Catholic League president Bill Donohue directs his comments at an editorial in today’s New York Times:
If someone were nominated to serve in a major legal position in a Republican administration who previously tried to take away the tax exempt status of Islamic mosques and institutions—for purely political reasons—everyone knows that he or she would never be given a hearing.
So why is Dawn Johnsen’s nomination to head the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel still being considered? She tried in the late 1980s to take away the tax exempt status of the Roman Catholic Church, all because she wanted to silence the Church’s voice on abortion. Yet the New York Times audaciously asserts today that the “baseless objections” and “baseless concerns” of her critics should be ignored.
Since when are objections to proven instances of bigotry considered “baseless”? Would it be “baseless” to object to someone who wants to deny Muslims the same tax exempt status afforded Catholics, Protestants, Jews and others? Would not such a person be branded a bigot who is unfit to serve in any administration, especially in a high post in the Justice Department? If the answer is obvious, then why is her nomination even alive?
