Catholic League president reacts to push to nix tax-exempt status: We will not be deterred
The president of a prominent Catholic advocacy group is striking back at an atheist legal organization that has called for the IRS to remove its tax-exempt status.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation filed a formal complaint against The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, best known as the Catholic League, over social media posts about the 2024 presidential election.
“The Catholic League is blatantly and gleefully flouting tax-exemption regulations,” said FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor in a statement on Tuesday. “The IRS should sanction it at once.”
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On Friday, Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, vehemently pushed back against the allegation that he has violated IRS regulations. Labeling FFRF as a “hate group,” Donohue contended in a statement on Friday that the FFRF “provides not a single instance whereby we violated any IRS structure — it simply repeats my criticisms of [Vice President Kamala] Harris.”
Donohue added: “That is not only my First Amendment right, it does not run afoul of IRS rules. For more than 30 years, there have been many attempts made to hound me from public life. Some have gotten to the point where I have had to contact law enforcement, at the federal and local level, and bodyguards. This latest effort — the militant atheists would like to take away the Catholic League’s tax-exempt status — will fail just like the rest of them.”
“We will continue to publicly hammer anti-Catholic bigots,” he said. “We will be deterred by no one.”
In a letter to the IRS on Monday, FFRF Staff Attorney Chris Line insisted that the Catholic League is violating IRS regulations for nonprofit organizations by posting such content.
“The Internal Revenue Code states that to retain its 501(c)(3) status an organization cannot ‘participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distributing of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office,’” Line wrote. “In this instance, the Catholic League has breached the responsibilities of its tax exempt status by openly opposing one candidate for elected office, while defending a candidate on the opposing ticket.”
FFRF cited three posts as examples of what it characterizes as violations of the Catholic League’s tax-exempt status, including a July 24 post written by Donohue declaring that “KAMALA HARRIS IS NOT RELIGION-FRIENDLY.” Donohue further warned that “Harris’ record on life, marriage, gender ideology and religion are deeply troubling,” He encouraged Catholics to “consider the positions” the Democrat nominee has taken “on several issues of interest to Catholics.”
Donohue specifically expressed concern about Harris’ positions on abortion, actions taken as attorney general of California seen as hostile toward the pro-life movement, support for same-sex marriage, opposition to the Florida bill that prohibited school officials from talking about matters related to sexual orientation and gender identity with students in kindergarten through third grade, and her line of questioning directed at a Catholic judicial nominee due to his membership in the Knights of Columbus.
He also pointed to Harris' support for men competing in women’s sports and support for a measure that would have stripped religious liberty protections for Catholic hospitals that opposed performing abortions or body-mutilating sex-change surgeries as other examples of what he characterized as Harris’ hostility toward religion.
Two previous posts by Donohue, a July 23 article titled “Spinning DEI for Kamala” and a July 22 piece about Sen. J.D. Vance, the Republican video presidential nominee, titled “Vance’s Catholicism Under Fire,” were also cited by FFRF as examples of the Catholic League “attempting to take a position in the presidential election, in violation of IRS regulations.”
The Catholic League describes itself as an organization that “hits the newspapers, television, and radio talk shows defending the right of the [Catholic] Church to promote its teachings with as much verve as any other institution in society” in response to “slanderous assaults” against the Catholics and acts “as a watchdog agency and defender of the civil rights of all Catholics” and “the religious freedom rights of any American.”
FFRF identifies its mission as to “promote the constitutional principle of separation of state and church, and to educate the public on matters relating to nontheism.”
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
