Biden has also indicated he supports the so-called “Equality Act,” which has passed in the House and been championed by Harris in the Senate. This legislation is designed to impose gender ideology even beyond schools and other institutions that receive federal funding. Its purpose is to force businesses and other public institutions not merely to accommodate people according to their gender identity, but rather to affirm an ideology that violates the moral commitments of most Christians, and forces citizens to say or affirm falsehoods about sex and gender.
The administration of presumptive President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris is certain to implement policies and initiate litigation that will, at best, be in tension with the moral commitments of Christians in the United States, imposing high costs on conscientious attempts to practice our faith. At worst, the incoming administration will impose moral positions on Christians that are repugnant to us and infringe upon the exercise of religious faith in the public square.
Abortion
To his credit, Biden does not take the intellectually disingenuous “personally opposed but” position of some of his pro-abortion Catholic predecessors and colleagues. His Catholic faith notwithstanding, Biden has repeatedly personally affirmed the morality of abortion without meaningful restrictions. And he has promised to facilitate access and procurement of abortion on demand, financed with tax dollars.
For example, he will almost certainly re-implement regulations from the Obama administration prohibiting states that receive federal funds for family planning from withholding payment to abortion mills such as Planned Parenthood. He has stated that he will take preemptive measures to codify the essential holding of Roe v. Wade in order to bypass possible Supreme Court approval of states’ reasonable regulation of abortion. And Biden has promised to pass regulations under the Affordable Care Act that will eliminate accommodations for Catholic organizations such as, for example, the Little Sisters of the Poor, forcing them to facilitate and finance access to contraception and abortion for their lay employees.
Biden now supports repeal of the Hyde Amendment, perennial legislation that has prohibited direct funding of abortion since 1977. Thus, tax revenue collected from Christians and others opposed to abortion will be used directly to fund abortion in a Biden administration. Nor is this aggressive position limited to domestic policy. Biden also plans to suspend the Mexico City Policy, which prohibits international aid to NGOs that provide or finance abortions in developing countries.
Gender Ideology
Biden has also promised to re-implement aggressive Obama-era policies imposing secular gender ideology on all aspects of public life. He will re-implement the so-called “Dear Colleague” letter from May 2016, which forced public schools that receive vital federal funds to allow students to use locker rooms, restrooms, and showers of the student’s choosing, regardless of the student’s biological sex.
