Minnesota backs off anti-Christian provision for colleges, for now

Following backlash and a lawsuit, a new law that would bar Christian colleges and universities in Minnesota from using statements of faith for student of certain courses won’t be immediately enforced.

An education finance law passed by the state Legislature earlier this year would have penalized religious schools that require statements of faith, according to Fox News.

Under the new law, high school students taking college courses free of charge, financed by the state, would not be required to submit the standard statement of faith to religious colleges and universities delivering the courses, said Fox.

Nor would religious institutions be able to “base admissions decisions on religious beliefs,” as has been standard practice in the past. 

Parents and students from Crown College and Northwestern University of St. Paul, as well as the two schools themselves, have sued Gov. Tim Waltz and Willie Jett, the state’s commissioner of Education and the state’s Department of Education. 

The suit alleges that “Minnesota knowingly excluded Crown and Northwestern [from the funding] because of their religious beliefs, even after being warned this was unconstitutional,” according to a copy of the lawsuit, provided by local KSTP ABCNews 75.  

The suit also asked for a temporary restraining order (TRO) on enforcement of the new law. 

Surprisingly, the state’s attorney general, Keith Ellison, agreed to the TRO. 

“We sued and Minnesota backed down!” tweeted Eric Baxter, Senior Counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which filed the suit on behalf of the plaintiffs. “Just weeks after passing a law that targeted religious schools that asked their students to sign a statement of faith, Minnesota agreed to a court order tying its hands from enforcing the law while our lawsuit is pending.”  

Ellison has agreed not to enforce the law until the case is resolved through the court system, said the Becket Fund 

“As this effort to walk back demonstrates, the state didn’t do its homework before it passed this unconstitutional law. The next step is for the court to strike down this ban for good,” said Diana Thomson, senior counsel at Becket.  

The plaintiffs are asking a federal judge to strike down the law on the grounds that it violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the Minnesota Constitution, said KSTP.