Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on the latest misguided program to help the poor:

The greatest enemy of the poor are those who champion their cause. It sounds counterintuitive. How can this be? Because most of those who lead the charge against poverty have no personal stake in their cause.

Unlike Mother Teresa, who made it clear that helping the poor must begin with those who carry their banner, most of the professional champions of the poor believe that writing a check—with other people’s money—will solve the problem. It rarely does.

To be sure, the aged, the disabled, and the infirm benefit from a safety net. The late Daniel Patrick Moynihan once noted that social security did more to alleviate poverty among the elderly than any other factor. But when the subject switches to able-bodied men and women, the check-writing approach fails. Indeed, it typically makes matters worse by fostering dependency.

There is a ton of empirical evidence to back up this observation. Yet in many influential quarters, all the data in the world mean nothing. Ideology wins every time. The latest gambit to catch fire is called Universal Basic Income.

Offering a guaranteed annual income is not a new idea, but the latest incarnation is novel: credit the Silicon Valley with giving birth to it. Those who live there are overwhelmingly wealthy and overwhelmingly burdened with guilt. Everyone of them became rich through hard work and ingenuity, but they are convinced that those at the bottom of the income scale do not possess these attributes. Which is why they want to send them a check.

Forget about the racist assumptions—the successful ones are either white or Asian and the ones at the bottom are mostly black or Hispanic—the fact remains that these schemes are bound to fail.

Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, is leading the cause for a universal income. He broached this idea while speaking to Harvard graduates in 2017. His net worth exceeds $55 billion, meaning that his stash is bigger than the GDP of over 100 nations.

Zuckerberg and his rich left-wing friends in the Silicon Valley have endorsed a policy that would give a monthly stipend to those who live in Stockton, California, 80 miles away. The plan is to make Stockton the first city in the nation to participate in a test of the Universal Basic Income policy. It will begin by selecting 100 people, each of whom will receive $500 a month for 18 months. It will begin next year; they hope to make it available to everyone citywide.

They haven’t determined who the lucky first 100 people will be, but they’ll figure it out. The goal is see to it that none of the 300,000 residents live in poverty. Not sure how they will keep illegal aliens from moving to Stockton—there is no talk of a wall (not yet anyway)—but again, the rich boys will figure it out.The good news for the recipients is that there are no conditions on how the money is to be spent. They can spend their money on food and shelter or on booze and heroin. Everything goes. No questions asked.

Chicago will be the first big city to test Universal Basic Income. Alderman Ameya Pawar has introduced a bill that would give $500 a month to 1,000 Chicago families. Following the Stockton model, they can spend their money on anything they want. Let’s hope they don’t buy any more guns.

Pawar is working with Mayor Rahm Emanuel to get his bill through and he already has the support of a majority of Chicago lawmakers. Emanuel, whose net worth is $14 million, likes the idea of giving away free money to the poor, many of whom are killing each other on the streets of Chicago on a daily basis.

No one has given the idea of Universal Basic Income a lift more than Barack Obama. When he spoke in Johannesburg, South Africa on July 17, at an event honoring Nelson Mandela, he endorsed the Chicago plan. “It’s not just money a job provides,” he said, “it provides dignity and structure and a sense of place and a sense of purpose.”

Yes, a job can do all that. But the Universal Basic Income policy does not require anyone to work. The effect of giving a handout to able-bodied persons who are not in the labor market is fundamentally different from giving social security to retirees who paid into the fund for decades.

Alaska has had something like this program for a long time. Rich with oil money, it has provided a universal income to virtually everyone for decades. The few economic studies done on this initiative indicate that it has not had any noticeable effect on overall employment (though part-time rates have spiked). What has not been studied is the effect on able-bodied persons at the bottom of the income scale who are not working.

Alaska, of course, is not typical. It has tens of billions of oil money to play with, and since the program is not aimed at the poor, the effect on the middle class is similar to the effect of social security on seniors, which is negligible. These people have their dignity precisely because they have earned the money they live off of, something which is not true of many in the lower class.

