Christian School Says Leftist Tabloid Duped California into Armed Gov't Raid
A Christian boarding school in Northern California recently experienced the ugly, long arm of state law after it was subject to a SWAT-style raid courtesy of information authorities allegedly gathered from a left-leaning tabloid website.
According to the Christian Post, River View Christian Academy — a school that takes in troubled teens from across the country — says it was raided after a leftist tabloid article claimed the school was essentially an apocalyptic compound, complete with stockpiles of illegal narcotics and firearms.
But state authorities found nothing of the sort during the military-style raid on Jan. 18, which involved 16 California Highway Patrol troopers, 17 social workers and two canine units, that the state got a warrant for.
The raid was also conducted to investigate abuse allegations made in a BuzzFeed News report.
The school says that after the raid, it received daily fines for operating an “unlicensed community care facility.”
The school has long argued that they’re exempt from needing to obtain the aforementioned licensing, however, the Community Care Facilities Act of 2016 requires many Californa boarding schools like theirs to be properly licensed.
River View Christian Academy filed a lawsuit in March challenging the constitutionality of the law, according to KRCR. However, the lawsuit was eventually thrown out, based on evidence that not all administrative options to rectify the situation had been exhausted.
But instead of moving on with further administrative action, the California Department of Social Services returned fire, filing a lawsuit against the school and personally targeted the school’s CEO, Phil Ludwig.
“We have been kind of harassed by the state of California Department of Social Services. Specifically, it’s called Community Care Licensing,” Ludwig told the Christian Post.
“And they’re suing me personally, which I thought as a corporation, I would be protected,” Ludwig said. “And so, to me, it’s what they do. And, I get it. This is how they operate. They’re trying to just bully us into submission. And I don’t know how anyone could fight these guys.”
If the school gave in to their demands and obtained said licensing, the school says that it would have to abandon the way it teaches children about marriage and sexuality, based on their Christian belief system.
Making matters worse is that the licensing apparently gives children the right to sexual and spiritual exploration, which is something that a Christian school obviously wouldn’t be comfortable with.
And on top of that, the licensing provides no exemptions for religion-based schools, even if it would go against everything the school believes in and teaches.
If that’s not an example of a state attempting to heavily control education by using newly created laws that give them the power to essentially do whatever they want, I don’t know what is.
Kevin Snider, the lead attorney at the Pacific Justice Institute, a firm that provides pro-bono legal work to entities dealing with religious freedom issues, was stunned at the way DSS targeted the school.
“In 25 years of practice, I have never seen this level of aggressive, militant, and ideologically-driven conduct by a State agency against a religious institution,” Snider said.
“This armed incursion on a faith-based school shows that the State wants nothing less than to take jurisdictional control over Christian education in California.”
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