Westboro Baptist Church at it Again: Anti-Gay Church Members Picket Outside Fort Hood Gates

KILLEEN (May 19, 2012)—Members of the controversial anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., were picketing against soldiers on Armed Forces Day Saturday.

Westboro members picket the funerals of fallen troops, saying their deaths are God’s punishment for the country’s tolerance of homosexuality.

On its website, the church boasts of conducting 48,015 pickets in 859 cities.

Members holding signs with such messages as “pray for more dead soldiers” were gathered Saturday outside the gates of Fort Hood.

Local residents organized a rally in support of the troops in the same area during which funds were being raised for the Wounded Warrior Project.

About 100 area residents took part in the counter demonstration Saturday morning.

“Our intention is to take away any attention the WBC could possible gain during their protest in a peaceful and positive manor,” organizer Hayley Kunkel said.

III Corps and Fort Hood released a statement on Facebook that said, “This group has a right to protest and express their opinions. We are working hand in hand with the City of Killeen to ensure the safety of both the protestors and residents of Killeen and Fort Hood.”

About 35 Killeen police officers stood by during the protest, but there were no reports of any major incidents.

In March 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment protects the fundamentalist church members who stage attention-getting, anti-gay protests outside military funerals.

The court voted 8-1 in favor of the church, upholding an appeals court ruling that threw out a $5 million judgment awarded to Albert Snyder, the father of a fallen Marine who sued church members after they picketed his son’s funeral.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that even “hurtful speech” on public issues must be protected, so that debate isn’t suppressed, but the court’s lone dissenter, Justice Samuel Alito, said the commitment to free speech doesn’t mean the nation has to tolerate what he calls a “vicious verbal assault.”

The Marine’s family had the support of 48 states, 42 U.S. senators and veterans groups, who said the church protests amounted to “psychological terrorism.”

But a daughter of the church’s minister, Margie Phelps, who’s also the lawyer who argued the case, said the court would have had to “shred the First Amendment” to rule against the church.