The Supreme Court on Queer Rights: A Checkered Future

In June 2023, six out of nine Supreme Court justices ruled in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis that a Colorado graphic designer could legally discriminate against same-sex couples by refusing to make websites for their weddings. The case expands the narrower precedent of Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, a 2018 decision which ruled that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission could not compel a bakery to sell a wedding cake to a same-sex couple. Both rulings used the First Amendment’s provision for religious freedom as a bludgeon against the LGBTQ+ community’s right to access to public life.