International
Washington Senate passes bill to jail priests for not violating Seal of Confession
From LifeSiteNews
By Matt Lamb
Priests are automatically excommunicated if they break the Seal of Confession, according to canon law.
The Washington state Senate passed legislation to throw priests in jail for almost a full year for maintaining the Seal of Confession.
Senator Noel Frame, a Democrat, is on her third attempt to force priests to divulge what they hear during Confession if it concerns abuse. Last year, a bill backed by the Washington Catholic Conference, though not by all bishops in the state, died.
This year, Frame’s bill includes no exemptions at all for the religious liberties of priests. It passed the state senate 28 to 20 – all but two Democrats voted to violate the religious freedom of Catholics and remove the clergy-penitent privilege. All Republicans voted against the measure on February 28. A House version is now in committee waiting a further vote.
Senate Bill 5375 and House Bill 1211 in the state of Washington are “no exemption” bills that remove all protections for what priests hear in confession when it comes to alleged abuse. Frame said the bill will not compel priests to testify but only to report abuse.
However, that is not written in the text of the law. Furthermore, a priest would presumably have to reveal the name of a person admitting to the abuse in the confessional in order to alert authorities to what child allegedly might be at risk, as LifeSiteNews previously reported.
Frame’s office did not respond to an inquiry from LifeSiteNews on March 3. LifeSiteNews asked if an attorney had reviewed the legislation for potential religious freedom issues.
Frame previously dismissed religious freedom concerns during a hearing. “I have tried really hard over the last couple of years to find a balance and to strike a careful compromise,” she claiming before saying “sorry” for not being willing to “make a compromise anymore.” She criticized efforts to protect clergy-penitent privilege “in the name of religious freedom.”
Priests are automatically excommunicated if they break the Seal of Confession, according to canon law.
Canon 1386 states, “A confessor (priest) who directly violates the sacramental seal incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See; he who does so only indirectly is to be punished according to the gravity of the offence.”
Efforts to force priests to do so, including Montana and Washington this year, have drawn condemnation from Catholic groups as well as several legal experts.
Catholic group calls bill ‘egregious violation’ of First Amendment
“This bill is an egregious violation of the First Amendment, and we can only hope that the courts will waste no time in striking it down,” the Catholic League told LifeSiteNews via email on Tuesday. “Given the political landscape of Washington State, it is, unfortunately, pretty much a done deal.”
Contra the Democrats claims about the bill being just about preventing child abuse, the Catholic League pointed out there are efforts to weaken protections for children, stating:
What is even more galling is that in Washington State they have steps to water down provisions on the public schools to report sexual abuse to parents. Washington State House Bill 1296 seeks to undo much a voter-backed (AND PASSED!) parental rights initiative. In the current legislation, there is a provision to allow public schools to take up to 48 hours before notifying parents if their child is sexually abused. When efforts were made to remove the language that gave schools this ridiculous leeway, the Democrats successfully blocked those efforts. A simple amendment that requires Washington State’s public schools to tell parents right away about crimes committed against their child is too much for the same people supporting an attempt to break the Seal of Confession.
Senators also killed an amendment brought by Republican Senator Phil Fortunato to require school districts to report sexual abuse allegations, and related actions taken, to the state.
“This is, simply, an effort to cause a chilling effect on people of faith,” the Catholic League told LifeSiteNews. “The rabid secularists in Washington State would love nothing more than to marginalize faithful voters who stand in the way of their revolution.”
The law is “impractical,” so the aim must be “to intimidate Catholics and other people of faith.”
“When they specifically take aim on one of the sacraments, they clearly are trying to cause a chilling effect on good Catholics and other people of faith who wish to see public policy that is ordered by traditional morals,” the Catholic League stated.
‘Blatantly unconstitutional,’ legal scholar says
A left-leaning legal expert called the bills in Washington and Montana “blatantly unconstitutional.”
“Putting aside the obvious violation of the sanctity of the confessional, it presents a novel problem for priests if they both encourage the faithful to unburden themselves while at the same time reminding them anything that they say can and will be used against them in a court of law,” Professor Jonathan Turley wrote on his commentary website.
“In my view, the Washington State law is a frontal attack on free exercise and would be struck down if enacted,” the George Washington University law professor wrote.
“The only question is why Democrats consider such legislation to be any more viable politically than it is constitutionally.”
Business
P.E.I. Moves to Open IRAC Files, Forcing Land Regulator to Publish Reports After The Bureau’s Investigation
Following an exclusive report from The Bureau detailing transparency concerns at Prince Edward Island’s land regulator — and a migration of lawyers from firms that represented the Buddhist land-owning entities the regulator had already probed — the P.E.I. Legislature has passed a new law forcing the Island Regulatory and Appeals Commission (IRAC) to make its land-investigation reports public.
The bill — introduced by Green Party Leader Matt MacFarlane — passed unanimously on Wednesday, CTV News reported. It amends the Lands Protection Act to require IRAC to table final investigation reports and supporting documents in the Legislature within 15 days of completion.
MacFarlane told CTV the reform was necessary because “public trust … is at an all-time low in the system,” adding that “if Islanders can see that work is getting done, that the (LPA) is being properly administered and enforced, that will get some trust rebuilt in this body.”
The Bureau’s report last week underscored that concern, showing how lawyers from Cox & Palmer — the firm representing the Buddhist landholders — steadily moved into senior IRAC positions after the regulator quietly shut down its mandated probe into those same entities. The issue exploded this fall when a Legislative Committee subpoena confirmed that IRAC’s oft-cited 2016–2018 investigation had never produced a final report at all.
