PRATTVILLE, Ala. –
A federal judge has ordered an Alabama city to allow an LGBTQ2S+ pride group to participate in the city’s Christmas parade on Friday, after the mayor initially blocked the group from the annual event citing unspecified “safety concerns.”
U.S. District Judge R. Austin Huffaker Jr. ruled that the City of Prattville violated Prattville Pride’s First Amendment right to free speech and 14th Amendment right to equal protection under the law when it banned the group from running a float in the annual Christmas parade one day before the event was set to take place.
“The City removed Prattville Pride from the parade based on its belief that certain members of the public who oppose Prattville Pride, and what is stands for, would react in a disruptive way. But discrimination based on a message’s content ‘cannot …