Dear Friend,
Part of my job is to always keep one eye open and on the news. It’s why my browser windows (plural) are perpetually overflowing with open tabs (much to the dismay of my more ‘Type A’ colleagues). I digress.
My point is this was another of those weeks where each new headline was more outrageous than the last. Rather than attempt to weave all the incoherent nonsense into a still-incomprehensible narrative, we’re going with a listicle, folks. Without further ado, this week’s Atheist News:
>> On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court handed a major victory to religious anti-vaxxers. The case, Miller v. McDonald, challenged a 2019 New York law (which American Atheists supported) that abolished religious exemptions to school vaccine mandates. Prior to enacting this evidence-based public health policy, New York had experienced its worst measles epidemic in decades. It was, as Slate reports, “predictably [worse] in private and parochial schools with high numbers of unvaccinated students.”
Yet the plaintiffs in Miller, supported by vaccine opponents and conservative religious groups, wanted to strike down that law and asked the Court to send the case back to the lower court “in light of Mahmoud v. Taylor.” The justices’ 6-3 decision this week did just that. It’s a gravely concerning expansion of an already worrisome ruling. Mahmoud granted religious parents unprecedented control over public school curriculum. Now, the Court seems to be expanding its interpretation of “parental rights” to school immunization requirements.
This regressive return to religious exemptions is unfolding while the CDC is actively spreading vaccine misinformation and rolling back recommendations for infant vaccinations; while health officials in South Carolina this week announced an “accelerating” measles outbreak, “which appears centered on a single church and several schools”; and while, here in Iowa, a school district had to cancel classes yesterday after a confirmed case of whooping cough in a county where the two-year-old immunization rate for pertussis is just 38.2%.
>> On Thursday, the White House issued a far-reaching Executive Order that purports to limit states’ ability to regulate artificial intelligence (AI). “We want to have one central source of approval,” said the president. The move sparked backlash from both sides of the aisle but was yet another big win for Big Tech. Just this year, 38 states adopted around 100 AI regulations: One such law in North Dakota prevents users from stalking or harassing people with AI, and Arkansas’s legislature passed a policy to prevent AI from violating intellectual property rights. The prohibition of basically any control — local or otherwise — is especially concerning given this administration’s blatantly corrupt favoring of the cronies, companies, and criminals that pay up or play along (whether it’s propaganda, surveillance, or whatever this is).
(Psst: If the intersection of tech and civil rights is up your alley, you won’t want to miss our fourth and final issue of American Atheist this year! Make sure you’re on our mailing list here.)
>> You might recall the Trump Administration declared “antifa” a domestic terrorist organization back in September. At a House Homeland Security Committee hearing this week, a top FBI official failed to answer even basic questions about what he called “the most immediate violent threat” facing the U.S. Around the same time, we learned U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi ordered the Department of Justice (DOJ) and law enforcement agencies to “compile a list” of so-called domestic terrorists, including groups advancing “radical gender ideology, anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, or anti-Christianity.” Experts warn Bondi’s sweeping memo (which also calls for the establishment of a tip line and cash reward system for information leading to an arrest) is a dramatic escalation in executive efforts to not only restrict but criminalize free speech and association. Also this week: Hundreds of former DOJ employees signed an open letter accusing the Trump Administration of “destroying” the department’s Civil Rights Division.
>> Monday, President Trump released an official statement “on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception,” the latest in a long and growing-longer line of overtly religious messages coming out of this White House. Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance’s office sent out invitations to a Hanukkah reception that said, in all caps, “celebrating 50 years of Christmas.” And the U.S. Southern Command — the military force that has struck vessels in the Caribbean and killed at least 87 people — posted a graphic featuring the Jerusalem Cross, a symbol from the Crusades that has been co-opted by extremists, hate groups, and Christian Nationalist Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth.
As I said, it’s been a “WTF” kind of week. But at American Atheists, we consider it an honor to keep our eyes on all this. It’s what good watchdogs do, and we’ve been doing it well since 1963, thanks to members and donors like you.
There are plenty more “WTF” weeks ahead of us, so before 2025 is through, I hope you’ll make a contribution in support of our team here and the truly vital work we’re doing everyday to safeguard civil rights for you, your loved ones, and everyone.
In solidarity,
Melina Cohen
Director of Strategic Communications & Policy Engagement
PS: In case you missed this bit of good news, our friend Rachel Laser at Americans United was appointed this week to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF). Check out what our own Nick Fish — and other secular leaders — said about this exciting development here.
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