ATLANTA — A group of 13 Georgia state senators introduced a bill to ban discrimination against Georgians on the basis of religion and belief.
The “Freedom of Speech and Belief Act” filed by Sen. Blake Tillery and co-sponsored by a dozen others says it is meant to prevent discrimination in the provision of essential services, particularly singling out financial institutions, utility services and doctors’ ability to deny providing an abortion based on their religious beliefs.
Senate Bill 57, filed Wednesday, says that the freedoms enshrined in the U.S. Bill of Rights are fundamental and among them is the “freedom of association, which businesses and citizens of this state may ordinarily exercise in choosing to engage or not to engage in business with others.”
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Despite the freedom to not engage in business with others, the legislation says that exercising freedom of association by businesses that provide essential goods and services would threaten the ability of Georgians to freely exercise their own rights.
“Today, citizens of this state are at risk of being deprived the ability to obtain financial and utility services due to such citizens’ lawful exercise of their constitutional rights,” the lawmakers wrote in the bill. “Depriving citizens of this state financial and utility services would put such citizens at an extreme disadvantage in carrying out the duties of daily life and would deprive such citizens of the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
As a result, the senators said they’re taking action to protect Georgians from these issues.
The bill defines discrimination for its purposes as:
“Discriminate in the provision of essential services’ means, directly or indirectly, refusing to provide essential services or restricting or terminating the provision of essential services to a person based on such person’s social credit score or such person’s exercise of any Constitutional right protected by the first 10 amendments to the United States Constitution, including, without limitation, such person’s speech, association, religious exercise, or ownership of firearms.”
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In terms of what the legislation considers essential, the 13 senators said essential services are financial or utility services or their providers, defined as financial institutions with more than $1 billion in assets and their affiliates or subsidiaries, payment processors, payment networks, or payment providers and gateways that have processed more than $1 billion in transactions in the past year.
Persons providing services refers to any “individual, partnership, association, joint stock company, trust, corporation, nonprofit organization, or other business or legal entity.”
From the text, lawmakers said a “social credit score” means a score or ranking assigned to someone based on their exercise of any constitutional rights or “a person’s failure or refusal to adopt any policy or make any disclosure relating to emissions of greenhouse gases, as defined in Code Section 12-6-221, beyond what is required by applicable state or federal law.”
The bill also says someone’s refusal to conduct “racial, diversity or gender audit or disclosure” or putting in place a quote based on race, diversity or gender may be considered part of how a social credit score may be determined as well.
Finally, a person’s failure or refusal to either facilitate or assist employees obtaining abortions or gender reassignment should also not be counted as a negative factor for these “social credit scores.”
The bill has a provision that allows individuals to sue for damages against businesses providing electric, water and sewer, natural gas or broadband services to retail customers if they are discriminated against in the manner described by the bill.
Damages can range between whatever the actual purported financial damages are or $50,000, whichever is higher.
Additionally, if the violation is intentional, those suing can win damages up to three times the actual value or $150,000, whichever is higher, in addition to attorney’s fees and declaratory or injunctive relief.
The legislation has no analysis from the Georgia General Assembly yet, and there is no example of a social credit score being enacted in Georgia provided in the legislative text by writing or citation.
Channel 2 Action News has reached out to bill sponsors for examples to include, if available.
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