Joe Scarborough Raises Issue Of Indiana Business Owners' Rights (UPDATE)

Joe Scarborough Raises Issue Of Indiana Business Owners' Rights (UPDATE)

Clarification: The story has been updated with additional video in an effort to provide a broader context of the conversation. Language has been changed to reflect that context more accurately.

MSNBC host Joe Scarborough posited a question about business owners' rights while discussing Indiana's controversial Religious Freedom Reformation Act.

On Wednesday, Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and the "Morning Joe" panel were discussing the legislation, which makes it legal for individuals or companies to cite religious freedom if sued for discrimination by, say, someone in the LGBT community.

These are firmly held beliefs that people have had for thousands of years, and you can call it bigotry if you want to, but just because the attitude in the United States of America has changed over the past decade doesn't mean that we, on this set in Manhattan, should judge -- I'm sorry -- a florist in Little Rock, Arkansas, or in Indianapolis. I'm sure I'll get in trouble for this, but I'm sorry. Everybody is marching lockstep. I wouldn't do it, but at the same time if somebody believes that marriage should be between a man and a woman, I just wonder where [do] their rights stop? Can you no longer go into business as a florist in America if you believe that a man marrying a man or a woman marrying a woman is a sin? And I'm just asking a question.

Brzezinski also offered her opinion.

"It's not our place to judge or deny business to people that we disagree with in any way," she said. "I'm sorry, I don't think attitudes changing over the past 20 years is really the way to describe it. This is about human rights ... We're not going to block people from going into stores because we disagree with their lifestyle."

Scarborough agreed that people should not be barred from service because of their sexual orientation and called Indiana's issue a "distraction."

After a flood of backlash from celebrities, corporations and other states alike, Indiana Governor Mike Pence (R) said Tuesday that changes will be made to the bill to bar discrimination against the LGBT community. Arkansas is slated to sign a similar bill, but Governor Asa Hutchinson (R) said he will only sign if the current version is similarly altered to prevention discrimination.

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George Takei

Reactions To Indiana's 'Religious Freedom' Law

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