Obama may mean well, but what he is promoting is likely to retard the upward mobility chances of the poor. He has a proven track record of doing just that. To wit: African Americans are doing much better economically under President Trump’s growth-oriented approach than they did under Obama’s redistributive policies.

“I’m surprised how much money I’ve got,” Obama told the South African audience. So are many Americans—his net worth is over $40 million. He added that he would have no problem paying “a little more in taxes” to pay for Universal Basic Income. Again, it’s the multimillionaires (and multibillionaires) who sponsor such programs. They know full well that the effect of new taxes on them has almost a zero effect as compared to the burden levied on the middle class who must pay the lion’s share of this pipedream.

As usual, little attention is being given to the unintended consequences of a Universal Basic Income policy. Why shouldn’t the recipients receive $1500 a month, instead of $500? What will the proponents say when the recipients demand a raise? What will the sponsors say to those not selected to participate in their scheme?

What effect will the program have on those who should be working, but have now elected not to? How will it affect hard-working persons living just above the poverty line knowing that their taxes are going to some who prefer to hang out on the corner rather than seek a job? How will they feel when they learn that the cash allotment is being spent on drugs, not groceries? What will happen if the program goes bust? Are the proponents ready for the riots?

Mother Teresa said that helping the poor should be an act of love, and that love should cost: it should cost those who work with the poor to enhance the condition of the needy. Universal Basic Income does none of this. It is nothing but another cheap trick played by some very rich Americans who harbor a patronizing and condescending attitude toward the poor. They are the poor’s greatest enemy.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on how the artistic community is responding to a portrait of the Klan:

Quiz: Which of the following represents hate speech?

1. a) a depiction of Klansmen at a gathering
2. b) a play that depicts Jesus having sex with the apostles
3. c) a portrait of the Virgin Mary smeared with feces
4. d) a video of huge ants crawling all over a crucified Jesus

Those in the artistic community know the right answer: “a.”

Not only do they find the three anti-Catholic depictions acceptable, they castigate those who disagree, even to the point of challenging their right to object.

The New York Times has a front-page story in the “Arts” section today titled, “Treading Cautiously”; the subtitle reads, “A panorama of a modern-day Klan gathering challenges a museum to consider all concerns.”

Why is the arts community “treading cautiously” about a mundane portrait of Klansmen? There is nothing vulgar or obscene about the depiction—there are no blacks hanging from a tree—just a dozen or so guys wearing sheets and pointy-headed hats.

The piece, which is the work of Vincent Valdez, is on display at the Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at Austin. Believe it or not, the museum got so worked up about it that it took them two years deciding how to roll it out. Now they admit they blew it: they should have run it by the NAACP. Maybe they needed another year.

Michael Hardy, the reporter who covered this story for the Times, noted that this masterpiece “required sensitivity.” Indeed, the curators had a special gallery built featuring warning signs: beware, it said, this work “may elicit strong emotions.”

Hardy cites the advice offered by the National Coalition Against Censorship. It has a document detailing ways to handle controversy. He fails to mention that this organization does not always get worked up about controversial artwork, especially when the hate speech is directed at Catholics.

In the aforementioned quiz, it was the 1998 play, “Corpus Christi,” that depicted Christ having sex with the apostles. When I led a demonstration against it in front of the Manhattan Theater—I never sought to censor it—the Catholic League was criticized by the New York Times. The National Coalition Against Censorship went beyond criticism—the “anti-censorship” group objected to our right to raise objections, turning out a small contingent to protest our demonstration.

The same newspaper and organization criticized the Catholic League in 1999 when we objected to a portrait of the Virgin Mary smeared with elephant dung; it was displayed at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. In 2010, these same two sensitivity-police organs hammered us again, this time for protesting the ants-on-Jesus video featured by the Smithsonian.

