The Christian nationalist legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is celebrating an $800,000 settlement that the city of Louisville, Kentucky paid to Christian photographer Chelsey Nelson to settle her legal challenge against the city’s LGBTQ+ anti-discrimination ordinance — even though she was never personally asked to provide services to LGBTQ+ customers.

Nelson preemptively filed a lawsuit in 2019 challenging Louisville’s Fairness Ordinance, which requires all businesses to treat customers equally, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. She said that being required to photograph a same-sex marriage would violate her sincerely held religious beliefs and her First Amendment rights.

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She was represented by ADF, the SPLC-designated hate group that has served as legal counsel in numerous anti-LGBTQ cases, including U.S. Supreme Court cases that have overturned queer rights. ADF also lobbies for laws that continue to erode queer civil rights.

The city asked the court to throw out her case because the law hadn’t actually affected her. But in 2020, the current president’s Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a  “statement of interest” supporting Nelson. Then, last September, U.S. District Judge Benjamin Beaton issued an injunction against the ordinance in Nelson’s case.

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Beaton was appointed by the current president and is a member of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group that has helped pack U.S. courts with anti-LGBTQ judges who will serve for decades to come.

Last October, a federal court ruled that the ordinance contained two provisions that violated Nelson’s First Amendment rights: one prohibiting her from denying services to people based on their LGBTQ+ identity, and another prohibiting her from publishing any statement explaining her refusal to provide services.

The court’s ruling was based on the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark 303 Creative v. Elenis ruling, which found that some businesses have a free speech right to violate anti-discrimination laws if such laws would compel them to engage in speech they disagree with.

Similar to Nelson’s case, the Supreme Court case involved a Christian web designer who hadn’t actually been approached by a same-sex couple to make them a wedding website, nor had Colorado investigated or punished her under its anti-discrimination law. The web designer was also represented by ADF lawyers.

Following the announcement of Louisville’s settlement to Nelson, ADF Senior Counsel Bryan Neihart said, “The government cannot force Americans to say things they don’t believe. For almost six years, Louisville officials tried to do just that by threatening to force Chelsey to promote views about marriage that violated her religious beliefs. Louisville’s threats contradicted bedrock First Amendment principles, which leave decisions about what to say with the people, not the government. This settlement should teach Louisville that violating the U.S. Constitution can be expensive.”

Despite her court victory, Matt Mudd, a press secretary for Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg, told The Louisville Courier Journal, “We are committed to fully enforcing Louisville’s anti-discrimination ordinances, including the Fairness Ordinance, which bans discrimination against LGBTQ people.”

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