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ROWAN COUNTY, KY, September 3, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) — Rowan County clerk Kim Davis has been jailed for contempt of court for not giving marriage licenses to gay couples.

According to USA TODAY, U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning placed her in the custody of U.S. marshals.

Bunning had previously ordered Davis to give licenses to gay couples, an order she refused. Davis has argued that the U.S. Constitution, the Kentucky Constitution, and the Kentucky Religious Freedom Restoration Act protected her from being forced to give the licenses, even as a public employee.

Davis has been criticized as a hypocrite for her stand because she has been married four times, and was impregnated by her third husband during her first marriage. Her last marriage took place in 2008. 

But her supporters note that she had a conversion to born-again Christianity four years ago, after a deathbed wish from her mother for her to go to church.

More than 100 protesters gathered outside the courthouse on both sides of the issues. One news outlet described the scene as “chaos.”

Davis's fight has largely been carried out by her and a handful of supporters, with even GOP presidential candidates split between supporting her and demanding she hand out the licenses or quit her job.

First Things editor R.R. Reno defended Davis in an op-ed, saying, “Our legal and political system has no final authority over us, because there is a higher one. At times, one ought not to do what one is told to do. Kim Davis finds herself in just that sort of situation. Good for her. She’s doing something noble: quietly following the dictates of her conscience.”

According to the Kentucky Trial Court Review, the attorney for Rowan County told Davis that he would not defend her, and that she “does not represent” the county.

Bunning was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2001 and approved by the Senate despite nepotism charges because his father was a sitting U.S. senator.

The Associated Press reports that Bunning “was part of a three judge panel on a federal appeals court that overturned Michigan's ban on partial-birth abortion,” and in 2003 he “ordered the Boyd County School District to allow the student club Gay-Straight Alliance to meet on campus.”

Contact: 

The Honorable David L. Bunning
United States District Judge
US District Court
35 West 5th Street
Covington, KY 41011
Phone: (859) 392-7907
Fax: (859) 392-7945