PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, VA – A new lawsuit was filed last week in an effort to fight against religious discrimination in the medical field. The MinuteClinic recently fired Paige Casey because she chose to exercise her First Amendment rights and honor her religious freedom when it comes to the prescriptions she writes.
What makes the situation even more suspicious and disheartening is that just days prior to her firing, Casey was awarded a raise based on her merit and her hard work within the clinic.
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The MinuteClinic in question is inside of a Manassas CVS and is a part of the nationwide drugstore chain. Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) has taken up the case and is working for Casey in her pursuit of justice after she declined to prescribe abortion-inducing medication.
Casey had been working as a nurse practitioner and following her Catholic faith teachings since September 2018, and even completed a form at the beginning of her employment that described her religious beliefs and her unwillingness to prescribe drugs that would cause a woman to abort her fetus. Casey stated that she believes her religious teaching that says life begins at conception, and therefore her providing medication to kill the inseminated egg would be akin to murder.
The statement never caused an issue for the clinic or for Casey, and she continued her employment for over three years under the limitations she gave CVS because of her religious beliefs. She never had even one complaint from coworkers, supervisors, or patients. She had a “spotless” record and did not have performance issues.
In August of 2021, CVS sent information to its clinics saying that they would “no longer accommodate employees with religious convictions against prescribing hormonal contraceptives and other abortion-causing drugs.” She resubmitted a religious accommodation form, as she was instructed to do.
In January, she was told that the clinic could no longer accommodate her beliefs, per the chain’s instruction. Interestingly, however, Casey continued her employment for two more months without issue. She spoke on the phone with her supervisor on March 25, according to the ADF, and reiterated her beliefs and limitations. There did not seem to be any issues.
In fact, on March 27, 2022, Casey was given a raise based on her merit.
Two days later, though, she was fired.
The lawsuit was filed in August. A blog for Alliance Defending Freedom posed the situation this way: Casey was rewarded for her good work and then fired for her faith, a clear violation of Casey’s First Amendment rights, as well as Virginia’s Conscience Clause.
After the suit was filed, ADF Senior Counsel Denise Harle said, “Corporations like CVS cannot defy the law by firing professionals who want to work consistently with their faith. Paige had a spotless record of caring for patients, yet CVS decided to abruptly fire her solely because of her religious belief that life begins at conception. Virginia law protects the freedom of everyone to work without fear of being fired for their religious beliefs prohibiting participation in abortion.”
Case law as recent as 2020 reaffirmed the religious freedoms of Americans in the case of Little Sisters of the Poor Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, in which the Supreme Court ruled that “pro-life nuns should not be forced to provide abortifacients and other drugs that violate their faith in their employee health plans.”
CVS, the ADF argues in the lawsuit, is in clear violation of Virginia State law, as well as federal law.
This piece was written by Leah Anaya on September 5, 2022. It originally appeared in RedVoiceMedia.com and is used by permission.
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