The National Coalition Against Censorship is not only a fraud—it tried to stifle the free speech of the Catholic League—it lectured Catholics on the need to put aside their objections to the Virgin Mary portrait. It still does.

On the organization’s website, under “Issues,” there is a “Religion” section that speaks to the work of Chris Ofili, the genius behind the fecal art. “The Holy Virgin Mary, showed the Virgin as black, with a three-dimensional breast made from a ball of elephant dung. Some Catholics were outraged. They saw a s***-smeared holy icon—a defaced Virgin. What they neglected to discover was that Ofili himself is a Catholic, and that he drew upon his African roots to represent his idea of the Virgin Mary. The elephant dung symbolizes fertility and the Earth in Ofili’s culture.”

This ignorant statement is wrong on four counts.

It never mentions the pictures of vaginas—porn cutouts—that adorned Our Blessed Mother. Ofili is a self-hating Catholic, and besides, his religion is irrelevant: if a nutty Jew put a swastika on a synagogue and calls it art, are his critics disarmed? Ofili is not African—he is a Brit (his parents are from Nigeria). And it is a racist myth to ascribe feces as an honorific statement in African culture. Tell that to the Nigerians.

It is not easy deciding which is worse—the poverty of intellectual thought, the dishonesty, or the anti-Catholic bigotry.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on the polling results of two surveys on abortion:

As a social scientist who has analyzed and written about polling data for many years, I am always taken aback when I encounter dishonest surveys. The latest example of this is a survey done by Gallup on the subject of abortion; it follows a pattern established by the Pew Research Center on this subject.

The survey results on abortion taken by these two polling institutions, both of which enjoy a good reputation, were recently cited by those worried that Roe v. Wade may be overturned.

In a New York Times op-ed article published on July 12, Nation magazine  writer Katha Pollitt—she is known for saying abortion is a “positive social good”—cited a 2017 Pew survey showing that a large majority of Americans support Roe v. Wade‘s legalization of abortion.

Also on July 12, the Hill ran a headline, “Poll Finds Strong Support for Roe v. Wade,” citing the results of a Gallup poll that was just released; similar headlines appeared in other media outlets on this survey.

Pew and Gallup dropped their standards in issuing these surveys. How?  By taking a simple-minded approach to a complex issue.

Any poll that offers only two choices on an issue that most Americans have very mixed feelings about is dishonest. The researchers at Pew and Gallup know this to be true—they have even done surveys in the past that accurately tap how conflicted the public is on abortion—yet they undertook a poll that made it impossible to reveal the nuances.

The Gallup poll that was released July 12 asked respondents, “Would you like to see the Supreme Court overturn its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision concerning abortion, or not?” It found that 64% believe the ruling should stand and 28% want it overturned. In January 2017, Pew released its findings showing that the figures were 69% and 28%, respectively.

Last month I wrote a news release titled, “Majority Oppose Roe v. Wade.” According to the two polls I just cited, I must be wrong. But I am not. They are. To top things off, my proof comes by way of a Gallup poll released on June 11.

That poll found that 53% of Americans said abortion should be legal in only a few circumstances (35%) or in no circumstances (18%). This means that a majority of Americans reject abortion-on-demand, which is what Roe v. Wade rendered! Moreover, 48% said abortion is “morally wrong”; 43% disagreed.

My point is that by collapsing the survey responses to a “yes” or “no” on Roe does not get at the more nuanced responses that most Americans have about this issue. Most Americans do not think that abortion should be legal for any reason whatsoever, or for any time during pregnancy. Yet that is what Roe allows.

Just as misleading, the Pew survey mentioned by Pollitt shows that most Catholics think Roe should stand. But a more sophisticated survey shows the opposite.

In 2015, I commissioned a scientific survey of 1,000 Catholics; it was conducted by The Polling Company. I had a hand in crafting the questions (my doctorate is in sociology), all of which were designed to get at issues that the big survey houses refuse to query.

