Three students have filed a lawsuit against Virginia officials over allegations that they were denied access to scholarship grant programs because of their decision to pursue religious studies.
Cameron Johnson and Luke Thomas, recent high school graduates planning to attend Liberty University, along with Trace Stevens, a current Liberty student, initiated the legal action late last month in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Richmond Division.
The defendants named in the lawsuit include A. Scott Fleming, director of the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia; John Jumper, chair of the same council; Major General James W. Ring, adjutant general of Virginia; and Donald Unmussig, chief financial officer of the Virginia Department of Military Affairs.
According to the complaint, Johnson and Thomas were denied a Tuition Assistance Grant because the SCHEV reportedly excludes certain religious programs of study. And Stevens, Virginia Army National Guard member, was denied a grant from the National Guard Tuition Assistance Grant Program because his academic study was centered on “religious training or theological education.”
The three students are being represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a nonprofit legal organization dedicated to protecting religious freedom. Jake Reed, legal counsel for ADF, told The Christian Post that his organization had received numerous calls from individuals concerned about the restrictions tied to these grant programs.
“We decided to take the case because, at bottom, what is happening in the great state of Virginia, this exclusion for certain students who decide to pick certain religious programs is unconstitutional, violates the First Amendment. We want to make that right,” Reed said.
Reed emphasized that “this is a generally available – or supposed to be generally available – public benefit program to all college students in the state of Virginia,” and asserted that “all Trace, Cameron and Luke want is to be treated equally to their classmates. So that’s what this case is about.”
In recent years, there has been notable litigation regarding whether students pursuing Christian education qualify for certain publicly funded benefits or tuition assistance programs.
In 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in David Carson et al. v. A. Pender Makin that Maine’s state tuition assistance program could not prevent parents from applying funds to institutions that include religious instruction.
Additionally, in December, Georgia officials reversed previous restrictions and allowed Luther Rice College and Seminary to participate in student financial aid programs available to other colleges, after initially excluding any “school or college of theology or divinity.”
