Conservative legal group aims to export its rightwing Christian mission beyond US borders | Far right (US)
Alliance Defending Freedom, the conservative legal advocacy group behind the overturning of Roe v Wade, has increased its global spending on lawsuits and other campaigns in what appears to be an attempt to export what critics call “freedom.” far-right Christian theocratic values Beyond US borders.
ADF and ADF International, a separate legal entity, spent a combined $10.9 million on international grants and programs this year Expires June 2024According to the most recent public tax records, spending on European-related matters has increased by 70% year-on-year.
Paul Coleman, chief executive of ADF International, based in Vienna, Austria, described his group’s mission as “not only defending the persecuted, but also opposing censorship, promoting biological reality, and securing the rights of parents.”
“By the grace of God, we have done just that,” ADF International said in its 2024 annual report, noting that the group had “success” in 39 cases at the European Court of Human Rights and 282 victories in national courts.
Founded in the United States more than three decades ago, the group has been involved in a number of important and high-profile legal cases involving conservative Christian issues: from challenges to gay and transgender rights to calls for religious charter schools to receive taxpayer funding.
ADF and ADF International are both led by the CEO Kristen Wagoner.
An examination of ADF International’s work shows that the group is trying to replicate a plan that has led to some major victories in the United States: namely, encouraging and supporting individual cases involving Christians who claim they have been persecuted or silenced for their religious beliefs and trying to elevate those claims to the highest courts.
Alyssa Bowen, deputy chief executive of investigative research watchdog True North Research, said the ADF’s activities should ring alarm bells for civil society in Europe and other regions.
“Despite PR claims, the ADF’s foreign operations will use religious freedom not as a shield but as a sword to attack equal rights and efforts to protect the fundamental rights and freedoms of all people,” Bowen said.
The ADF’s record of “assaulting the rights of women, the LGBTQ+ community, and parents and teachers to promote truth in public education” should be a lesson to other countries about imposing limits on spending to influence elections and protect the independence of judges.
The ADF has become a player in what it calls freedom of expression in Finland, involving member of parliament Päivi Räsänen, who was accused of incitement against a minority group after criticizing the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland. in a tweet Because he supported an LGBT Pride event, he said the move “adds shame and sin.”
Räsänen, a member of the Christian Democrats (a relatively small political party in Finland), was acquitted twice but his case is currently being reviewed by the Finnish supreme court. In emailed responses to the Guardian’s questions, he said ADF International reached out to him in Autumn 2019 after hearing about his case.
“I am extremely grateful for ADF International’s expertise in defending freedom of expression and religion,” he said.
At the heart of the controversy is the question of whether Räsänen violated a law that prohibits threats, slander or insults on the basis of race, colour, descent, religion or sexual orientation, among other classes. Most violators are fined under the law, and so far only those deemed too harmful or racist towards ethnic minorities have been found guilty.
University of Helsinki lecturer Tuomas Äystö said Räsänen’s case was unique because it was the first in the high court to test the limits of hostile rhetoric towards a “sexual minority”.
“Räsänen’s legal team insists that a guilty verdict “will make it illegal to quote the Bible,” but this is not the case. From the perspective of the Criminal Code, it does not matter which book the defendant is quoting; they are only interested in what the defendant did,” Äystö said. He added that a not guilty verdict by the high court would lead to a major public debate about the rights of sexual minorities, the role of religion in society and politics, and perhaps the influence of international actors in Finland. He will probably try to appeal the guilty verdict to the European Court of Human Rights.
“Either way, I predict that Räsänen’s well-established international Christian networks will be interested and will report his decision – either as a victory or a disgrace,” he said.
This case made him famous among European leaders of the far right. He said that while attending a conference organized by the Axioma Center during his recent visit to Budapest, he “unexpectedly received a request to meet with Viktor Orban” and that Orban “spared an hour for our conversation.” He said the ADF was not involved in its installation.
In response to emailed questions, an ADF International spokesperson said the group is a human rights organization that aims to advance “the right to life and to tell the truth for all people, and that our legal advocacy benefits everyone, regardless of their beliefs.” This included coordinating the defense before Nigeria’s supreme court of Yahaya Sharif Aminu, who was convicted of “blasphemy” and sentenced to death after distributing a song on WhatsApp that allegedly contained derogatory comments against the Prophet Muhammad, the spokesman said.
“Our work is fully compatible with the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is based on ‘recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family’,” the spokesperson said.
The ADF’s UK branch funded the trial of anti-abortion campaigner Livia Tossici-Bolt, who was convicted in April 2025 for violating the buffer zone outside an abortion clinic near Bournemouth. ADF UK said on its website that it “continues to support its legal defence”. In the US, a lawyer for the group appeared alongside Nigel Farage before the House judiciary committee, which invited the UK Reform leader and testified to what Farage called the “horribly authoritarian” situation on free speech in the UK.
The New York Times reported that the ADF “brokered” a meeting between Farage and senior foreign office officials in London and “provided the Trump administration with lines of attack that portrayed the British government as hostile to free speech.”
An ADF International spokesman said the group was “non-politically partisan” and said the group had contacted parliamentarians from all major Westminster parties.
“It is our policy not to publicly discuss private conversations or whether they occurred,” the spokesman said.
A Labor Party spokesman told the Times there was no record of the ADF having any contact with the party. Farage told the Times his party was talking to “all sorts of groups” and rejected any suggestion that he was speaking out against abortion. But he told the newspaper that the 24-week limit on abortion “appears to be in serious danger given that we have spent a fortune trying to save babies at 22 weeks”. “Maybe we need to rethink all this,” he told the paper.
In Germany, ADF International also backed groups holding vigils outside abortion clinics, saying banning such protests violated freedom of expression rights.
Do you have a tip about this story? Please send us a message on Signal at +1 646 886 8761.
