With the support of NARAL Pro-Choice America, Planned Parenthood, and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, President Biden signed the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) into law late last year.
When it goes into effect June 27th, employers will be forced to give the "pregnant persons" they employ paid time off to have an abortion. In fact, pro-life organizations will risk being sued if they do not provide the "abortion leave."
Though he is not surprised by it, Mat Staver of Liberty Counsel calls it "the most absurd thing" he can imagine.
"That will be challenged," he asserts. "It's part and parcel in this Biden administration, in its radicalism – the most pro-abortion, pro-death administration in history. I thought that's impossible after Obama, but obviously, he's topping what Obama did."
Staver says the slight religious exemption included in the law, which states that employers "may be able to deny … an accommodation – but only in limited circumstances," will not protect Catholic or secular pro-life organizations from charges brought under the PWFA.
Matthew Sharp of Alliance Defending Freedom submits that religious organizations would be naive to expect any favor from the courts under the law's exemption alone.
"I'm sure that there's going to be attempts to force it on a wide range of religious organizations," Staver predicts. "Those will be, most of them, resistant. In that case, we'll go up to the U.S. Supreme Court, and we'll win this case."
He points out that the U.S. Constitution guarantees religious freedom, and the government cannot violate it unless it has "a compelling governmental interest" in doing so.
The National Women's Law Center, which prides itself as being "on the leading edge of every major legal and policy victory for women" for the past 50 years, celebrates the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and is encouraging women to "brainstorm what kinds of accommodations you might ask for" under the new legislation.
Staver, however, says it is certainly "an overreach."
