Iowa jail chief fired for online posts targeting Muslims, LGBT community asks federal court to revive civil suit

(CN) — A former Iowa jail administrator fired for his Christian commentaries posted online, which condemn Muslims and LGBTQ+ people, asked a federal appeals court Tuesday to reverse a trial court’s dismissal of his claim that his firing violated his civil rights.

At issue in the appeal before the St. Louis-based Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals is whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act protects Dean Naylor from being fired for expressing his religious views in posts that said, among other things, “Muslims are at war with Christians and Jews” and that “public and governmental acceptance of the gay lifestyle which is an abomination that according to scripture even defiles the land has caused great harm on our nation.”

Naylor argues that the law guards him from adverse employment actions based on expression of his religious views outside the workplace.

The county argues Naylor’s online posts amounted to hate speech that damaged public perception of the jail’s ability to fairly treat minority prisoners and threatened contracts with neighboring counties and the U.S. Marshall’s service to house prisoners, which make up as much as 80% of the jail’s budget.

U.S. District Judge Rebecca Goodgame Ebinger, a Barack Obama appointee, granted summary judgment to the county in 2023. Naylor appealed to the Eighth Circuit.

Emily Mimnaugh, of the Reno, Nevada-based Pacific Justice Institute, who represents Naylor, told the Eighth Circuit judges Tuesday that the effect of the lower court’s decision is that “Title VII protects all aspects of religious observance and practice of one’s belief unless that belief is too unpopular or offensive."

“Such a proposition turns Title VII on its head,” Mimnaugh said.

With regard to the county’s concerns about the jail’s public image, U.S. Circuit Judge Jane Kelly said, the county’s concern was that “we can’t have a leader of a governmental agency or office that has views so negative of folks they serve."

The Obama-appointed judge posed a hypothetical: “Let’s say it was the Social Security Administration,” which deals with people with disabilities, and “leadership makes vitriolic public statements about folks with disabilities.”

Mimnaugh said in response that “the harm also falls squarely on Mr. Naylor’s religious beliefs” and he has “a track record over a decade that shows he never discriminated against any individual.”

Senior U.S. Circuit Judge Morris Arnold, a George H.W. Bush appointee, wanted to know “the probability of consequences” of Naylor’s statements in terms of other counties withdrawing inmates, and whether it was mere speculation.

In response, attorney Kacy Flaherty-Tarpey of Dentons Davis Brown in Des Moines, who represents Muscatine County, said Johnson County officials said in a letter to Muscatine County that Naylor “should not continue as jail administrator or we will pull our inmates from the jail.”

In a brief filed with the appeals court, Naylor argues, “Title VII does not permit termination of a public employee if his religious beliefs become sufficiently unpopular with certain political bodies and some members the public.”

He argues he established a prima facie case that his rights under the Civil Rights Act were violated by the county, saying his online commentaries “constituted religious belief and practice, as protected under Title VII,” and he was fired for expressing his views. The county lacked proof of actual harms it relied on, he says, such as public perception of unfair treatment of prisoners, and any loss of outside contracts is just speculation.

The county argues in its reply brief that Title VII does not protect expression of personal beliefs that are “essentially political, sociological, philosophical or merely personal moral code[s]”, quoting from a 2023 Arkansas federal district court decision.

“Naylor’s violent rhetoric targeting minority groups is hate speech that can only be categorized as a social, political, or philosophical belief,” the county argues.

In addition to Kelly and Arnold, U.S. Circuit Judge James Loken, another Bush appointee, sat on Tuesday’s panel. The court did not say when a ruling would be issued.

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