Attack on the Right
Now that the Virginia General Assembly is controlled by the Left for the first time in a generation, the legislature knows it has the votes to change the social landscape of the Commonwealth. With this goal in mind, the Left has taken aim at the beliefs and values of conservatives and Christians and introduced legislation that could have devastating, long-term effects on the citizens who reside in the Old Dominion.
To begin, legislation (HB 1051) has been introduced to repeal conscience protections for religious adoption agencies, which would effectively shut those agencies down. The goal of this bill is to prohibit the Commonwealth from contracting with or providing funds to “any child-placing agency that, in making decisions regarding the placement of a child, discriminates against the child or otherwise eligible prospective foster or adoptive parents on the basis of,” among other protected classes, “sexual orientation, gender identity, or marital status.” Additionally, this legislation would remove conscience provisions that protect religious adoption and foster care agencies from being denied licensing, contracts, or grants when they refuse to place children in certain households due to “religious or moral convictions or policies.
In short, this bill opposes religious diversity by targeting faith-based, non-profit organizations and shutting them down simply for placing children in homes with a mom and a dad. Since Rep. Mark Levine, the patron of the bill, knew only of the impact this legislation would have on Catholic Charities even though it would adversely affect other organizations, this clearly demonstrates that conservatives and Christians were the sole targets of this legislation.
Additionally, Virginia is ranked 49th in the country for children aging out of the foster care system without being adopted so one would think the goal of the legislature would be to help get children adopted into good families instead of passing legislation that prevents this from happening. There are approximately 5,000 foster children in Virginia and more than 900 of whom are currently ready for adoption. Because many of the adoption and foster care providers in Virginia are from religious communities, if HB 1051 were to become law, the number of adoption and foster care providers in the Commonwealth would be drastically reduced. It is a sad state of affairs in the Commonwealth when religious adoption and foster care agencies are not free to follow the convictions of their faith while working to serve vulnerable children.
To further illustrate my belief that the left is targeting conservative ideology, let’s examine HB 567, which would outlaw “indoor shooting ranges” that are “not owned or leased by the Commonwealth or federal government” unless they meet certain exceptions including that fewer than 50 employees work in the building; that at least 90% of those who use the range are law enforcement or federal law-enforcement officers; and that the shooting range verifies the identity and address of each user by requiring all users to present a government-issued photo-identification card – essentially these shooting ranges would be required to keep a log of all gun owners and their corresponding addresses who visit their range. Since gun ranges are not typically housed in a building with more than 50 employees, and because this bill focuses solely on indoor shooting ranges, it only makes sense that this bill was introduced with the specific intent to shut down the gun range at the NRA Headquarters in Fairfax. The cherry on top of this is that the sponsor of the bill, Rep. Dan Helmer, made gun control one of his top priorities while running for office in 2019, and passing HB 567 would surely bring him increased, positive notoriety among his liberal constituents.
Finally, Gov. Ralph Northam’s budget proposal has put a bull’s eye on Liberty University, a private, Evangelical Christian University in Lynchburg, Virginia. Specifically, Northam wants to cut the Virginia Tuition Assistance Grant (VTAG) aid for online students, which would negatively impact more than 2,000 Virginia students per year at Liberty, 260 of whom are studying to be nurses and teachers.
Not only is Liberty University the Commonwealth’s largest university by enrollment, but it is also one of the largest Christian universities in the world, and one of the largest private non-profit universities in the United States. If Northam’s proposal passes, Virginia students who are taking online classes at private universities and colleges like Liberty would no longer be able to receive VTAG aid. According to Liberty University, these online aid cuts will negatively impact “more than 374 military families, 200 single parent working families, and over 140 emergency response personnel who attend classes online.
As you can see, the three pieces of legislation described above primarily impact both Christian and conservative based ideals and institutions, which is ironic considering the Left likes to claim that, as a group, they are more inclusive than the right. I think Virginia’s new General Assembly is doing a good job of proving that the left is anything but inclusive.
