In what activists are calling an attempt to allow taxpayer-funded discrimination, the U.S. House of Representatives on July 25 passed, by one vote, a bill that would let religious organizations receiving federal funds for Head Start programs refuse to hire people on religious grounds. The act opens "a back door to antigay discrimination," said John Marble of the National Stonewall Democrats. The bill, awaiting a Senate vote, follows the blueprint of President Bush's stalled faith-based initiative, which would let federally funded religious charities discriminate.
"This is just one more example of the Bush administration's assault on the Constitution and the bedrock principle of separation of church and state," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
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