New York Times columnist David Brooks ignored his paper's reporting to defend Indiana's controversial new “religious freedom” law, misleadingly equating it with its federal version and misrepresenting the reason it has sparked such widespread opposition.

Indiana has been embroiled in controversy since it passed its version of a “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” (RFRA), a law that has been used to provide a legal defense for individuals and businesses who cite their religious beliefs as a justification for discriminating against gay people, even in lawsuits that don't involve the government.

In his March 31 column, Brooks joined a number of conservative defenders of the law in falsely suggesting that Indiana's measure is no different than the federal RFRA signed into law in 1993. Brooks also erroneously stated that opponents of Indiana's dangerous expansion of the federal RFRA (and previous state versions) are not respecting the “valid tension” between religious belief and permissible discrimination, when in fact the main objection to the law is that Indiana has upset the previous balance to further undercut antidiscrimination protections:

The 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was supported by Senator Ted Kennedy and a wide posse of progressives, sidestepped the abstract and polarizing theological argument. It focused on the concrete facts of specific cases. The act basically holds that government sometimes has to infringe on religious freedom in order to pursue equality and other goods, but, when it does, it should have a compelling reason and should infringe in the least intrusive way possible.

This moderate, grounded, incremental strategy has produced amazing results. Fewer people have to face the horror of bigotry, isolation, marginalization and prejudice.

Yet I wonder if this phenomenal achievement is going off the rails. Indiana has passed a state law like the 1993 federal act, and sparked an incredible firestorm.

If the opponents of that law were arguing that the Indiana statute tightens the federal standards a notch too far, that would be compelling. But that's not the argument the opponents are making.

Instead, the argument seems to be that the federal act's concrete case-by-case approach is wrong. The opponents seem to be saying there is no valid tension between religious pluralism and equality. Claims of religious liberty are covers for anti-gay bigotry. [emphasis added]

The New York Times' own reporting debunks both of Brooks' points. According to a March 30 Times report, Indiana's RFRA is significantly more expansive than federal law. The paper specifically notes that “legal experts” object to the law because it reworks the standards of the federal version “to allow some religious groups to undermine the rights of women, gays and lesbians or other groups”:

Contrary to the assertion by Governor Pence, the Indiana law, Ms. Franke said, is not identical to the federal law or the version supported years ago by President Obama when he served in the Illinois State Senate.

She and other legal experts said the Indiana law expands the parties who could ask for relief on religious grounds to include a wider range of corporations, if individuals with “substantial control” of the business share the same religious beliefs.

The Indiana measure also grants parties the right to bring legal action to prevent a “likely” burden on religious belief, even before any burden is imposed. And it expands the situations in which the protection could be invoked to include disputes between private parties engaged in lawsuits, even if they do not involve any direct actions by a government agency.

Comparisons between Indiana's RFRA - which makes it harder for gay customers to invoke antidiscrimination protections against a business that refuses to serve them -- and federal law have been debunked by The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and even by Fox News anchor Bret Baier. The ACLU of Indiana has called the law's broad language "virtually without precedent."