Iowa officials ban Satanic event over made-up claim that it'd be "harmful to minors"

The family-friendly event was intended to celebrate the season "with joy and camaraderie"

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Why did officials at the Iowa Department of Administrative Services tell Satanists they weren’t allowed to host a holiday celebration inside the Capitol on Saturday, even though The Satanic Temple had received permission to use the facilities?

The answer given by one official is that the celebration would have had "elements that are harmful to minors”:

"After careful consideration of administrative rule and DAS policy, I determined the totality of the event request to include elements that are harmful to minors and therefore denied the request," Adam Steen, the director of the Iowa DAS, said in a statement to the Register.

It’s rich to hear any Republican talk about other groups being “harmful to minors” when their party’s policies and their overwhelming Christian base have routinely hurt children. Furthermore, they’ve used protecting the kids as a rallying cry against every group they can’t stand, including trans people, drag queens, and sex educators.

In fact, the actual details of the Iowa event tell a very different story.

The “Satanic Holiday Joy” event was publicly announced last month as a “family friendly one day event celebrating the holiday season.” (It had gone up on the DAS’ calendar on October 7.)

It would have included an ornament-making session, a coloring station for kids, “Satanic carols,” a Krampus costume contest, and “a ritual.”

In fact, that announcement suggests an even more family-friendly event than their original proposal, which I obtained. (It didn’t include the coloring!)

Basically, nothing that would have taken place that day would have been offensive to a casual observer. The only difference between this event and a more traditional Christian one is that this one wasn’t about celebrating Jesus.

Satanic Minister Mortimer Adramelech told me over the weekend that his group was in regular conversation with the DAS office and that “if there were any issues with any portion of our event that they felt violated the [memorandum of understanding], that we were open to discussion to make necessary changes, but they declined to discuss the issue further.” That included the “ritual,” which he said “focused on finding light in the darkest nights of the year.”

But on Friday, the day before everything was set to take place, the group announced that the event had been “forcibly cancelled”:

We are saddened to announce that our event at the Iowa State Capitol has been forcibly cancelled by the Iowa Department of Administrative Services.

We have made every effort to work with them to ensure a successful event, but after over two months on the official Capitol events calendar we have been informed that our event will no longer be allowed.

Our goal was to promote tolerance and acceptance of diverse religious beliefs, with a theme of finding a light in the darkness and welcoming the darkest nights of the year with joy and camaraderie.

We are no stranger to obstacles in advocating for religious pluralism and freedom of speech, and we will continue to fight for the rights of Satanic Temple members and our local community.

We encourage Satanic Temple members and supporters to keep the seven tenets of The Satanic Temple in mind. As a peaceful law-abiding organization, we will embody the spirit of wisdom and compassion in the face of injustice.

Hail Satan, Hail Iowa.

Our liberties we prize, and our rights we will maintain!

The statement didn’t include any response to Steen’s comments about how the event would have been “harmful to minors.” But that claim was later echoed by Gov. Kim Reynolds speaking with a right-wing media outlet:

"Our state government is always going to be concerned about the wellbeing of children. The Iowa State Capitol Complex is a place that is open to the public, where children and families routinely visit. Because of this, the State's event policy takes into consideration conduct that would be harmful to minors. This satanic event, which specifically targets children, is harmful to minors and so it was denied."

It’s telling that neither Steen nor Reynolds explained what would have been bad for children. That omission suggests both of them were more interested in keeping Satanists out of the Capitol than protecting kids. After all, Steen is a “credentialed minister” and Reynolds is a Christian Nationalist who has urged Iowans to “read through the Bible on a daily basis each year until the Lord comes.”

It’s likely they just wanted to avoid what happened last year.

You may recall that last December, a Satanic display went up in the State Capitol alongside a Nativity scene. Reynolds called the innocuous display “absolutely objectionable.” A Christian zealot, Michael Cassidy, soon vandalized the display and was eventually charged with a hate crime. (He later accepted a deal in which he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge, paid a small penalty, and was placed on probation.)

But it was the Satanists who got punished over the whole debacle, with one GOP lawmaker even filing a bill to ban Satanic displays on public property. The new rules for holiday displays say that groups can only reserve the space for a single day (unless the state itself sponsors the display). (Meanwhile, the Catholic Church has been allowed to host monthly prayer events on Capitol grounds without even having to apply for permits.)

They didn’t stop there either. A few months ago, when The Satanic Temple planned a book reading inside the Capitol, the same Department of Administrative Services changed the rules to prevent them from doing so, even though the move ended up hurting homeless veterans looking for a job.

In short, Iowa Republicans have tried over and over to block Satanists from accessing public space, using flimsy excuses, no matter the cost to everybody else. The Satanic Temple hasn’t asked for anything unusual. What we’re seeing is religious discrimination under the guise of respecting the rules. As far as I can tell, no Christian organizations in the state have gone out of their way to defend the Satanists in the name of religious freedom.

How will the Satanists respond this time around?

“We are considering our options on the best way to address this situation,” Adramelech told me.

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