Ep. 197 ‘Are cakes speech?’ with Alliance Defending Freedom’s Kristen Waggoner

President, CEO, and general counsel of the Alliance Defending Freedom, Kristen Waggoner, joins us for a discussion on freedom of speech and religious liberty. ADF has played various roles in 74 U.S. Supreme Court victories and since 2011, has won cases before the Court 15 times. 

According to its website, “ADF is the world's largest legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, marriage and family, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.”

ADF has litigated many high profile and controversial free speech cases, including the recent Supreme Court case involving a web designer who didn’t want to be compelled to design websites for same-sex weddings. Before that, ADF litigated the 2018 Masterpiece Cakeshop case, which involved a cake designer who similarly didn’t want to provide his services for same-sex weddings on religious grounds.

After the initial conversation was recorded, The Washington Post and The New Yorker released articles critical of ADF. Nico and Kristen recorded an additional, brief conversation to address these articles. That is included at the end of the podcast. 

Transcript:

https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/so-speak-podcast-transcript-are-cakes-speech-alliance-defending-freedoms-kristen

Timestamps:

0:43 - Introduction

6:16 - Kristen’s path to ADF

12:54 - ADF’s international team

14:20 - Pavi Rasanen controversy

19:24 - What does it mean to be a ministry?/blasphemy laws

22:56 - ADF’s Supreme Court cases 

26:58 - 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis 

28:56 - Public accommodation laws/Masterpiece Cakeshop

40:40 - Pre-enforcement challenges

42:50 - Facial challenges

47:32 - Test cases or fake cases?

49:44 - Yale incident

57:50 - Other campus shoutdowns

1:00:08 - L.M. v. Town of Middleborough 

1:14:27 - Kristen addresses WaPo article

1:15:38 - Kristen addresses New Yorker article 

 

Related Articles/Podcasts:

• “Inside the tactics that won Christian vendors the right to reject gay weddings,” Jon Swaine and Beth Reinhard (The Washington Post)

• “Are ADF’s Cases ‘Made Up’?” Lathan Watts (ADF, response to The Washington Post)

• “The next targets for the group that overturned Roe,” David D. Kirkpatrick (The New Yorker)

• FIRE’s response to Kristen Waggoner Yale incident 

• FIRE’s response to Anne Coulter Cornell incident

• FIRE’s response to Ilya Shapiro Georgetown incident

• FIRE’s response to Ian Haworth UAlbany incident

• “The Imperfect Plaintiffs” (“More Perfect” podcast with Julia Longoria)

 

Cases Discussed:

• Dubash v. City of Houston (Animal rights activists lawsuit, 2023)

• Paivi Rasanen (Finnish lawmaker charged with incitement against gay people)

• 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis (2022) 

• Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (2017) 

• Uzuebgunam v. Preczewski (2021) 

• West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943) 

• Wooley v. Maynard (1997) 

• Plessy v. Ferguson (1986) 

• L.M. v. Town of Middleborough (2023)

 

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