Satanists sue Iowa officials for blocking them from erecting a holiday display in the Capitol
State officials kept inventing rules to block The Satanic Temple from putting up a holiday display in the name of protecting children
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The ACLU of Iowa is suing state officials for blocking The Satanic Temple from putting up a holiday display inside the State Capitol, a blatant case of religious discrimination that Republicans refuse to acknowledge.
This is the culmination of discrimination that’s been happening for years now, and it began in 2023. You may recall that in December of that year, a Satanic display went up in the Capitol alongside a Nativity scene. Gov. Kim Reynolds called the innocuous display “absolutely objectionable.”
A Christian zealot, Michael Cassidy, soon vandalized the display and was later charged with a hate crime. (He eventually pleaded guilty to a lesser crime to avoid felony charges.)
Despite all that, only the Satanists have ever been punished over the whole debacle, with one GOP lawmaker even filing a bill to ban Satanic displays on public property. That bill, thankfully, didn’t go anywhere, but administration officials have been trying to find their own ways to prevent Satanic displays from appearing in the Capitol.
If that bill didn’t go anywhere, then how come the Satanists were blocked from putting up a holiday display in 2024?
Because of a sudden rule change.
See, the Satanic Temple of Iowa planned to hold a marathon four-day reading of John Milton’s 1667 epic poem “Paradise Lost” inside the Capitol, and as soon as they filed the paperwork, the Iowa Department of Administrative Services announced that it was changing its rules for who could use the Capitol space. From now on, events couldn’t last longer than one day, and no group could hold “more than one event per calendar year.”
That one-day limit, the officials told the Satanists, would also apply to holiday displays in the future. Furthermore, that meant if the Satanists held a one-day reading of “Paradise Lost” in the Capitol, they would be prohibited from erecting a display in December.
(In fact, a different group, the Iowa Atheists and Freethinkers, hoped to put a holiday display in the Capitol in 2024, but their application was rejected because they held a “Reason on the Hill” lobbying event in the building that January. In other words, they inadvertently used up their allotted yearly slot based on rules that went into effect several months later.)
The same agreement included another section that prohibited any Capitol displays that might be seen as “obscene.”
Were those rules changed directly because of the Satanists’ request? And who got to decide which displays were obscene, offensive, or worthy of value? No one knew.
In any case, the Satanists held their reading event at a different location to avoid being shut out during the holidays…
But when December came around in 2024, they were shut out anyway.
They planned to hold a one-day holiday celebration at the Capitol—and filled out the necessary paperwork—only to have the event canceled at the last second because a state official declared their presence would be “harmful to minors.”
“After careful consideration of administrative rule and [Iowa Department of Administrative Services] DAS policy, I determined the totality of the event request to include elements that are harmful to minors and therefore denied the request,” DAS director Adam Steen, the director of the Iowa DAS, said in a statement provided to the Des Moines Register.
Steen didn’t specify what the objectionable elements were or how they could be harmful to minors.
At one point, Steen did explain the concern: There were going to be “costumes with sticks used as weapons on children.” As if Satanists were going to harm children by beating them with sticks. Not only was that never part of the plan, it’s deeply ironic because that’s quite literally what white evangelicals like James Dobson urge parents to do to their children.
Gov. Kim Reynolds later echoed those lies about how the event would harm children:
“The Iowa State Capitol Complex is a place that is open to the public, where children and families routinely visit,” the governor said. “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.”
Again, there was no explanation of how the holiday celebration would be harmful.
None of it made any sense.
The Satanic Temple Iowa threatened to file a lawsuit in 2025 over this bigotry, but they never actually did it. Over the summer, however, the ACLU of Iowa filed a civil rights complaint on behalf of the Satanists with the Iowa Civil Rights Commission.
The complaint alleges in denying the application, the state wrongly alleged the celebration would have included sex acts, gore, and similar content and was not suitable for minors.
The looming question, then, was whether 2025 would be any different. Would the state still fight the Satanists or would they see the furor dying down and just let it slide?
Take a wild guess.
That year, the Iowa Department of Administrative Services once again blocked the Satanists from putting up a holiday display in the Capitol or having any kind of celebration inside, claiming that it would be harmful to minors. (Again, no evidence of this was offered.)
In fact, Adam Steen, who was running to become governor (but lost in the GOP primary), held a press conference last November as part of his apparent victory-against-Satan tour:
… This is a tipping point. One of the most divisive issues in the state over the last couple of years, and the attempts of the so-called “Satanic Church,” has been denied yet again. No more marketing to children. No more trying to get them to create Satanic symbols, sing Satanic hymns, partake in Satanic rituals. No more having youth involved in costume contests that depict weapons used to abuse youth. This is not religious expression. It’s not free speech. It is evil.
