In its brief with the court (pdf), Catholic Answers argues that, in seeking to establish the legality of the group’s claim to tax-exempt status, the IRS has forced the group to continue to refile refund claims for years, effectively postponing a decision in the matter and thereby “chilling speech.”

Tax-exempt nonprofit groups such as churches are barred from performing express political candidate advocacy. They can take up political issues, however, and in championing charged issues like abortion, for example, the line separating advocacy for an anti-abortion position and the Republican Party generally has become thinner and thinner.

Catholic Answers calls itself an “apostolate,” by which it means it is carrying on its educational and evangelical mission with the Church’s blessing, although none of its members are ordained. Established in 1979, the group produces books, magazines, videos and a daily radio show on Church teachings and Church positions on issues of the day.

The group is being represented in its case against the IRS by high-profile religious-right attorney James Bopp, a reported adviser to presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Bopp advised Citizens United in its now-famous campaign finance case. He also defended the national anti-abortion organization Susan B Anthony List in a defamation suit filed by former Congressman Steve Driehaus. Bopp has also served as general counsel for National Right to Life and as special counsel for Focus on the Family.

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Robert Jeffress

Pastor Robert Jeffress of the Dallas-based First Baptist Church made his endorsement known over the weekend at the Values Voter Summit, where he drew direct ire from some for saying his support for Perry was based upon the candidate’s Christianity and implying that former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney isn’t a Christian due to his Mormon faith.

At issue for Americans United isn’t the personal endorsement, but the fact that Jeffress has used the church’s tax-exempt status to spread his message about Perry. The group has asked the Internal Revenue Service to investigate.

“Pastor Jeffress is trying to do an end-run around the law,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United. “The IRS should put a stop to it.”

Jeffress has posted his introduction of Perry at the Summit, where he made the initial endorsement, and an interview appearances on MSNBC, where he reiterated his support. The website also contains a line of text: “The posting of video clips and media acounts of Dr. Robert Jeffress’ recent media appearances does not constitute First Baptist Dallas’ endorsement of any political candidate. As Dr. Jeffress has noted in multiple interviews, his political views and endorsements do not represent the church, but him personally.”

Americans United believes such language does not save the church from IRS scrutiny.

“In fact, the Internal Revenue Service has never said that disclaimers like this ameliorate candidate endorsements or make this permissable,” Lynn wrote to the agency.

Lynn pointed out that an IRS publication called “Election Year Activities and the Prohibition on Political Campaign Intervention for Section 501(c)(3) Organizations” warns churches and other nonprofits to be careful about what they post on their websites. The IRS states, “A web site is a form of communication. If an organization posts something on its web site that favors or opposes a candidate for public office, the organization will be treated the same as if it distributed printed material, oral statements or broadcasts that favored or opposed a candidate.”

This isn’t Jeffress’ first brush with this issue. In 1998, while serving as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Wichita Falls, Texas, Jeffress checked out two books with gay themes from the local public library and refused to return them. He then urged members of his congregation to vote against city council members if they refused to ban the books. A local newspaper reported that Jeffress challenged his congregation to “vote out the infidels who would deny God and his word.”

As Minnesota Pastor Brad Brandon noted on his radio program last Friday, since his October 2010 endorsements of a slate of Republican candidates including U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and gubernatorial candidate Tom Emmer, he hasn’t received a thing.

“You’d have to be living under rock if you didn’t know back in October of 2010, I chose to endorse candidates from behind my pulpit,” Brandon said. “Everywhere I go people ask me, ‘What happened?’”

“Are you ready for what happened? I’m going to explain to you what happened.” Brandon played a few seconds dead radio air. “That’s exactly what happened. Nothing happened.”

“So far the IRS has done absolutely nothing. What does that prove? That this is nothing more than an intimidation factor by the goverment to try to control the pulpit, to control the church.”

He added, “They know that if this were ever to go to the Supreme Court it would be shot down.”

Our sister site, The Minnesota Independent, first reported on Brandon’s endorsements in 2010 and that reporting generated a complaint to the IRS by Americans United for the Separation of Church and State.

As Brandon notes, the complaint appears to have gone nowhere.

Rob Boston of Americans United told the Minnesota Independent that the reason why the IRS hasn’t been effectively enforcing the law is “complex.”

“A few years ago, the IRS moved to audit a church in Minnesota that had endorsed Michele Bachmann,” he said. “The church sued, claiming that the IRS had not followed its own procedures for auditing churches. The church won the case when a federal court ruled that the IRS official who approved the audit was not of sufficient rank.”

