Pence: Coverage of religious freedom law 'shameless'

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence on Sunday sternly defended his state’s new religious freedom law from what he called “reckless” and “shameless” media coverage, claiming Indiana has been hit with “an avalanche of intolerance.”

Pence, a Republican who is weighing a White House bid, insisted during an appearance on ABC’s “This Week” that the new law was not intended to regulate interactions between private individuals but to serve as a check on big government. He blamed “misinformation and misunderstanding around this bill” for calls for business leaders and sporting events to boycott the state.


“We’re not going to change the law, OK?” he told host George Stephanopoulos, though the governor held open the possibility of some sort of legislative clarification.

He also insisted the new law wouldn’t allow bakers or florists to refuse to serve gay couples, something supporters of the legislation have claimed it would allow.

“This is not about discrimination, this is about empowering people to confront government overreach,” he said.

Pence also fired back at the online firestorm over the law.

“From people who preach tolerance every day, we’ve been under an avalanche of intolerance,” he said. “I’m not going to take it lying down.”

Pressed by Stephanopoulos on whether he believed Indiana should add sexual orientation to its list of protected classes under civil rights law, Pence repeatedly ducked the question.

“Hoosiers don’t believe in discrimination,” he said.

Pence also sought to defend the law by noting that then-President Bill Clinton signed a version of it into law in the early 1990s and then-State Sen. Barack Obama voted for a version of it in the Illinois legislature. But in an interview immediately following Pence’s, White House press secretary Josh Earnest rejected that argument.

“If you have to go back two decades to try to justify something you are doing today, it may raise some questions about the wisdom of what you’re doing,” Earnest said. “It should be easy for leaders in this country to stand up and say that it is wrong to discriminate against people just because of who they love.”