TENNESSEE ADOPTION BIAS SUIT REVIVED
NASHVILLE, Tenn.
Appellate judges have revived a couple’s lawsuit that alleges a state-sponsored Christian adoption agency wouldn’t help them because they are Jewish and argues that a Tennessee law protecting such denials is unconstitutional.
On Thursday, a threejudge panel of the state Court of Appeals ruled that Elizabeth and Gabriel Rutan-Ram have the right as taxpayers to sue in the case, as do six other taxpayer plaintiffs in the case. The ruling overturns a lower court’s determination in June 2022 that none of them had legal standing. The case can now proceed in the trial court.
The lawsuit against the state challenges a 2020 law that installed legal protections for private adoption agencies to reject statefunded placement of children to parents based on religious beliefs.
Much of the criticism of the law focused on how it shielded adoption agencies that refuse to serve prospective LGBTQ+ parents.
But the Rutan-Rams alleged they were discriminated against because they are Jewish, in violation of their state constitutional rights.
In their lawsuit, the married couple said the Holston United Methodist Home for Children in Greeneville barred them from taking Tennessee state-mandated foster-parent training and denied them a home-study certification when they attempted to adopt a child from Florida in 2021.
The state Department of Children’s Services later provided the couple with the required training and home study, then approved them as foster parents in June 2021.
The couple has been fostering a teenage girl they hope to adopt. They also want to foster at least one more child, for whom they would likewise pursue adoption, the ruling states.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which filed the lawsuit on the couple’s behalf, called this week’s ruling an important victory.
A spokesperson for the Tennessee attorney general, Amy Wilhite, said their office is reviewing the court’s decision.
A representative for Holston United Methodist Home for Children did not immediately return emailed requests for comment on the ruling. The home is not a defendant in the lawsuit.