Following the Supreme Court ruling in favor of Colorado graphic designer Lorie Smith, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg made the unfounded insinuation on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday that she only went into her business “for the purpose of provoking a case like this.”
Smith took her case all the way to the Supreme Court over her First Amendment right to religious freedom when she refused to do wedding sites for LGBTQ couples because she is a Christian. The high court ruled in her favor that she had the right to do so, sending the Left into a frenzied meltdown.
CNN host Dana Bash asked Buttigieg if there was any “merit” to the Supreme Court’s argument.
“No, there isn’t, and I think it’s very revealing that there’s no evidence that this web designer was ever even approached by anyone asking for a website for a same-sex wedding,” Buttigieg charged and then put forth a claim worthy of a lawsuit all in itself. “It appears this web designer only went into the wedding business for the purpose of provoking a case like this and in that sense, I think there is something in common with the Supreme Court ruling and what we’ve seen happening in state legislatures in the country, which is kind of a solution looking for a problem.”
Buttigieg only went into the military — where his primary role was destroying US computer hardware — to run for president. https://t.co/CttpLb1RYX
— Eddie Scarry (@eScarry) July 2, 2023
“In other words, sending these kinds of things to the courts and sending these kinds of things to state legislatures for the clear purpose at chipping away at the equality and the rights that have so recently been won in the LGBTQ+ community and when you do that it’s at the expense of so many other issues that Americans are asking for relief and support on, the kinds of economic issues that President Biden was emphasizing in his Bidenomics address,” Buttigieg claimed.
He added that the ruling “tells you everything you need to know about this agenda.”
“The fact that this was relief from a situation that may have never happened in the first place tells you everything you need to know about this agenda to use every instrument of government, courts, and legislatures, to claw back at these rights for people who were just trying to go about their lives and just trying to be treated equally by businesses and by the government,” Buttigieg asserted, engaging in the defamation of Smith and the Supreme Court once again.
Smith originally sued the state of Colorado over its anti-discrimination law that prohibited businesses providing sales or other accommodations to the public from denying service based on a customer’s sexual orientation.
Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion where he stated, “In this case, Colorado seeks to force an individual to speak in ways that align with its views but defy her conscience about a matter of major significance.”
“But tolerance, not coercion, is our Nation’s answer. The First Amendment envisions the United States as a rich and complex place where all persons are free to think and speak as they wish, not as the government demands. Because Colorado seeks to deny that promise, the judgment is reversed,” he added.
Buttigieg wasn’t alone in the lawsuit-worthy smearing of Lorie Smith and the Supreme Court. Colorado’s Attorney General Phillip Weiser defamed the Supreme Court’s ruling also, calling the decision a “license to discriminate.”
(Video Credit: MSNBC)
Weiser sat down with MSNBC’s Simone Boyce on Sunday who asked what Justice Gorsuch meant when he wrote, “Under Colorado’s logic, the government may compel anyone who speaks for pay on a particular topic to accept all commissions on that same topic.”
“What he is trying to say is that here is someone that had a free speech interest that was being implicated in a negative way,” Weiser remarked.
“But the problem, first off…this is a made-up case. This was based on hypotheticals, and the court didn’t have to deal with the whole equation. In a real case, you have a victim who is denied services, and the consequences of the court’s ruling would be much more self-evident. But second, let’s be clear, here; whoever creates a website, or whoever creates any artistic work can make whatever they want. Our position, they have to sell it to everyone, and they cannot restrict the sales in a public business because they don’t like someone’s ethnicity, religion, race, what have you,” he said, accusing Smith of lying and the Supreme Court of falling for it.
Then he brought social justice into his false reasoning.
“A societal challenge because we as a society now have a choice if we have an expressive business. We can serve everyone and stand for our nation’s motto of E pluribus unum, or now, as you said, people have a license to discriminate, saying, ‘I have this expressive product and I’m not going to offer it to everybody,” Weiser commented.
“And then the courts are going to have to work out what this exception means. It’s never existed before. And we’ll have to determine what is an expressive business, or how do we decide who is truly exercising some free speech right, as opposed to trying to find some illegitimate excuse for discriminating?” he speciously concluded.
The accusation against Smith and SCOTUS caused an intense response on Twitter:
WHAT. What a REMARKABLY DESPICABLE allegation. My God.
— PⒸг (@bloodless_coup) July 2, 2023
303Creative should sue him personally for this.
— Byron Smith (@Byron4Tradition) July 2, 2023
She should sue him for defamation
— R O S A (@rcantz1964) July 2, 2023
He just can’t help himself, can he? The man lies about everything.
— Paul Gadot (@gadot_paul) July 2, 2023
More correctly, LGBTQ went to her for services to provoke a discrimination complaint like this. They had thousands of places to go for these services & they targeted her.
If Lorie set a trap for them, I’m even more proud of her.
— Robert M. Miller, Ph.D. (@Gristgrinder) July 2, 2023
And how many courts and high-paid, high-powered Lefty lawyers, firms and Civil Rights experts missed this alleged fact?
— SuzanBCruzan (@SuzanBCruzan) July 3, 2023
He said without the slightest shred of evidence to support that claim…
— Dave McTooterson (@DCornpop) July 2, 2023
Once again, when a democrat accuses republicans of doing something subversive it’s only to cover for their own actions. Just like the queer wedding people attempting to force Christian bakers to bake their cakes simply to engage in legal battles. These people are sick,…
— Chris Noblett (@ChrisNoblett) July 2, 2023
A sitting Presidential Cabinet member is angry that a Christian was not made to bow before the LGBTQ god.
— James Smith (@JamesSm09850309) July 2, 2023
Actually the complainant, who knew there would be a business that would do as he requested down the street, only went into a devout Christian’s business to provoke a case like this — it’s the EXACT REVERSE. This is gaslighting.
— Robert Craigen (@RCsEvilTwin) July 3, 2023
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