…
We did it. We stood up. We got the denial that we wanted. And I’m proud to say that good, again, has defeated evil. Denying this event will protect our children. Our children deserve that. Thank you. God bless you. God bless the great state of Iowa…
Elsewhere in that video, he said he was the “only candidate being sued by the Satanists.” That was a lie. The Satanic Temple hadn’t sued him, and if any reporter cared to press him on that, they would know he’s lying.
After his bloviating was over, Steen was asked what was so offensive about the proposed Satanic display. He evaded the question and said “Any content that goes towards the soul of children, and that fights against the good that are inside of children, is evil and needs to be flushed out. Anything that rips away hope from children. Anything that… raises up this Satanic name is evil for children. And I will always fight for children to keep that out of their way.”
He was also asked what, if any, other religious beliefs might be “harmful to children.” His response? “Anything that is not God first.”
Seemed like a blatant case of religious discrimination. He was just defining religious symbols he didn’t like as inherently evil without explaining how they were harmful. Even though, if kids followed the Seven Fundamental Tenets of The Satanic Temple, they would be far more ethical than children raised in conservative Christianity.
It seems like, after years of Iowa officials creating piles of evidence of religious discrimination, the Satanic Temple of Iowa is finally fighting back with force.
The federal lawsuit goes after Steen (“in his individual capacity”), Mark Campbell (who took over Steen’s job as Director of the Iowa Department of Administrative Services), and the Iowa Department of Administrative Services. The Plaintiffs include The Satanic Temple and Mortimer Adramelech, who runs TST’s Iowa affiliate.
In addition to laying out much of what I’ve written here, the lawsuit notes that this past March, the Satanists submitted paperwork to put up a display this December… and they have yet to receive a response. That’s over 160 days ago. The reason for the delay is glaringly obvious.
… Defendants have discriminated against TST-Iowa by denying them services and public accommodations, both (1) on the basis of their religion and/or their perception of their religion and (2) in retaliation for their prior reports of discrimination.
There is a pattern and practice of Defendants delaying, denying, or failing to respond to applications by the Plaintiffs. There is no reason to expect this pattern to change, or expect that Defendants will actually allow TST-Iowa to hold their 2026 holiday event at the Rotunda absent intervention by this Court.
The lawsuit says the state has violated the Satanists’ “federal constitutional rights to free speech, free exercise of religion, and equal protection under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.” They also want the courts to end these violations and allow The Satanic Temple to put up a display this December in the Capitol, along with forcing the state to pay whatever amount the court deems fit in damages.
It’s such a clear-cut case of religious discrimination:
"It is a foundational principle that the government should not favor one religious belief over another or discriminate against its citizens based on their religious beliefs," said Rita Bettis Austen, legal director of the ACLU of Iowa. "So that means when the state makes the public space in the Capitol rotunda available for these religious holiday events — for example, a Christmas event or a Hanukkah event — it cannot then deny that same right to other religious groups that it disfavors."
All I can say is it’s about damn time. This whole controversy revealed how little conservatives care about “religious freedom.” They think it only applies to Christians like them. The moment a minority faith seeks the same access to public space that Christians have always enjoyed, the whole structure collapses. Iowa officials used children’s safety as an excuse to censor a non-Christian group.
That’s why this lawsuit matters. The Satanists’ presence forces government officials to confront the actual meaning of religious freedom, not the imaginary version crafted by Christian Nationalists. They’re exposing the obvious double standards: how the rules only “change” when Christians feel inconvenienced, how displays are only “obscene” when they’re not promoting Jesus, and how harm to “children” only counts when imaginary demons are involved—not when an actual Christian vandal destroys a lawful display in broad daylight.
If Iowa’s conservative leaders thought they could get away with banning a peaceful, lawful, minority-faith display from a public building, they’re about to find out the law’s not on their side. And their own statements are going to be some of the key pieces of evidence against them.
(Portions of this article were publisher earlier)
Why do xtians find atheist displays "objectionable," yet have NO objections to a beaten, bleeding man nailed to and hanging from a wooden torture/execution device? Something Catholic children see every time they go to Mass?
Xtians are sick sick sick.
"Harmful to minors." Said by the religion that is full-to-overflowing with child predators. A fact we see on a near-daily basis.