The Independent’s reporting on Pastor Mac Hammond’s endorsement of Bachmann, as well as a financial set-up within the church that came under heavy scrutiny, generated that IRS investigation back in 2007. The IRS lost its case because the law limits how the agency can investigate churches and it had not followed its own rules.

“Subsequently, the IRS announced that it would revise its policies for church audits,” Boston said. “As far as we know, this process is ongoing. So, if there has been a pause in enforcement, it’s just that – a temporary pause.”

Even if the IRS isn’t currently going after churches that break tax laws, it still advises churches not to break the law.

“The IRS website continues to contain material warning churches (and other non-profits) against partisan politicking, and no change in policy has been announced,” Boston said.

Other churches continue to break the law every year and skate by with little to no consequences. Warroad Christian Church in northern Minnesota has been endorsing Republicans over the last few years.

The IRS dropped its investigation of that church after the Hammond court decision.

The church decided to endorse again this year as part of a broader movement called Pulpit Freedom Sunday. The Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian legal group, encourages churches to endorse from the pulpit each October. This year the movement picked up 539 churches around the country.

In Minnesota, five churches participated in Pulpit Sunday. Aside from Warroad, Faith Baptist Church in Brainerd, Hill City Baptist in Hill City, Landmark Baptist Church in Red Wing and South Troy Wesleyan Church in Zumbro Falls also announced they were endorsing candidates.

A Department of Labor press release adds that “signatory states are Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Utah and Washington. Secretary Solis also announced agreements for the Wage and Hour Division to enter into memorandums of understanding with the state labor agencies of Hawaii, Illinois and Montana, as well as with New York’s attorney general.”

The Miami Herald reports that “the information will help Labor officials target businesses that improperly label workers as independent contractors or as non-employees to deprive workers of minimum wage and overtime pay. Misclassifying workers also lets companies avoid paying workers compensation, unemployment insurance and federal taxes.”

The Herald adds  that the Department of Labor “has focused on industries where so-called ‘wage theft’ is considered a problem, including the hotel, restaurant, janitorial, health care and day care industries,” adding that “last month, the agency began targeting large U.S. homebuilders to see if they failed to pay workers the minimum wage or overtime.”

The Florida Independent reported late last month that at least 50 construction workers who had worked 10 hours or more a day on a Broward County affordable housing project had not received their wages for anywhere from three weeks to two months. The general contractor and two companies involved in the project said it was not their responsibility to pay the workers.

Cynthia Hernandez, a research associate at the Research Institute on Social and Economic Policy at Florida International University, has extensively studied wage theft wrote in an email to the Independent that practices like those alleged by the Sunrise workers is “very common”:

Small contractors to even large corporations like Wal-Mart and Toys-R-Us have used this method to not pay employees. It happens a lot in construction because there are so many different levels of contractors and subs, which make it even harder for the worker to identify ultimately who is responsible for their pay. I have even heard of sub-contractors (employers) who have been stiffed out of their cut by contractors and as a result, have been late or unable to pay their employees. Until we can actually get some enforcement, this will continue to happen.

After workers reported the situation to the Independent and sought legal help, about 60 men, after weeks of being stiffed out of their wages, were paid with checks issued by Florida Shell Construction at the worksite.

McCollum, along with 74 members of Congress, signed a letter that says the agency has a responsibility to provide information for same-sex couples, who encounter complicated tax statuses because of inconsistencies in tax law between the states and federal government.

Same-sex couples who have legal relationships in at least 15 states through marriage, civil unions and domestic partnerships aren’t recognized by the federal government because of the Defense of Marriage Act. That makes filing taxes much more complicated for those couples.

In fact, in some states, the IRS is inaccurately penalizing same-sex couples. In Nevada, Washington and California, which have community property deduction laws, the IRS has improperly assessed fines against couples who claim that deduction, because the IRS systems don’t recognize what would otherwise be a legal deduction.

“The LGBT community still faces discrimination in this country and that is unacceptable. In this case, it’s even more disturbing when this discrimination comes from our federal government,” McCollum said in a statement Friday. “The IRS has the ability to provide federal tax guidance to same-sex couples, and it should have done so years ago. The LGBT community deserves to be treated fairly and equally by the U.S. government not only for federal tax purposes but in any other situation.”

The letter presses the IRS to come up with a set of guidelines to aid same-sex couples in filing their taxes.