There have been reports, including from CBC, that the Buddhist landholders have ties to a Chinese Communist Party entity, which leaders from the group deny.
In the years following IRAC’s cancelled probe into the Buddhist landholders, The Bureau reported, Cox & Palmer’s general counsel and director of land joined IRAC, and the migration of senior former lawyers culminated this spring, with former premier Dennis King appointing his own chief of staff, longtime Cox & Palmer partner Pam Williams, as IRAC chair shortly after the province’s land minister ordered the regulator to reopen a probe into Buddhist landholdings.
The law firm did not respond to questions, while IRAC said it has strong measures in place to guard against any conflicted decision-making.
Reporting on the overall matter, The Bureau wrote that:
“The integrity of the institution has, in effect, become a test of public confidence — or increasingly, of public disbelief. When Minister of Housing, Land and Communities Steven Myers ordered IRAC in February 2025 to release the 2016–2018 report and reopen the investigation, the commission did not comply … Myers later resigned in October 2025. Days afterward, the Legislative Committee on Natural Resources subpoenaed IRAC to produce the report. The commission replied that no formal report had ever been prepared.”
The Bureau’s investigation also showed that the Buddhist entities under review control assets exceeding $480 million, and there is also a planned $185-million campus development in the Town of Three Rivers, citing concerns that such financial power, combined with a revolving door between key law firms, political offices and the regulator, risks undermining confidence in P.E.I.’s land-oversight regime.
Wednesday’s new law converts the expectation for transparency at IRAC, voiced loudly by numerous citizens in this small province of about 170,000, into a statutory obligation.
Housing, Land and Communities Minister Cory Deagle told CTV the government supported the bill: “We do have concerns about some aspects of it, but the main principles of what you’re trying to achieve are a good thing.”
The Bureau is a reader-supported publication.
To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Daily Caller
Laura Ingraham’s Viral Clash With Trump Prompts Her To Tell Real Reasons China Sends Students To US
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
On Monday, Ingraham pressed Trump on why a plan to admit 600,000 Chinese nationals into U.S. universities qualifies as a “pro-MAGA” move, challenging him directly after he defended the influx as vital to maintaining Washington’s relationship with Beijing. During a Wednesday broadcast, Ingraham said no modern president has fought harder for American workers than Trump and predicted he will “honor that distinction for the next three years.”
“There was also more consternation over the approach to allowing Chinese and other foreign students to take spots at U.S. universities. A lot of MAGA folks didn’t like that at all. And it’s not, by the way, as some Chinese influencers today said on X, I love this, it’s not that the MAGA folks, certainly not myself, dislike the Chinese people. It’s ridiculous,” Ingraham said.
“What they dislike is the Chinese system that represses Chinese people and uses them as human spies and saboteurs. Remember, when the CCP greenlights hundreds of thousands of their people to come study here, they’re not sending them so they can learn about the wonders of Western civilization, Plato and Socrates, Greek history, become champions of individual freedom and take that message back home. They’re sent here to do whatever is necessary to learn how to push the People’s Republic closer to crushing America, to stealing from us, and for spying on us,” Ingraham added.
Ingraham said that people “understandably perplexed by some of the president’s comments, we cannot forget, what American president has ever been tougher on China than Donald Trump? None.”
Ingraham told viewers that Beijing does not send its students to America to study the Western canon or return home as advocates of individual liberty.
WATCH:
Ingraham warned that China’s rise didn’t happen overnight, saying that decades of inattentive presidents allowed Beijing to gain the strength Trump now must confront.
“Given China’s growing strength that’s been amassed over decades of presidents who were out to lunch, President Trump inherited the most challenging situation,” Ingraham said. “I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say this, that any president has faced in the last 50 years. He and his entire team are dedicated to countering the Chinese aggression that’s building.”
Washington and Beijing struck a deal in June clearing the way for Chinese nationals to enroll in American universities, a shift that followed the administration’s June 5 move blocking Harvard from bringing in additional international students. Officials justified the restriction by pointing to security vulnerabilities and rising campus turmoil, including allegations of antisemitic activity, as reasons to tighten the flow of foreign applicants.
Trump acknowledged at the time that admitting large numbers of students from a country controlled by the Chinese Communist Party carries real intelligence concerns, saying in June that the government “must be vigilant” about who enters U.S. classrooms. National security experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the policy could create openings for the CCP to exploit America’s higher-education system and potentially endanger U.S. interests.
Bizarre Decisions about Nicotine Pouches Lead to the Wrong Products on Shelves
Alberta government’s plan will improve access to MRIs and CT scans
RFK Jr’s argument for studying efficacy of various vaccines
No Jobs Clause: Liberals Under Fire Over Stellantis Deal in Fiery Committee Showdown
-
Crime2 days agoCBSA Bust Uncovers Mexican Cartel Network in Montreal High-Rise, Moving Hundreds Across Canada-U.S. Border
-
Environment2 days agoThe Myths We’re Told About Climate Change | Michael Shellenberger
-
Business2 days agoCarney and other world leaders should recognize world’s dependence on fossil fuels
-
armed forces2 days agoWhat A Second World War Aircraft Taught Me About Remembrance Day
-
armed forces2 days agoWhy we keep getting Remembrance Day wrong
-
Alberta2 days agoMark Carney Has Failed to Make Use of the Powerful Tools at His Disposal to Get Oil Pipelines Built
-
Business1 day agoCarney shrugs off debt problem with more borrowing
-
Daily Caller2 days agoEx-Terrorist Leader Goes On Fox News, Gives Wild Answer About 9/11