NYCLU sues Nassau County over law banning protests outside religious sites

The New York Civil Liberties Union sued Nassau County, County Executive Bruce Blakeman and Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder on Tuesday, claiming a new law making it illegal to protest outside religious sites violates the U.S. Constitution.

Nassau’s “Religious Safety Act,” signed by Blakeman in January, violates the First Amendment, the Fourteenth Amendment and state law, according to JP Perry, lead attorney in the lawsuit. NYCLU is suing Nassau on behalf of two Catholic plaintiffs who say they have a right to protest anti-immigrant policies and hand out leaflets to fellow parishioners outside churches.

The law makes it illegal to protest within 100 feet of a religious site an hour before or after a service, or within 35 feet at any other time.

“Protecting the right to worship is paramount,” Perry told Newsday. “This law doesn’t actually advance that. All it does is limit people who want to protest on public streets and sidewalks outside of places of worship, where, by the way, the place of worship might not even be the target of the protest.”

Nassau is not alone in its efforts to crack down on protests outside religious sites, but its law is the most restrictive in New York. Weeks after a rowdy protest outside a Manhattan synagogue last fall, New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin and Gov. Kathy Hochul backed similar legislation. Suffolk legislators later followed suit. Supporters say the restrictions are necessary to protect religious rights, while critics say they’re part of a national attack under President Donald Trump on the right to protest.

Asked for comment Tuesday about the suit, Blakeman wrote to Newsday: “Protecting the rights of individuals to practice religion freely is a guaranteed right under the constitution of the United States. I suggest the NYCLU get better constitutional lawyers.”

A few days before Christmas, Claudia Borecky, a Merrick activist and plaintiff in the suit, had plans to visit nine local churches to combat anti-immigrant sentiment among fellow Catholics. She wanted parishioners to sign the Cabrini Pledge, an initiative by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to support migrants.

But when she heard news of Nassau's new law, she called the plans off.

"I felt like my voice was being silenced," Borecky told Newsday. "I also consider myself an American, besides being a Christian, and I feel our rights are being chopped away. ... Laws are already in place to prevent intimidation at churches. ... And we were in no way intimidating."

Last November, about 150 people gathered outside the Park East Synagogue on Manhattan's Upper East Side to protest an event hosted by a group that encourages and helps pay for American Jews to immigrate to Israel and settlements in the occupied West Bank. Demonstrators chanted “death to the IDF,” according to news reports.

About two weeks later, Nassau Legis. Mazi Melesa Pilip (R-Great Neck), an Orthodox Jew who served in the Israel Defense Forces after immigrating to Israel from Ethiopia, introduced Nassau’s bill.

“No one should fear for their safety when they are simply trying to come in or leave a place of worship,” Pilip said at a legislature meeting last year.

Nassau’s law, which passed unanimously, makes it illegal to protest, distribute pamphlets or “engage in oral advocacy” within 100 feet of a religious site an hour before or after a service, or within 35 feet any other time. It also makes it illegal for protesters to come within 10 feet of anyone entering or leaving a house of worship.

Breaking the law is a crime punishable by 1 year in prison, a $250 fine or both.

“This [law] was passed in response to something that didn’t even happen in Nassau County,” Perry said. “There is no history of obstruction, intimidation, interference or threats of safety to worshippers who are trying to worship in Nassau County.”

The Manhattan synagogue protest also spurred Hochul to support a 25-foot protest buffer zone around religious sites and reproductive health clinics. Meanwhile, Menin, the New York City Council speaker, demanded the NYPD secure a 100-foot buffer zone around the city’s houses of worship. But after First Amendment concerns were raised, the bill was watered down.

Nassau has 980 houses of worship, Perry said. Since the bill was signed into law in January, police have made no arrests, a Nassau County police spokesperson told Newsday.

A spokesperson for Ryder declined to comment, citing ongoing litigation. 

Historically, the question of whether governments can restrict protests has played out on a national stage outside abortion clinics. In 2014, the Supreme Court unanimously struck down a Massachusetts law barring such protests.

“To make [protesting] into a crime is disturbing,” Ellen Yaroshefsky, professor emerita of legal ethics at Hofstra University Law School, told Newsday. “It makes the right to protest nearly meaningless if you’re so far away that the protest is going to have absolutely no effect.”

Ronald Colombo, a Hofstra University Law School professor who specializes in religious liberty, said Nassau legislators legitimately exercised their power to protect religion and religious citizens.

“It’s reasonably related to protecting religious worship, which is a value in our nation. However, does it run afoul to other parts of the First Amendment … prohibiting freedom of speech?” he said. “It may very well cross the line.”