“The IRS has the ability to provide specific guidance to ease the complexity and uncertainty surrounding these couples,” the letter states. “While full equality cannot be achieved without repealing DOMA, this guidance will provide significant relief to hundreds of thousands of taxpayers, and save critical resources by avoiding unnecessary audits and inappropriate enforcement actions.”

McCollum Ellison letter on LGBT taxes –

Groups and key delegates of Maryland’s General Assembly that are against marriage equality have targeted churches, especially those in African-American communities, with the hope of rallying against the bill ahead of the 2012 legislative session, when the General Assembly will resume consideration of legislation that failed to come to a vote in 2011.

The IRS is firm on rules preventing churches from endorsing specific candidates during elections. But when it comes to promoting legislation, the law reads much more loosely. In essence, religious leaders are at liberty to preach from the pulpit in favor or in opposition to political issues and upcoming legislation so long as specific candidates are not endorsed.

Ira C. Lupu, professor of law at George Washington University Law School, said the law is written to ensure limitations and fairness among organizations with tax-exempt status, like churches.

“The idea is there are limitations,” Lupu told TAI. “If I want to stop Barack Obama, and I donate money, [my contribution should not be] tax-deductible. It would give [tax-exempt groups] an unfair advantage.”

But with social-issue legislation, it’s different. Lupu said that even among lawyers and law students, tax law on this issue can appear tricky, so he tries to make it simple: “Churches cannot use their resources to urge to vote for or against a particular candidate,” Lupu said. “Churches can encourage members from the pulpit to take a stand [on an issue].”

A gray area emerges, he said, if the line between endorsing a piece of legislation and endorsing a candidate pushing that particular issue is muddied. Another questionable area involving churches’ legislative activity has to do with raising money for legislative campaigns.

If a church spends a large sum of money on a referendum campaign, it can begin to dip into violation territory, said Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State (AUSCS), a Washington, D.C.-based organization dedicated to preserving the U.S. Constitution’s religious liberty provisions.

“In general the tax laws do allow participation in referendum campaigns,” said Lynn, an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, who lives in Chevy Chase, Md. “Where a religious organization will run afoul [of the law] is if they use a ‘substantial’ amount of their overall budget.”

The word “substantial” is what the IRS uses in its tax code, a word that Lynn pointed out is not very clear. The way for tax-exempt organizations to avoid potentially violating the law is to set a limit, Lynn said, noting that AUSCS, a tax-exempt organization, only dedicates 20 percent of its budget expenses to lobbying.

Another way churches could potentially violate IRS law, Lynn said, is by selling lists of church members’ contact information to campaign committees or legislators. However, gathering the lists and giving them away is not illegal, he said, though church members might not appreciate it.

IRS spokesman Anthony Burke told TAI the law is clear. During every election cycle, the IRS puts out a press release about political activity tax-exempt organizations, which states:

Organizations other than churches and private foundations may elect the expenditure test under section 501(h) as an alternative method for measuring lobbying activity. Under the expenditure test, the extent of an organization’s lobbying activity will not jeopardize its tax-exempt status, provided its expenditures, related to such activity, do not normally exceed an amount specified in section 4911. This limit is generally based upon the size of the organization and may not exceed $1,000,000, as indicated in the table below.

However, the IRS is not clear on the lobbying rule as it relates to churches.

Even though preaching policy at the pulpit is usually legal, Lynn said he does not agree with the practice.

“I wish churches didn’t spend any money on [political activity],” he told TAI. “There is a fundamental misunderstanding on how laws are made in this country.”

In the case of same-sex marriage, Lynn said the bulk of the arguments against are based on religion, hence much of the support and lobbying comes from religious organizations.

“Historically [the argument against gay marriage] is always rooted in the interpretation of Christian biblical principle.” Lynn said. “But we don’t make laws based on our understanding on biblical principle. Martin Luther King, Jr., never endorsed a candidate from the pulpit.”

Peter LaBarbera’s Americans for Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) last week launched a campaign to prevent gay men from donating blood. Keep the Gay Blood Ban (KGB²) was sparked, LaBarbera says, because of “renewed lobby efforts to open up the U.S. blood supply to homosexuality-practicing men.”

Since 1983*, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has banned blood donations frommen who have ever had sex with men and women who have ever had sex with men who have had sex with men. In 2010, 40 members of Congress called on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to lift the ban on gay men donating blood. However, LaBarbera only mentioned Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.), “who represents the homosexual Boystown neighborhood in Chicago,” in hisKGB² launch article on AFTAH’s website.

