OKLAHOMA CITY (BP) – Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond has filed a lawsuit to block the nation’s first state-sponsored religious charter school, St. Isidore Catholic Virtual School preparing to open in 2024.
Drummond filed suit Oct. 20 in the Oklahoma State Supreme Court against the Statewide Virtual Charge School Board, which approved the school in June. The board signed a contract Oct. 9 with the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City to sponsor the school, which will teach and stand on Catholic doctrine.
Drummond presented his case as his “duty … to protect religious liberty and prevent the type of state-funded religion that Oklahoma’s constitutional framers and the founders of our country sought to prevent,” according to the lawsuit filed in court. “Make no mistake, if the Catholic Church were permitted to have a public virtual charter school, a reckoning will follow in which this State will be faced with the unprecedented quandary of processing requests to directly fund all petitioning sectarian groups.”
Drummond believes the board’s decision “will pave the way for a proliferation of the direct public funding of religious schools whose tenets are diametrically opposed by most Oklahomans.”
Drummond, a Republican, is on the opposing side of Gov. Kevin Stitt, also Republican, who considers the school a victory for religious freedom.
“Oklahomans support religious liberty for all and support an increasingly innovative educational system that expands choice,” Stitt said after the board approved the school. “Today, with the nation watching, our state showed that we will not stand for religious discrimination.”
Drummond bases his case on the Oklahoma Constitution and the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The school, which would receive state funding, would jeopardize more than a billion dollars the state receives in federal education funding, Drummond said, and goes against a 2016 voter referendum defeating a proposed constitutional amendment to allow public funding for religious entities.
“There is no religious freedom in compelling Oklahomans to fund religions that may violate their own deeply held beliefs,” Drummond said in his lawsuit. “The framers of the U.S. Constitution and those who drafted Oklahoma’s Constitution clearly understood how best to protect religious freedom: by preventing the State from sponsoring any religion at all.”
Drummond advised the board against approving the school shortly after his term began, reversing the recommendation of his predecessor John O’Connor. Drummond’s lawsuit is the second legal challenge to the school.
In August, a group of Oklahoma parents, clergy and public education advocates filed a lawsuit challenging the board’s decision. The Oklahoma Parent Legislative Action Committee (OPLAC), a statewide public education advocacy group, is joined by nine parents, educators and clergy in the suit to block the charter school from receiving public funding.
The plaintiffs, who include Protestants, Catholics, members of the LGBTQ community and parents of children with disabilities, argue that the school would discriminate against non-Catholics, students with disabilities and students who identify as LGBTQ, according to the lawsuit filed July 30 in Oklahoma District Court.
Their case is ongoing.
St. Isidore Catholic Virtual School is gauging interest in the school in preparing to accept applications for its Fall 2024 term.
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