Masterpiece Cakeshop is again under fire, now the subject of a third discrimination lawsuit alleging that owner Jack Phillips “discriminated” against a customer by refusing to make a cake for an unspecified event.
Phillips, of course, won at the United States Supreme Court after suing a Colorado “human rights” commission that punished him for refusing to provide a wedding cake for a same-sex wedding in Denver, a task Phillips said violated his religious conviction that true marriage is between one man and one woman. Phillips offered to sell the couple a pre-made cake or refer them to another baker — solutions that would have allowed Phillips to avoid material participation in the same-sex wedding — but the couple wasn’t satisfied and leveled a complaint with Colorado authorities.
Ultimately, in a decisive Supreme Court victory, Phillips won against the Colorado human rights commission, but the victory hinged on the behavior of the commission itself, which SCOTUS found to be harassing and discriminatory. The Supreme Court refused to issue a verdict on whether the First Amendment’s free exercise clause protects Christians from being forced to participate in same-sex weddings — or any event or action that violates their right of conscience.
But, intent on punishing Phillips for his “crimes,” leftists have hit the baker twice with lawsuits alleging further “discrimination,” once the day of the Supreme Court verdict — that was tossed out — and again last week, according to CBS’s Denver affiliate.
“The latest lawsuit was filed Wednesday in Denver District Court on behalf of Autumn Scardina by attorneys Paula Greisen and John McHugh,” the outlet reports.
Scardina is the same woman who filed the previous lawsuit alleging discrimination after Masterpiece Cakeshop denied her request — made the day Phillips won his case — for a cake celebrating her gender transition. Reports on this newest lawsuit are vague on the theme of the pastry in question — they have said, so far, only that Scardina requested a “birthday cake” — but previous filings indicate that Scardina has gone out of her way on several occasions to request cakes Masterpiece Cakeshop clearly will not make.
Newsweek reports that the baked goods at the center of Scardina’s previous complaints to Colorado authorities included a “cake to celebrate Satan’s birthday,” with “cheesecake frosting” that would feature “a large figure of Satan, licking a 9” black Dildo…an actual working model, that can be turned on before we unveil the cake.”
Phillips said then that he believes Scardina regularly requests objectionable cakes from his bakery, including cakes with pentagrams and upside-down crosses.
Scardina’s previous lawsuit, based on claims Phillips made during the original same-sex wedding cake litigation that he would make “any” cake for an LGBT customer except for a wedding cake, was dropped back in September of last year, after Phillips agreed to drop his own discrimination case against the state of Colorado, according to Colorado Public Radio.
But Scardina, apparently, felt no need to give up.
“A new lawsuit has been filed against Masterpiece Cakeshop that appears to largely rehash old claims. The State of Colorado abandoned similar ones just a few months ago. So this latest attack by Autumn Scardina looks like yet another desperate attempt to harass cake artist Jack Phillips. And it stumbles over the one detail that matters most: Jack serves everyone; he just cannot express all messages through his custom cakes,” Phillips’ attorney said in a statement Monday.
This latest lawsuit bypasses the state of Colorado and requests a trial by jury instead.