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Michelle Wu can spend tomorrow in Boston; judge agrees she doesn't have to spend time in Salem answering questions about the city council's tastes in religious leaders
By adamg on Mon, 11/01/2021 - 4:56pm
A federal judge on Friday ruled Michelle Wu does not have to show up in Salem tomorrow to answer questions about how the City Council picks religious leaders to start Wednesday council meetings with an invocation.
Still to be determined, however, is whether Wu will have to travel to Witch City at some later date to answer questions from lawyers for the Satanic Temple, which is suing the council over the issue.
US District Court Judge Angel Kelley gave the group until Nov. 12 to answer arguments by city attorneys that requiring Wu, and only Wu, to be "deposed" on the issue is simple harassment when the city provided a list of 47 other people who could talk about why the council has never invited any members of the quasi-religious group to lead the council in prayer or just thoughtfulness.
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Comments
god's messenger
with a judge named "angel" they didn't have a chance
Way to go Satanists!
Piss off the fanbase that is most sympathetic to you to get attention!
They are not Satanists.
They are non theists.
Okay
That makes it one stupider.
Not really.
Attention to the issue of separation of church and state is what they were after. And they got plenty of it. Smarter than the average bear, I’d say.
They're not trying to get anyone elected, Swirl
They have a mission, so to speak, and it's to shine a light on the absurdity of this opening prayer bs.
Call them stupid, but I for one would love to see "GOD" taken out of government and off our currency completely.
Don't pray on the taxpayers dime.
I don't care if it bugs Wu. The seperation of church and state is a tad more important than one person's political goals.
Weird
How they only demanded one mayoral candidate, one of two mayoral candidates who are sitting councilors, one of 13 city councilors, to appear on this specific day. But surely, it has nothing to do with Wu herself.
1) she is the chosen target
1) she is the chosen target because everyone knows she is going to win
2) picking one target, specifically the clear front runner, instead of many - or the whole council - will cause more drama
3) more drama leads to more coverage
It may be a sleazy tactic, but it gets headlines. the chances of this succeeding in a legal sense is probably slim, so dragging the next mayor of Boston through the coals for being a party to the idiotic invocation process is a victory if it gets a lot of press.
if this pisses you off, you're not paying attention
The temple has said they knew damn well that they weren't going to get her for Nov 2nd.
It was mostly just for the publicity, and I'm totally OK with that. Plus, the city's argument that 47 other people can answer questions about this is equally silly.
How are there 47 people that have sufficient knowledge into the decision-making around who gets to lead a prayer before council meetings?
Each councilor has staff
And the council as a whole has a central staff. Then there are the councilors who were actually named in the Satanists' complaint, unlike Wu (even if the Satanists did screw up at least one councilor's alleged involvement in this sinister plot, i.e., Matt O'Malley, accused of bringing in a, gasp, North Shore minister, which is true only if you disregard the fact that the minister in question lives in Jamaica Plain, which is in O'Malley's district, and also worked as a minister at the Jamaica Plain care facility where O'Malley's mother spent time, which is one of the ways he knows her, in addition to working at the non-Boston church the Satanists cited).
wow
I'm sure it had absolutely nothing to do with the election too. Just a coincidence, nothing to see here.
It was the last chance to
It was the last chance to answer any questions before the coronation.