WASHINGTON — The Obama administration’s new policy requiring some religious institutions to provide coverage for prescription contraceptives has drawn additional criticism, this time from both the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and — in a rare display of disagreement with the president — Timothy Kaine, a Democratic candidate for Virginia’s U.S. senate seat.
Brent Walker
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Timothy Kaine
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Associated Baptist Press reported Feb. 9 that Brent Walker, executive director of the BJC, said the Obama administration should return the regulations to the drawing board to address religious liberty concerns.
Walker said the exemption granted to churches, while important, “is insufficient and should be broadened.”
Walker said broadening the exemption to religious employers beyond churches would not necessarily deprive anyone of health-care coverage.
“The exemption could carry a duty of full disclosure by the employer as well as an obligation to help employees who want contraceptive coverage to get it elsewhere at a reasonable cost,” he suggested.
Meanwhile, former Virginia governor Kaine, the likely Democratic nominee to succeed retiring Sen. James Webb (D), said he disagreed with forcing religious institutions to pay for birth control, the Washington Post reported.
“I think the White House made a good decision in including a mandate for contraception coverage in the Affordable Care Act insurance policy, but I think they made a bad decision in not allowing a broad enough religious employer exemption,” Kaine said in a radio interview, according to the Post.
Kaine, a Catholic, is a close political ally of Obama and was the president’s choice to lead the Democratic National Committee.