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An county social worker in Oregon says he has come under fire for not following a transgender pronoun policy due to his religious beliefs. He is now requesting a religious exemption to the policy and a guarantee that his employer will not retaliate against him or demote him, according to a non-profit legal group.
Liberty Counsel sent a demand letter to the Clackamas County Health, Housing, and Human Services Department (HHS) on behalf of the licensed social worker “facing unlawful retaliation” for not following the county’s pronoun policy.
The county reportedly requires employees to affirm any identities expressed by youth of any age, not just gender identities, regardless of the parents’ desires or the employee’s religious beliefs.
Earlier this year, the social worker met with his supervisors requesting a religious exemption from the pronoun policy, but was denied.
“In a follow-up email, [the supervisor] reiterated that he cannot refuse to follow the pronoun policy because of his ‘own personal perspectives, religion, culture or identities…’,” Liberty’s demand letter outlines.
In a written response, the social worker explained that the pronoun policy “infringed on the fundamental rights of parents to raise their children and discriminated against him for holding sincerely held Christian beliefs.”
“I differentiate between what we do as Wraparound professionals and what we or others might consider based on their own cultural and religious perspectives. I coach people to set aside their own biases (often using myself as an example) to respect the culture of the family,” he wrote.
The supervisor “explicitly threatened to demote” the social worker if he did not comply with the policy, the letter explains.
“If we receive credible feedback involving behaviors similar to those described above, we will remove you from the Wraparound Coach role. After that, if we receive further credible feedback involving the same concerns, we will move into the progressive discipline process.”
The social worker tried on another occasion to reiterate his concerns, but his supervisors “indicated a lack of concern and did not desire to continue the discussion.”
Liberty Counsel noted in a press statement that the First Amendment not only guarantees “the right to speak freely,” it also protects the right to “refrain from speaking at all,” such as declining to foster ideological concepts.
“The First Amendment guarantees the right to speak and the right to not speak. Clackamas County cannot force a social worker to endorse or engage in ideological viewpoints that violate his religious beliefs or freedom of speech. Clackamas County should immediately grant this social worker a religious accommodation and withdraw its unlawful retaliatory threats,” said Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver.
“Under the First Amendment and Title VII, the social worker’s decision to avoid using subjective pronouns is ‘indisputably protected’,” Liberty Counsel added.
Scott Anderson, a spokesperson with Clackamas County, told CBN News that an “active investigation is underway,” and is declining to comment any further on the incident.
Liberty Counsel had requested a written response from the department by September 26.
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