs To Justify Discrimination

The Board of Trustees of Americans United for Separation of Church and State today announced that Rachel K. Laser, an attorney with extensive experience in nonprofit advocacy, has been named the organization’s new executive director.

Today, Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AU) and the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC), joined by co-counsel Dentons, withdrew their legal challenge to the Trump administration’s interim final rules allowing virtually any employer or university to refuse to provide birth control coverage based on religious or moral objections.

The Trump administration today issued a rule aimed at allowing healthcare workers to use religion as a reason to deny patients medical care. The move comes in the wake of the administration’s Jan. 18 decision to create a Conscience and Religious Freedom Division in the Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The new office will be tasked with enforcing today’s rule.

Today, the Trump administration created a Conscience and Religious Freedom Division in the Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). This new division will enforce the administration’s extreme and harmful interpretations of federal religious freedom laws. In addition, it will enforce a still unreleased rule that will allow health care workers to use religion as a reason to deny services to patients.

A federal court in California today issued an order temporarily blocking implementation of the Trump administration’s rules that allow employers and universities to cite religious or moral objections to restrict employees’ and students’ access to birth control. This is the second federal court to block the rules from going into effect.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the National Women’s Law Center today filed a lawsuit against Trump administration rules that allow employers and universities to cite religious or moral objections in order to deny employees and students health insurance coverage of birth control.