The survey found that 50% of Catholics identify as pro-life, and 38% as pro-choice. That was just the beginning. When the data were disaggregated, more revealing results were found.

For example, 17% of all Catholics said abortion should be prohibited in all circumstances; 17% said it should be legal only to save the life of the mother; and 27% said abortion should be legal only in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother. That’s 61% who are mostly pro-life.

Among those who are pro-choice, only 5% said that abortion should be allowed for any reason and at any time. Another 4% said any reason was okay but there should be none after the first six months of pregnancy. And 17% said abortion should be legal for any reason, but not after the first three months of pregnancy. That’s 26% who are mostly pro-choice.

Another way of looking at it is to consider how Catholics feel about the current law. Under Roe, abortion is effectively allowed for any reason and at any time. This makes us unique: No nation in the world has more liberalized abortion laws than the United States, including the Scandinavian countries. Now think about it: If only 5% agree with the current law, that means 95% of Catholics reject what Roe permits.

Pew and Gallup could also probe respondents more deeply on this issue—asking a series of related questions—so when they do not, they are dropping their standards, eliciting findings that distort the truth.

This is too serious an issue for polling houses not to dig deep, uncovering the qualified responses that most Americans have regarding abortion.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on an article about Catholic representation on the Supreme Court:

Are there too many Jews on the Supreme Court? Just raising the question is enough to raise eyebrows. In some circles it would be proof of bigotry. Count me among those who would detect at least a whiff of anti-Semitism. Why, then, are pundits questioning the Catholic representation on the Supreme Court, and getting away with it?

The latest example comes by way of an article originally published by Religion News Service on July 11; it has been picked up as an op-ed by several newspapers. “Catholic-Heavy Supreme Court Moves Right as the Church Moves Left.” That is the title of an article by Jacob Lupfer.

What occasioned Lupfer’s concerns about a “Catholic-Heavy” Supreme Court was President Trump’s selection of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to sit on the Supreme Court. Lupfer describes Kavanaugh as a “doctrinaire conservative,” one who is “more heavily and outwardly invested in his Catholic identity than his mentor [Justice Anthony Kennedy].”

Is this because Kavanaugh is a lector at his parish? Is it because the nominee cited his work helping the poor while working for Catholic Charities? The red flag thrown by Lupfer was followed by some red meat for anti-Catholic bigots. He says Trump is “exacerbat[ing]” and “heighten[ing]” the “angst (or excitement)” about “the institution’s ever more conservative Catholic majority.”

In other words, it is not the bigots who are to be blamed for raising the issue about too many Catholics on the high court, it’s Trump’s fault.

Lupfer then offers a pass to Senator Dianne Feinstein for her anti-Catholic attack on Judge Amy Coney Barrett, who was on Trump’s short list to replace Justice Kennedy.

In her questioning of Barrett, Feinstein said of her, “The dogma lives loudly within you.” We all know what that meant. Lupfer manages to spin Feinstein’s bigoted comment saying it was nothing more than a “gaffe.” No, a gaffe is unintentional. Feinstein’s comment was scripted. And she never apologized.

Worse, Lupfer then accuses Feinstein’s critics of using her remark as a “rallying cry for conservatives enthralled with the notion that devout, orthodox religious people are systematically excluded from positions of elite influence, and particularly positions of legal authority.” In other words, when those offended by bigoted comments complain, they are exploiting the issue. Would this apply to others as well, or just Catholics?

Lupfer offers a dire warning. “The triumph of conservative Catholicism on the court has a dark lining,” he informs. The “darkness,” he says, is evident in the way “the Catholic Supreme Court” has ruled on liberal causes.

“The Catholic Supreme Court”? Kavanaugh, who is Catholic, may replace Kennedy, who is also Catholic. The other four Catholics are Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Clarence Thomas, Justice Samuel Alito, and Justice Sonia Sotomayor. It should be noted that Sotomayor identifies as a “cultural Catholic,” not a practicing one.

