California Ordered to Pay $2 Million in Church Legal Fees Over Coronavirus Shutdowns Case
A court has ordered the state of California to pay two million dollars in legal fees to the churches engaged in lawsuits to stop the officials from shutting down their worship services.
Several groups of churches sued California for the lockdowns shuttering their houses of worship saying that the lockdowns were a violation of their constitutionally guaranteed religious liberties.
Some of these cases have been successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court. With that in mind, the courts in California have no ruled that the state must pay up.
Per Fox News:
The settlement includes a permanent injunction in line with Supreme Court rulings that found restrictions on houses of worship cannot exceed those on retail businesses, attorney Paul Jonna said.
“If they’re gonna restrict Costco to 50%, then they can do the same thing to churches,” Jonna said. “But what they were doing before, as you may remember, is they were keeping those places open and they were shutting down churches — at least in California — completely.”
The settlement has little practical impact after a Supreme Court ruling led the state in April to lift limits on indoor worship. As the state’s case rate of COVID-19 has plummeted since a deadly winter surge and vaccination rates rise, Gov. Gavin Newsom is poised to lift all restrictions on June 15.
Advertisement - story continues belowNewsom’s office issued a statement saying he put the health of Californians first when he imposed closure orders. It said the settlements provide clarity on how public health standards can be applied to churches.
The governor’s actions were generally upheld until the churches began winning lawsuits. California Gov. Newsom began trying to pull back on his orders to mollify the churches, but he continued to insist on massive restrictions.
None of his attempts made the churches feel any better.
But the churches were right. These fake coronavirus restrictions were nothing but unconstitutional acts.
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