The same Colorado baker who was recently sued for refusing to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple is back in court after being sued again – this time by a transgender attorney who demanded he bake a cake celebrating the attorney’s “gender transition.”
Attorneys for Jack Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop, say the attorney and the state have specifically targeted Phillips after he won his initial case before the Supreme Court earlier this year, claiming the government is now unfairly punishing Phillips for his Christian faith.
"At this point, he's just a guy who is trying to get back to life. The problem is the state of Colorado won't let him," said Jim Campbell, an attorney for the non-profit firm Alliance Defending Freedom.
But the Colorado Civil Rights Commission has now accused Phillips of discriminating against Denver attorney Autumn Scardina, who demanded Phillips bake a cake that was blue on the outside and pink on the inside to celebrate Scardina’s male-to-female transformation. This is the same commission that the Supreme Court ruled had violated Phillips’ First Amendment rights by targeting him for refusing to make a same-sex wedding cake back in 2015, saying the state had unconstitutionally taken aim at Phillips' religious beliefs.
Scardina reportedly ordered the gender-transition cake the day SCOTUS announced their ruling in favor of Phillips back in June.
Phillips attorneys say that just as he believes marriage is between a man and a woman, their client also "believes as a matter of religious conviction that sex - the status of being male or female - is given by God, is biologically determined, is not determined by perceptions or feelings, and cannot be chosen or changed."
Now, Judge Wiley Daniel has said he’ll allow the current case to proceed through the courts, saying he would “have to hear evidence before deciding whether to temporarily block state proceedings,” according to ABC7 Chicago.