Conveniently, Lupfer never mentions that three of the Supreme Court Justices—Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Elena Kagan—are Jewish. Do we have too many Jews on the Supreme Court?

Jews are approximately 2 percent of the population, yet they make up a third of the high court. Catholics are not nearly as overrepresented: they are approximately 25 percent of the population and make up slightly more than half of the Supreme Court.

We don’t have too many Catholics or too many Jews on the Supreme Court. What we have are some of the best jurisprudential minds in the nation. Those who think otherwise are the problem, not the religious affiliation of those on the high court.

Contact: Thomas Gallagher, CEO, Religion News Service: thomas.gallagher@religionnews.com

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on remarks made about abortion in the wake of President Trump’s pick of Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court:

Most Americans who defend abortion rights are conflicted over the issue: they may want it to be legal, but they also support many restrictions on it. Whether those restrictions involve the reasons for abortion, the time of gestation, parental notification, or some other limitation, the bottom line is that these Americans are uneasy about abortion. Indeed, they reject the boundless right to abortion encoded in Roe v. Wade.

Importantly, these Americans are not represented by abortion activists and pundits who claim to be speaking for them.

Sadly, there are those who love abortion. The most recent expression of this comes from Michelle Wolf, the foul-mouthed “feminist” known for bashing women she hates. On Sunday, she dressed up in red, white, and blue, and marched across a stage in honor of her “Salute to Abortion!” She told her Netflix show fans, “God bless abortions!” She was given a rousing ovation.

This love affair with abortion is nothing new. In 1975, atheist Anne Nicol Gaylor published a book titled, Abortion Is A Blessing. It was endorsed by the two most prominent feminists of the day, Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem (Steinem had an abortion when she was 22). In 2009, Rev. Katherine Ragsdale, an Episcopalian priest, echoed this refrain, exclaiming that “abortion is a blessing.”

Those who love abortion like to lie about it.

An hour before President Trump announced that Judge Brett Kavanaugh was his choice to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court, Cecile Richards, the former president of Planned Parenthood, said on MSNBC that before Roe, “young, healthy women died routinely in emergency rooms.” The next day, Senator Patty Murray said that Trump’s pick would bring us back to the day when “women had to go to back alleys for healthcare.” Healthcare?

Here are some hard facts. Prior to Roe, women were not dying “routinely” of illegal abortions, whether in emergency rooms or alleys. In 1972, the year before Roe was decided, there were exactly 39 women who died nationwide as a result of an illegal abortion.

How do I know this? The data are not found in a pro-life journal—they were published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Moreover, they are cited in a journal published by the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion organization once affiliated with Planned Parenthood.

The passion—indeed the delirium—that these folks have for abortion is almost as terrifying as the procedure itself. They need our prayers. They also need to be defeated.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s suitability for the U.S. Supreme Court:

All four of President Trump’s short list of Supreme Court nominees were splendid selections. Congratulations to his top choice, Judge Brett Kavanaugh. There are four reasons why the Catholic League believes he is a great pick.

1) Kavanaugh came down squarely on the side of Priests for Life in rejecting the Obama administration’s claim that there should be no religious exemption from its Health and Human Services mandate. He said that this mandate, which ordered Catholic non-profit organizations to provide for abortion-inducing drugs, contraceptives, and sterilization in their healthcare plans, was in violation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

2) Kavanaugh turned back a challenge to the constitutionality of Inaugural prayers brought by atheist activist Michael Newdow. He did not mince words, saying that the religious significance of this well-established prayer cannot be discounted, and in no way runs afoul of the First Amendment provision regarding separation of church and state.

