California Governor, Gavin Newsom’s delay in reopening churches has pitted him against the United States Attorney General, William Barr.
The Department of Justice (DoJ) in a Tuesday letter sent by its Civil Rights Division said the state government’s indeterminate date for resumption of in-person services constituted “unequal treatment of faith communities”.
California is presently on phase two of its five-stage opening plan following COVID-19-induced lockdown.
But the DoJ advised Newsom to step up places of worship to phase two rather than phase three of the plan.
Eric Dreiband, lead attorney in a team assembled by Attorney General William Barr to examine religious liberty disputes amid state shutdown orders, wrote, “Simply put, there is no pandemic exception to the U.S. Constitution and its Bill of Rights.”
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He added that it was unfair for churches to remain closed while other “essential” services remained open.
“California has not shown why interactions in offices and studios of the entertainment industry, and in-person operations to facilitate nonessential ecommerce, are included on the list as being allowed with social distancing where telework is not practical, while gatherings with social distancing for purposes of religious worship are forbidden, regardless of whether remote worship is practical or not,” Dreiband wrote.
Meanwhile, some churches have vowed to reopen on May 31, irrespective of the governor’s directive.
This was after several of the churches sued the state government over the ban on in-person services and lost.