Amazon has banned the Family Research
Council (FRC) from its AmazonSmile charity program.
AmazonSmile allows customers to donate
to the charity of their choice.
According to The
Christian Post, Amazon's decision was based on the Southern
Poverty Law Center's (SPLC) labeling of FRC as a “hate group.”
Writing in The Washington Times,
Kay Coles James, president of The Heritage Foundation, a conservative
group, accused Amazon of singling out “a few well-known
conservative organizations like FRC and ADF from receiving part of
the tens of millions of dollars the program raises each year from
customers.”
The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)
was removed from the program in 2018. ADF is the Arizona-based
Christian conservative legal group best known for its support of
giving businesses the right to refuse service to people who identify
as LGBT.
Both FRC and ADF are vocally opposed to
LGBT rights.
Last year, FRC President Tony Perkins
reiterated his support for the criminalization of gay sex. Responding
to the Trump administration's unveiling of a campaign to end such
laws around the globe, Perkins said that the United States should not
“engage in 'cultural imperialism' by imposing policies that were
imposed upon us by our [Supreme Court] on other countries with
different cultures, traditions, and values.”
In his statement, Perkins denied that
his group supports the return of sodomy laws in the United States.
During a February 2010 interview with
MSNBC host Chris Matthews, FRC's Peter Sprigg was asked whether “gay
behavior” should be illegal. Sprigg answered “yes.”
Perkins himself has called gay sex
“harmful not only to society, but more importantly to the
individuals who engage in that behavior.”
Not only is FRC opposed to same-sex
marriage and LGBT protections, but it also supports therapies that
attempt to alter the sexual orientation or gender identity of LGBT
youth and cheered Trump's decision to prohibit transgender troops
from serving openly.