Hello Friend,

I have seen with my own eyes the cruelty and real-world harm that Rep. Mike Johnson — our new Speaker of the House and second in line to the Presidency — and his policies have inflicted on people like me here in Louisiana.

My name is Noelle Ramsey, and I’m the Senior Director of Direct Response Marketing for Americans United. I’m most often behind the scenes, but today, I want to talk to you peer-to-peer as a person living in New Orleans and a devoted AU member.

By now, I’m sure you’ve seen the litany of alarming Christian Nationalist views espoused by Speaker Johnson. He has helped to inflict considerable damage on church-state separation through his work at Shadow Network organizations Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) and First Liberty Institute.

As a member of the LGBTQ+ community, I’ve had a front row seat as he weaponized his personal religious views against people like me. Not only did he defend Louisiana’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples, in 2009 he was part of the ADF legal team that sued the City of New Orleans for extending health coverage to same-sex partners. While Johnson says he isn’t “motivated by hatred for homosexuals or anything like that” — his actions speak louder than his words:

• As a state legislator, Johnson introduced a bill to create a broad religious license to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.
• In 2016, he introduced the “Pastor Protection Act” in the Louisiana House to provide legal protection for clergy who declined to perform marriages for same-sex couples — a completely pointless measure because the First Amendment already ensures that clergy can’t be forced to preside at wedding ceremonies that violate their religious beliefs. But Johnson introduced it anyway as a crude dog whistle to his far-right base. (It failed only after Johnson made changes that would have allowed clergy to refuse to perform marriages for interracial couples!)
• Just last year, he introduced a federal “don’t say gay” bill, a mean-spirited proposal based on the extreme Florida law designed to drive any mention of LGBTQ+ people out of public schools.

But Speaker Johnson’s weaponization of his religious beliefs doesn’t end with attacks on LGBTQ+ people. He has repeatedly pushed for Christian Nationalist policies that threaten true religious liberty by punching a hole through the wall that separates church and state.

In 2017, he co-sponsored a bill to repeal a federal law (the Johnson Amendment) that bars houses of worship and other tax-exempt groups from endorsing or opposing candidates for public office. He advocated for a Bible course created by the National Council on Bible Curriculum in Public Schools offered in eight Louisiana parish public school districts, even though scores of scholars have criticized the classes as fundamentalist propaganda. And he has openly stated “...over the last 60 or 70 years, our generation has been convinced that there is a separation of church and state. Most people think that’s part of the Constitution, but it’s not.”

The AU pocket constitution I carry with me every day begs to differ.

Despite Johnson’s extreme views, I remain optimistic. He is wildly out of step with history as well as the majority of Americans. I am confident things can get better — but only if each of us renews our commitment to church-state separation and holds our leaders to account.

My optimism springs from knowing people like you are out there to oppose Johnson’s dangerous and vindictive extremism. Your dedication to AU means we can do the work of exposing the Shadow Network’s insidious agenda and fight for policies that protect ALL of us, without exception, and I am so grateful to you.

I am equally grateful to have the opportunity to work with the brilliant and principled team here at AU. They tirelessly shoulder the heavy responsibility of fighting the corruption and dark money that is funding this Christian Nationalist crusade, and they work ceaselessly to uphold our constitutional right to believe as we choose.

Right now, true religious freedom hangs in the balance, and your support is more important than ever before. With all of us working together, I know we can make a difference — and that gives me hope.

Sincerely,

Noelle Ramsey
Senior Director of Direct Response Marketing