Virginia After School Satan club on hold for now: Reports

Over 60 Chesapeake, Virginia, community members gave their opinions on a proposed "Satan Club" during a school board meeting on Monday, while board members held off on voting on its approval, according to reports.

WAVY-TV reported that an application submitted to B.M. Williams Primary School last month was canceled last week after the club’s sponsor stepped down.

The paperwork has been resubmitted by a new sponsor, though it is not clear whether the club is expected to start on Dec. 15 as originally intended.

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June Everett, an ordained minister in The Satanic Temple is the campaign director for After School Satan Club, or ASSC.

The club is intended to foster creativity and promote empathy, according to Everett, and attempts to establish a constructive and positive alternative to other religious after school clubs.

Everett told Fox News Digital that she was first led to The Satanic Temple five years ago after her first-grader "was traumatized by his classmates on the playground one day, and they were attendees of the Good News Club that was taking place at the public elementary school he was attending at the time."

After picking her crying son up from school one day, he said other students told him if he did not accept Jesus Christ into his heart and start going to church, he was going to burn in hell.

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL HOSTS ‘AFTER SCHOOL SATAN CLUB,' INFURIATES PARENTS: 'ABOMINATION AGAINST GOD'

This led Everett to seek alternatives to what was being offered to students.

On Monday, school board members did not vote on whether to allow the club, WAVY reported, but wanted to hear about the safety and concerns surrounding it.

A flyer on The Satanic Temple’s Facebook Page read, "The Satanic Temple is a non-theistic religion that views Satan as a literary figure who represents a metaphorical construct of rejecting tyranny and championing the human mind and spirit. After School Satan Club does not attempt to convert children to any religious ideology. Instead, the Satanic Temple supports children to think for themselves."

Despite concerns from parents in the district who argue the club does not need to be in the elementary school where children are so young, lawyers said the school must make room for the club because of its affiliation with religion, tying it back to the First Amendment and freedom of speech.

Still, all students are required to have a parent-signed permissions slip to attend any after school program hosted by an outside organization

DOJ official admits targeting pro-lifers in the wake of SCOTUS Roe v Wade ruling

Associated Attorney General Vanita Gupta admitted earlier this month that the Justice Department has targeted pro-life activists in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling over the summer that overturned the landmark case, Roe v. Wade. 

In remarks delivered at the Justice Department’s 65th Anniversary on December 6, Gupta said the Supreme Court’s decision "dealt a devastating blow to women throughout the country." 

The decision, she said, took away the constitutional right to an abortion and increased the "urgency" of the DOJ’s work "including enforcement of the FACE Act, to ensure continued lawful access to reproductive services." 

The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act of 1994, or FACE Act, is a law that ensures Americans’ access to pro-life and pro-choice reproductive health services. 

VETERANS AFFAIRS SUED OVER NEW ABORTION RULE AFTER ROE ROLLBACK THAT ALLEGEDLY VIOLATES RELIGIOUS LIBERTY

The law makes it a federal crime, with potentially steep fines and jail time, to use or threaten to use force to "injure, intimidate, or interfere" with a person seeking reproductive health services, or with a person lawfully trying to exercise the First Amendment right of religious freedom at a place of religious worship. The FACE Act also prohibits intentional property damage to a facility providing reproductive health services or a place of religious worship. 

The Justice Department ramped up prosecutions of pro-life activists in the months following the Supreme Court decision to reverse Roe v. Wade, under a law that was barely used in 2020 and 2021 but has now been used to indict 26 people this year. In contrast, only four FACE Act indictments took place in 2021, according to the DOJ.

While the DOJ has been prosecuting alleged FACE Act violations by pro-life activists, the Supreme Court decision has also led to dozens of violent incidents at pro-life pregnancy centers staged by pro-choice demonstrators. For example, the radical abortion rights group Jane's Revenge has claimed credit for vandalizing or firebombing at least 18 of these pro-life clinics.

But the FBI has made no arrests related to these incidents, and so far, no FACE Act charges have been brought against anyone involved in these attacks.

Fox News Digital has reached out to Gupta for comment. She served in the Obama administration and was appointed associate attorney general by President Joe Biden and confirmed on April 21, 2021. 

Fox News’ Brianna Herlihy contributed to this report.