3) Kavanaugh made a strong case for religious liberty by challenging the right of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority to censor a Christmas bus ad sponsored by the Archdiocese of Washington. The agency banned the ad because it “depicts a religious scene and thus seeks to promote religion.” The scene, which shows a silhouette of shepherds and sheep on a starry night, is inscribed with the words, “Find the Perfect Gift.” The ban was criticized by Kavanaugh who called it “pure discrimination.”

4) Kavanaugh offered a stinging dissent in a case brought by the ACLU that sued the federal government for not facilitating an immediate abortion for an illegal minor. He accused the majority of overreaching, of assuming supra-constitutional authority. He also noted that the government had “permissible interests” in “favoring fetal life,” thus sending a clear message to those who deny that there is life in the womb.

For these reasons alone, we are confident that President Trump made the right decision in choosing Judge Brett Kavanaugh to sit on the high court.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on recent remarks made by Bill Maher:

On July 8, HBO aired a stand-up comedy special, “Bill Maher: Live From Oklahoma.” As usual, Maher took shots at Catholicism, but did not stop with that—he lashed out at me.

Maher went on a tear calling out the Catholic League for protesting his show. “They were the ones trying to get me thrown off the air, 10, 12 years ago. William Donohue, head of the Catholic League with his letter-writing campaigns and his email campaign, at one point wanted to fight me. Fight me as Jesus would have wanted, I’m sure.”

He finished his tirade by saying, “Bill, I’m no anti-Catholic. I’m anti-child f***ing. Your organization has been caught doing that, so that doesn’t make me the bad guy.”

When Richard Nixon said “I am not a crook,” everyone knew he was. Similarly, when Bill Maher says, “I’m no anti-Catholic,” he cooked his own goose.

More important, Maher errs when he says the Catholic Church has a record of tolerating pedophile priests who sexually molest children. The problem has always been about homosexual priests abusing postpubescent males.

Maher knows the problem is homosexuality but does not want to appear to be anti-gay. Here’s the proof. On November 20, 2010, in a discussion with Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC, Maher brought the subject up again. Speaking sarcastically, Maher explained how the Church addresses this issue. “You know, ‘our priests are not sinning, they’re just giving into temptation when they’re molesting children and going gay and stuff like that.'” Going gay? That’s quite an admission.

Regarding the fight, I did tell Megyn Kelly a few years back that I would like to put on the Everlast and get into the ring with Maher at Madison Square Garden. He keeps bringing this up. I don’t want to disappoint him, so I will extend the invitation again: When are we meeting, Bill? Please call my office to set it up. Let us know if you need a stool.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on the possibility of President Trump picking Judge Amy Coney Barrett for the high court:

If President Trump chooses to nominate Judge Amy Coney Barrett to replace Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, two senators should recuse themselves: Dick Durbin and Dianne Feinstein.

Senators Durbin and Feinstein have already evinced an anti-Catholic bias, thus disqualifying themselves from voting on Judge Barrett’s suitability to serve on the Supreme Court. In September 2017, I wrote to the two of them about their bias; they showed their hand when questioning Barrett about her qualifications to serve on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals.

On September 6, 2017, Senator Durbin asked Barrett, “Do you consider yourself an orthodox Catholic?” Durbin, a product of 19 years of Catholic-school training, confessed that he did not know what the term “orthodox Catholic” meant. He was being more than coy.

An orthodox Catholic is someone who accepts the teachings of the Catholic Church. That would obviously exclude Senator Durbin: he champions abortion rights, something the Church calls “intrinsically evil.” More important, his question was meant as a red flag: He was signaling to his base that Barrett is a hard-line Catholic, someone whose strongly held religious beliefs will determine her decisions.

Senator Feinstein was worse. “When you read your speeches,” she said to Barrett, “the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you.”

In response, I wrote to Senator Feinstein stating, “No one was fooled by your question. Why didn’t you come right out and ask her if she takes her judicial cues from the Vatican? That would have been more honest.”

When Barrett testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee last fall, she pointedly said, “I see no conflict between having a sincerely held faith and duties as a judge. I would never impose my own personal convictions upon the law.” (My italic.)

