Beto O’Rourke vows to attack churches’ tax exempt status over gay marriage
Robert “Beto” O’Rourke, a Catholic and presidential candidate for the Democratic party, called for churches and religious institutions to lose their tax-exempt status if they oppose same-sex “marriage.”
Joining other Democratic candidates in defending their respective LGBTQ platform stances on Thursday evening during a CNN televised town hall, O’Rourke was asked if gay marriage should be used to removed this benefit, he responded with a adamant “Yes.”
“There can be no reward, no benefit, no tax break for anyone … that denies the full human rights and the full civil rights of every single one of us.” As the audience cheered, O’Rourke continued, saying, “And so as president, we are going to make that a priority, and we are going to stop those who are infringing upon the human rights of our fellow Americans.”
Check out the clip below.
O’Rourke took a step further in the direction of stripping churches and charities if they oppose same-sex “marriage” than Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ). When asked what he would do as president, Booker said there would be “consequences” for churches and religious institutions, stopping short of ending tax-exemptions. He did not say outright whether they would lose their exemption status.
When asked whether “religious education institutions should lose their tax-exempt status if they oppose LGBTQ rights,” the senator replied: “We must stand up as a nation to stay that religion cannot be an excuse to deny people health insurance, education, or more,” apparently broadening the issue to include private employers. “You cannot discriminate, he said, “….I’m going to make sure that I hold them accountable.”
Beto O’Rourke photo/ donkeyhotey
Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE) immediately denounced this policy as “bigoted nonsense.”
“This bigoted nonsense would target a lot of sincere Christians, Jews, and Muslims,” wrote Sasse in a statement released Friday. “Leaders from both parties have a duty to flatly condemn this attack on very basic American freedoms. This extreme intolerance is un-American. The whole point of the First Amendment is that … everyone is created with dignity and we don’t use government power to decide which religious beliefs are legitimate and which aren’t.”
