World News Korner

Gitmo detainees cite Hobby Lobby case in new request for religious freedom.

Courtesy Mother Jones:

In a new court filing, attorneys for two Guantanamo Bay detainees have invoked the Supreme Court's controversial decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, which allowed certain corporations to ignore the Obamacare contraception mandate if their owners object to it on religious grounds. The motions, filed with a Washington, DC, district court on behalf of Ahmed Rabbani of Pakistan and Emad Hassan of Yemen, ask the court to bar military officials from preventing Gitmo inmates from participating in communal prayer during Ramadan.

"Hobby Lobby makes clear that all persons—human and corporate, citizen and foreigner, resident and alien—enjoy the special religious free exercise protections of the [Religious Freedom Restoration Act]," the lawyers argue.

A spokesman for the Department of Defense told Al Jazeera America on Friday that the "Defense Department is aware of the filing," and that the "government will respond through the legal system."

Gee I wonder if the Justices who were supposedly trying to protect the non-existent religious freedom of corporations recognized the can of worms that they were opening?

I also wonder how all of those Right Wing supporters who touted the decision as a victory for religious freedom will feel if it helps these prisoners get more of their own religious freedoms back?

Yeah I somehow doubt that Chad and Christie Christian will be terribly thrilled with their newly protected religious freedom being extended to people who pray to Mecca five times a day and think that Jesus was a great prophet but no son of God.

Source