Indeed, in 1998 she co-authored a journal article saying that if a Catholic judge is caught in a dilemma when considering a capital punishment case—having to choose between his faith and rendering a fair legal judgment—he should recuse himself.

Senators Durbin and Feinstein have been down this road before. They made clear their anti-Catholic bias 13 years ago when they questioned John Roberts about his suitability to serve on the Supreme Court. Durbin told CNN that we need to “look at everything, including the nominee’s faith.” Feinstein asked Roberts if he shared President John F. Kennedy’s conviction about not mixing church and state.

If Durbin and Feinstein had a record of asking all candidates for the high court about their religion, they would not be open to the charge of anti-Catholicism. But they do not. It is just Catholics whom they probe.

If Judge Amy Coney Barrett is President Trump’s pick, Senator Dick Durbin and Senator Dianne Feinstein have a moral obligation to recuse themselves. Not to do so would be intellectually dishonest and patently unfair to Judge Barrett.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on Pennsylvania state legislator Mark Rozzi:

Pennsylvania Rep. Mark Rozzi’s shameless grandstanding may finally have caught up with him.

Under the guise of protecting children, Rozzi has spent the last several years targeting the Catholic Church—exclusively—while giving a pass to virtually all other institutions beset by predatory adults abusing minors.

Chief among his efforts has been trying to pass legislation that would allow individuals and organizations to be sued retroactively—going back not just years, but decades—for allegations of abuse that are almost impossible to adjudicate.

Now, support for that legislation is waning. Rozzi has acknowledged that the Speaker of the Pennsylvania House, who supported his bill in the past, has told him he no longer supports it. This is welcome news.

Rozzi’s original bill did nothing to eliminate the sovereign immunity that protects public entities from such lawsuits. This is a particularly egregious omission in Pennsylvania, which in recent years has been identified as having one of the worst records in the nation when it comes to public school personnel sexually abusing students.

But that was never Rozzi’s concern. He proved that in 2016 when he called for using taxpayer money to investigate every Catholic diocese in the state for sexual abuse crimes. He did not want to target any other institutions, public or private—including those notorious Pennsylvania public schools.

The next year, in a memorandum on his abuse legislation, Rozzi acknowledged that he had “heard heartfelt pleas from grown men and women whose lives had been destroyed by ministers of every denomination, scout leaders, public and private school teachers, coaches, missionaries, and worst of all, family members.”

Did this mean he was through exclusively targeting the Catholic Church? No! In the very next sentence, he hailed the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s “first in the nation, state-wide grand jury investigation of all eight Roman Catholic dioceses.” Not a word about the need to investigate all those other entities—again, including the public schools—that Rozzi had just acknowledged were responsible for destroyed lives at the hands of sexual predators.

Recently, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued a stay blocking release of that grand jury’s report on six Catholic dioceses—and Rozzi is fulminating. He called it “a punch in the gut.” He accused the Church of “spend(ing) millions to silence victims,” and of “kick(ing) us to the curb like trash”—even though he knows that all six dioceses supported the release of the grand jury report.

As the Supreme Court made clear, its release was challenged by “many” individuals who, while named in the report, were never allowed to appear before the grand jury. The Court believes this raises some legitimate due process concerns.

Rozzi, of course, shows little concern for due process rights—whether for people named but not charged in the grand jury report, or for those he wants to subject to lawsuits for decades-old allegations.

Rozzi’s goal was clearly to have the grand jury report released before the legislature adjourned at the end of June—so he could use it to ram through his retroactive bill.

With that bill now losing momentum, perhaps Pennsylvania will enact much fairer legislation passed by the Senate but blocked by Rozzi. That bill would greatly extend the statute of limitations going forward, for all entities, public as well as private. Its passage will enable the protection of all children, while also respecting the due process necessary for distinguishing the innocent from the guilty.