Last year, the Advisory Committee on Blood Safety & Availability for HHS recommended the ban not be lifted, due to lack of sufficient data to support revising the policy. The committee did, however, recommend further research into a possible ban lift, at least for “low-risk” gay and bisexual men. And just last month HHS announced that following the studies’ completion, a comprehensive evidence-based policy evaluation will begin.

In Kerry’s original letter to the committee, he was joined by medical experts at the American Red Cross, America’s Blood Centers and the American Medical Association in the position that the current blood donor policy (PDF) is discriminatory and “medically and scientifically unwarranted,” pointing out that heterosexual individuals who engage in risky sexual behavior are not subjected to a lifetime ban as gay men are. For example, heterosexual individuals who have had sex with HIV-positive individuals are only banned for a one-year period, as are heterosexual individuals who have had sex for money.

“Sadly, Sen. Kerry and others crusading against the homosexual blood ban do so on the basis that the ban is mainly about ‘anti-gay discrimination’ rather than preserving public health,” LaBarbera wrote in the article.

The thrust of LaBarbera’s call to continue banning gay men from donating blood is apubic health flier about anal sex between men (PDF) produced by Asian Health Services and funded by the California AIDS Clearinghouse.

The flier -– which graphically describes various sex practices and positions, accompanied by images of LEGO-style men demonstrating such positions — discusses health risks of oral, anal and oral-anal sex between men and speaks to the importance of using a condom to prevent the spread of disease.

LaBarbera implies that the transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases is common for all gay men, quoting from the flier: “Anal sex is the riskiest sexual activity for getting/spreading HIV.” He does not, however, quote the rest of that paragraph: “That risk goes up if you have more sex partners, if you f*** without a condom or if you have sex with someone who has HIV.”

LaBarbera writes:

[F]ew seem interested in investigating – much less restricting – the actual high-risk homosexual practices and deviant behaviors depicted and described in this (pro-‘gay’) flier, which crassly helps explain the immense heath [sic] risks of male homosexuality We excerpt this flier – vulgar slang references and all – to help educate the public as to how this lifestyle is so dangerous that men who practice it must be kept from the nation’s blood supply.

LaBarbera asks readers to contact their U.S. senators and representatives and ask them “to put the safety of Americans – and a pristine blood supply – ahead of the demands of the selfish Homosexuality Lobby.” He also wants congressional leaders to launch an investigation “into the health hazards of homosexual behaviors (just as the government studied the dangers of smoking).”

AFTAH defines itself as “a group dedicated to exposing the homosexual activist agenda.” Its nonprofit status was recently revoked by the Internal Revenue Service for failure to comply with IRS nonprofit filing requirements.

The Southern Poverty Law Center still defines AFTAH as a hate group (among 29 others in the Illinois, where the organization is based).

*Correction: TAI previously reported that the FDA banned gay men from donating blood, for a lifetime, in 1977. In fact, this policy on “men who have sex with other men” began in 1983; 1977 — deemed the beginning of the AIDS epidemic in the U.S. — is the cutoff year for “men who have sex with other men.” In other words, men who stopped having sex with other men before 1977 can donate blood. We regret the error.

The NOM rallies — in Manhattan, Albany, Rochester and Buffalo — were held simultaneously and live-streamed on NOM’s new website, which offers many different opportunities to donate money. Rather than consider defeat in what they have dubbed a “war on marriage,” NOM has instead pledged to overturn the state’s decision by attempting to pass a ballot measure amending the state constitution to restrict marriage to straight couples.

What happened on Sunday, and will continue to happen as more same-sex couples receive marriage licenses, has given marriage-equality advocates all over the country confidence that — if NOM is right and the marriage issue is a war -– they are on the winning side.

But NOM is pushing forward with its “let the people vote” plan, which should prove to be a lengthy endeavor given the earliest date such a proposal could go on the ballot is four years from now. Human Rights Campaign spokesperson Kevin Nix recently told The American Independent that NOM’s four-year plan will likely be difficult to pull off.

“Time is NOM’s enemy,” Nix said in an email. “A bipartisan supermajority of New Yorkers support marriage equality today. Four years from now … this supermajority will only be stronger and more bipartisan. New Yorkers – and all Americans – move in one direction on this issue – toward equality, not away from it. The ship has sailed.”

