New York And California Updates

A new federal lawsuit has been filed by ultra-Orthodox Jews in the upstate cluster of Orange and Rockland County, NY cases:

On Wednesday, three Orthodox Jewish congregations in Rockland County, N.Y., sued Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) for issuing a “blatantly anti-Semitic” coronavirus order restricting religious services in Jewish areas, just before three sequential Jewish holy days. Cuomo falsely blamed the Orthodox Jewish community for a surge in COVID-19 cases in New York, referring to the surge as “a predominantly ultra-orthodox cluster,” and he admitted the lockdowns were based on “fear” rather than science.

According to the link, the lawyers in the case are Ron Coleman and Harmett Dhillon with Dhillon Law Group and the Center for American Liberty. The Dhillon group, based in San Francisco, has represented California parents suing to reopen schools and Northern California churches suing against COVID lockdown provisions.

The story quotes from the transcript of Gov Cuomo's call with ultra-Orthodox rabbis that I mentioned in Thursday's post .

In an October 6 phone call with Jewish leaders, Cuomo admitted, “This is not a highly nuanced, sophisticated response, this is a fear-driven response, this is not a policy being written by a scalpel, this is a policy being cut by a hatchet, it’s just a very blunt.” He attempted to blame New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio for the fear-driven response, but then admitted that he worked with de Blasio in adjusting it.

"It’s not the best way to do it, but it is a fear-driven response, the virus scares people, hopefully we get the numbers down in the zip codes, the anxiety comes down, and then we can have a smarter, more tailored approach,” the governor added. “Hopefully we get it under control in a few weeks, people take a deep breath, and then we can have a more intelligent, sophisticated policy.”

The rabbis cited this gobsmacking admission in their lawsuit.

They also explained the vital importance of religious gatherings in Orthodox Judaism.

Notice that in the case of Capitol Hill Baptist Church, the plaintiffs were able to obtain a free-exercise restraining order based on the argument that their strongly held doctrines are unique to a small sect. But if doctrines are just as strongly held. but they're more mainstream, and they're generally held by a larger group, this is pretty clearly going to be a much tougher case.

It's hard to avoid seeing Cuomo's remarks as anti-Semitic, addressed to a group of rabbis apparently on the assumption they'd understand that the community is agitated against the Jews, so he has to act.

In the Southern California case of the Harvest Rock Evangelical megachurch, LIberty Counsel is asking for its request for a restraining order against Gov Newsom to be heard by the US Ninth Circuit appeals court en banc:

Harvest Rock Church and Harvest International Ministry filed an en banc petition to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals requesting that the entire panel of judges review the case regarding Governor Gavin Newsom’s unconstitutional orders. Harvest Rock Church has multiple campuses in California, including in Pasadena, Los Angeles, Irvine and Corona. Harvest International Ministries has 162 member churches throughout the state.

Earlier this month, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in a 2-1 decision did not grant an injunction pending appeal. However, the Court of Appeals will hear the merits of the request for an injunction in a future hearing to be set in the new year. Due to the importance of the issues, and the fact that now the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has issued two separate 2-1 decisions (in the South Bay and Harvest cases), Liberty Counsel is requesting a rehearing before all the Ninth Circuit judges.

This continues to be a slow process that's clearly estending into 2021. The problem is, of course, that COVID lockdowns, originally intended to last over a period of weeks, have taken on an indefinite life, and civil authorities are claiming to be able to tighten them, loosen them, modify them, and extend them on vague pretexts that, as we're beginning to see, arrn't "scientific" even by their own admission.

It remains to be seen whether restrictions on indoor worship services -- in many cases, forbidding indoor gatherings entirely, or limiting them to very small numbers -- that were seen as at least tolerable over the summer will continue into the late fall and winter. Legal redress may be ineffetive if weather curtails any in-person worship before the authorities can be prevailed upon to relax their restrictions.