DENVER (AP) – A Colorado baker who won a partial U.S. Supreme Court victory after refusing to make a gay couple’s wedding cake because of their Christian faith lost an appeal on Monday in their latest legal battle, involving the denial of a birthday cake request. celebrate gender transition.
The Colorado Court of Appeals ruled that the cake Autumn Scardina requested from Jack Phillips and Masterpiece Cakeshop, which would be pink with blue frosting, was not a form of speech.
It also found that state laws that make it illegal to refuse to provide services to people based on protected characteristics like race, religion or sexual orientation do not infringe on the right of business owners to practice or express their religion.
Relying on a Denver judge’s findings in a 2021 trial on the dispute, the appeals court said the Phillips store initially agreed to make the cake, but then declined after Scardina explained she would use it to celebrate the transition from male to female. .
“We conclude that making a pink cake with blue frosting is not expressive and any message or symbolism it conveys to an observer would not be attributed to the baker,” the court said.
Phillips, who is represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, maintains that the cake he made is a form of speech and plans to appeal.
“It’s not necessary to agree with Jack’s opinion to agree that all Americans should be free to say what they believe, even if the government disagrees with those beliefs,” ADF senior counsel Jake Warner said in a statement.
John McHugh, one of the attorneys representing Scardina, said the court carefully looked at all the arguments and evidence from the court.
“They just objected to the idea of Ms. Scardina wanting a birthday cake that reflected her status as a transgender woman because she objected to the existence of transgender people,” he said of Phillips and the store.
In 2018, the US Supreme Court ruled that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission acted with an anti-religious bias in applying anti-discrimination laws to Phillips after he refused to bake a cake to celebrate the wedding of Charlie Craig and Dave Mullins in 2012. The judge called the commission unfairly dismissive of Phillips’ religious beliefs.
The high court did not rule on the larger issue of whether businesses can invoke religious objections to deny service to LGBTQ people, but it has other opportunities to do so.
Last year heard another case challenging Colorado’s anti-discrimination law, brought by a Christian graphic artist who didn’t want to design a wedding website for same-sex couples. Lorie Smith, who is also represented by the ADF, claims the law infringes on freedom of speech.
Scardina, a lawyer, tried to order the cake on the same day in 2017 that the Supreme Court announced it would hear Phillips’ appeal in the wedding cake case. During the trial, he testified that he wanted to “challenge the veracity” of Phillips’ claim that he would serve LGBTQ customers.
Before filing the lawsuit, Scardina first filed a complaint against Phillips with the state and civil rights commission, which found probable cause that she had discriminated against him.
Phillips later filed a federal lawsuit against Colorado, accusing it of a “crusade to crush” him by pursuing the complaint.
In March 2019, attorneys for the state and Phillips agreed to drop both cases in a settlement Scardina did not participate in. He is pursuing a lawsuit against Phillips and Masterpiece himself.