BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Legal experts are weighing in on comments recently made by Indiana's Republican candidate for lieutenant governor.
Micah Beckwith recently told a gathering if he's elected, he'll fire any state employee who works with his office and uses pronouns in their email signatures.
Video of Beckwith making those comments was recently posted on YouTube. The video was shot by a reporter with the Bloomingtonian, an online local news publication that covers news in the Bloomington and Monroe County area.
The reporter who took the video posted it on YouTube and explained that he recorded it when Beckwith spoke at a recent Monroe County Republican Party dinner.
Here are some of Beckwith's comments after someone in the audience asked him if there was a deep state in government.
"There is a deep state within the Indiana government and we do have a plan to address it," he said, defining the deep state as "the bureaucrats that are rooted deep in the system that have their own personal agendas that are playing out through the mechanisms of government."
Beckwith also told the crowd he would do his part to get rid of the deep state and the easiest way to "...identify those who have far-left value systems within government" was through emails.
"If I get an email from anyone in my office or in agencies that I oversee as lieutenant governor and their signature has their email, their pronouns, on it, they're going to be gone, right? That's really easy. We're not going to play that," he said.
"You would have to go through an HR department. You can't fire people real easily, but we can certainly relegate them to places that they will have no influence," Beckwith added. "Listen, we're not going in there saying we're going to fire anyone and everyone, but you need to come over to the values that we have. If you can, in good faith, do your job in alignment with the values that people have elected, then we'll be fine.
"I don't care if you're on the left or right in the bureaucratic state, just do your job in good faith," he said.
Jennifer Drobac, a retired professor who specializes in and taught discrimination law at Indiana University, called Beckwith's statements discriminatory. She cited federal law dealing with protected classifications, noting sex is one of them and the U.S. Constitution's equal protection clause.
"In this case, it would be sex because we have identified pronouns or gendered pronouns as indicating an affiliation on the basis of sex and that is clearly a protected classification, as is religion, as is ethnicity, or national origin or race. These characteristics are those that we have said you should not be penalized for," Drobac said, adding that Beckwith's words will create a chilling effect.
"He's already said he's going to get rid of people who have identified pronouns and that indicates a particular orientation or sexual identity of sex-based identify and that's illegal. You can't do that," Drobac said.
Employment attorney Amber Boyd-Moorman said, in Indiana, employers can hire or fire someone for any reason, except based on a protected class, like sex, sexual orientation, religion or race.
"It can be hard to prove discrimination, but because we can go back to these exact comments where he's saying these things, I think they're setting themselves up, a person up, for a pretty easy discrimination case," said Boyd-Moorman. "If someone comes to me and they say, 'Amber, I was terminated and he was one of the decision makers.' I'm going to be like, 'Hey, this person is going to be have pretty viable case.'"
13News reached out to the Beckwith campaign for further clarification on his recent comments.
The campaign issued the following statement:
"It is disappointing that this comment was taken out of context. Micah Beckwith wants to stop unelected bureaucrats from undermining the agenda of elected officials. He will be basing decisions on job performance."
13News also reached out to Beckwith's running mate, Senator Mike Braun, who issued a statement saying, "My administration will hire and fire employees based solely on their merit and commitment to delivering efficient, effective state government to make life better and more affordable for Hoosiers, period."
"He is making a correct statement, and he is taking the right path. That is the lawful path and his lieutenant governor running mate is off the rails, legally," Drobac said.