Even so, NOM has said it would commit $2 million in New York, specifically to defeat the four Republican and three Democratic state senators who voted to legalize same-sex marriage in June after voting to ban it in 2009. On July 19, NOM announced it is spending $150,000 on mailers to send to the districts of those New York senators who “betrayed voters on marriage.” And this weekend the organization rolled out a newfundraising campaign made possible by one “generous donor.” Actually, it’s a challenge: Every time someone Facebook “Likes,” Twitter “Follows” or sends a text message about something on NOM’s website between now and Sept. 1, NOM will earn $1, up to $100,000, from this anonymous donor.

For its other anti-gay-marriage efforts in state legislatures and nationally, the Associated Press recently reported that NOM has pledged to spend $20 million by the end of the year.

In an email, NOM chairman of the board Maggie Gallagher told TAI that her organization is on target to raise at least $15 million by the end of fiscal year 2011, and possibly $20 million. She said NOM raised and spent $13 million in 2010.

“Our fundraising target evolve as our needs evolve, which is partly a result of our goals, and partly what we need to respond to pro-SSM [same-sex marriage] goals,” Gallagher said.

NOM’s massive growth

If NOM meets its $20 million target, that means in four years, the organization, whose stated goal is to ban gay marriage in every state where the issue comes up, will have grown by 3,900 percent. From a single donor in 2007, NOM has since acquired more than 50,000 donors, Gallagher told TAI.

“It’s been fairly rapid growth,” she said.

NOM’s first fiscal year began June 1, 2007, and ended Dec. 31, 2007, with $518,667 in total revenue and $472,840 in total expenses, according to the group’s exempt organization business income tax return from 2007 (PDF), provided on NOM’swebsite. Gallagher told TAI that they began the year with only one donor.

NOM began with eight officers, only two of whom were paid: then-Executive Director/now-President Brian Brown ($57,292) and then-President/now-Chairman of the Board Maggie Gallagher ($8,333).

In fiscal year 2008, NOM reported $2.97 million in revenue, a 529 percent increase, according to the group’s 2008 tax return (PDF). The officers remained the same, but this time, secretary treasurer Neil Corkery made it to the payroll, earning $24,000, and the two highest-ranking officials got pay bumps –- Brown earned $130,208; Gallagher $26,875.

In fiscal year 2009, NOM’s revenue rose to $7.4 million, according to its 2009 tax return, the most recent that is available to the public. NOM’s expenses were reported to be $7.5 million. All paid officers got a raise: Corkery made double, $48,000; Gallagher earned $92,500, more than three times her salary in 2008. Brown earned $154,167.

To supporters who subscribed to NOM’s email list throughout 2008 and 2009, Brown -– and sometimes Gallagher –- regularly emailed solicitation for donations, asking for small amounts of money (“Can you give $50, $500, or even $5,000 to support marriage? Can you afford to pledge even $1 a month to support marriage?”) and emphasizing the importance of grassroots fundraising.

“NOM is a grassroots organization that depends on the contributions of thousands of ordinary Americans to make our voices and values heard,” Brown wrote in an email dated Aug. 7, 2009, adding that at that time, the group’s donors had grown from 8,000 to 30,000.

However, as The American Independent has reported in the past, the NOM has historically received most of its funding from a few large donors. And the amount of individual high-dollar donations has increased from year to year.

From 2007 (PDF) to 2008 (PDF), NOM reported receiving $471,549 and $2,967,495, respectively, in “gifts, grants, contributions, and membership fees.”

According to the list of donations at or above $5,000 provided in the 2007 tax return, NOM reported receiving $492,500 from 15 people. The average donation was approximately $32,800. The median donation was $20,000.

In 2008, NOM reported receiving $2,161,000 from 52 donors. The average donation was $40,000. One single donation was $450,000. These large donations represent approximately 73 percent of NOM’s “gifts, grants, contributions, and membership fees” in 2008.

In 2009, even larger contributions came from even fewer sources. NOM reported receiving approximately $7.1 million in donations that year. Only 14 individuals donated amounts at or above $5,000 for a total of approximately $5.5 million, representing about 78 percent of the total donations. The average of these donations was nearly $40,000. Approximately 68 percent of all the donations from NOM’s supposed 30,000 donors in 2009 came from just three individual groups, in the amounts of $1.1 million, $1.2 million, and $2.5 million.

“AT NOM we are 500,000 people who believe in standing up straight and tall together for God’s truth about marriage in Maine and all across this great country,” wrote Brown in an email to subscribers dated Aug. 26, 2009.

