Kim Davis, the county clerk indicted after refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, is taking her case to the same bench that protected their right to wed: the U.S. Supreme Court. The court now features three more conservative justices and is still fresh off overturning Roe v. Wade, the precedent that protected Americans' right to abortions. Her legal supporters' hope is not just to establish the right of government employees to refuse service, but to overturn gay marriage rights entirely.
Liberty Counsel founder and Chairman Mat Staver said in a Tuesday press release that "Kim Davis deserves justice in this case since she was entitled to a religious accommodation from issuing marriage licenses under her name and authority."
"This case has the potential to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges and extend the same religious freedom protections beyond Kentucky to the entire nation," Staver said.
U.S. District Judge David Bunning in 2015 ordered Davis to jail for five days for contempt for refusing to comply with a court order. Bunning earlier this year ordered Davis to pay $260,104 in fees and expenses to attorneys who represented one of the couples she refused a marriage license. Bunning had earlier ordered Davis to pay the couple, David Ermold and David Moore, $100,000 in damages for violating their constitutional rights. Liberty Counsel is appealing Bunning's decisions.
Rural North Carolina was not on board her crusade—Davis lost her bid for reelection as Rowan County clerk in 2018—but it's the right-wing think tanks that matter, not everday Americans. Most studies find a majority of support for gay marriage in every state of the union.