Due to recent rulings that NOM must disclose its big-name sources, in recent campaign emails, Brown has not promised donors anonymity but has pushed the group’s self-appointed grassroots identity. In an email dated July 14, 2011, Brown solicited donations to reverse New York’s recent same-sex marriage legalization:

“I am asking you today to fight back against those who want to decriminalize polygamy, penalize conscience, normalize infidelity, and reward lying,” he wrote. “Please be one of the 100 who contribute $10, the ten who contribute $100—or give more for marriage today!

The National Cannabis Industry Association (NCIA) has filed its first lobbying disclosure forms, registering $5,000 in lobbying expenses since it officially began operations in January. While that number is just a fraction of what pro-marijuana groups like Americans for Safe Access ($410,000 since 2006) and the Marijuana Policy Project ($995,000 since 2002) have spent, NCIA is a far younger group. More significantly, it is the only group in existence dedicated strictly to lobbying for the medical marijuana industry.

As The American Independent has previously reported, Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.) intends to soon unveil a bill that will prevent banks from denying access to medical marijuana dispensaries. Currently, U.S. Treasury Department initiatives to have banks report dispensary financials and cut off service outright have led many medical marijuana dispensaries in states where they are legal to lose banking privileges.

Meanwhile, according to The Hill, Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) is working with the NCIA on a bill that would resolve the clause in the U.S. Tax Code that has allowed the IRS to aggressively audit dozens of medical marijuana dispensaries across the U.S. Section 280-E of the tax code prevents businesses involved in the trafficking of controlled substances from deducting expenses. Critics of the IRS’s actions have argued that the provision was designed for cocaine kingpins and was never intended to apply to state-legal medical marijuana. The NCIA expects Stark to introduce the bill in the next few weeks.

Marijuana advocates like NORML director Allen St. Pierre have been pessimistic about the chances of even ostensibly innocuous bills like Polis’ banking provision and tax code alteration. While marijuana law reform and protection of state medical marijuana providers have enjoyed some degree of bipartisan support in Congress, truly widespread backing in the House and Senate has so far been elusive.

Senate Bill 1282 will create a statue explicitly allowing any religious assembly or institution to speak out on political issues without having to register as a political action campaign, provided the organization “does not spend a substantial amount of time or assets, within the meaning of section 501 (c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, on influencing any federal state or local legislation, referendum, initiative or constitutional amendment. ”

The content of the bill is pretty sparse, opening up a broad interpretation for “substantial amount.”

Regarding federal tax-exempt rules, the IRS states:

Under the Internal Revenue Code, all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office. Contributions to political campaign funds or public statements of position (verbal or written) made on behalf of the organization in favor of or in opposition to any candidate for public office clearly violate the prohibition against political campaign activity.  Violating this prohibition may result in denial or revocation of tax-exempt status and the imposition of certain excise taxes.

Certain activities or expenditures may not be prohibited depending on the facts and circumstances.  For example, certain voter education activities (including presenting public forums and publishing voter education guides) conducted in a non-partisan manner do not constitute prohibited political campaign activity. In addition, other activities intended to encourage people to participate in the electoral process, such as voter registration and get-out-the-vote drives, would not be prohibited political campaign activity if conducted in a non-partisan manner.

The Center for Arizona Policy, which helped craft the bill’s language along with Senate sponsor Steve Yarbrough, has posited this bill as free-speech legislation. In its fact sheet on the proposed law, the group lists the following talking points:

• The First Amendment protects the rights of churches and religious leaders to speak out on public issues. This bill simply clarifies that campaign finance laws do not apply to speech by churches on issues of public importance that are being considered as ballot measures.
• Churches have the right to speak about the critical issues of our time. This bill protects that right by bringing Arizona into compliance with the Ninth Circuit court ruling.
• This bill protects churches from government intrusion into their religious practices and message. Government officials should not be monitoring a pastor’s religious speech from the pulpit to determine whether it is “too political.” This is excessive entanglement of the government with religion and is not constitutionally permissible.

Brewer also signed the following bills Monday:

SB 1169 – Clarifies that the board of nursing cannot allow nurse practitioners to perform surgical abortions.

SB 1188 – Requires marital status “to be considered” in adoption placements — establishing a preference for children to be adopted by a married man and woman, “when all relevant factors are equal.”

Other CAP-supported bills waiting for Brewer’s signature include:

• SB 1030 – Clarifies that physician assistants cannot prescribe medication intended to induce abortion.
• SB 1472 & 1482 – Requires online publication a judge’s biography and rulings on constitutional issues in judicial-retention elections