“The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.” —Article VI, U.S. Constitution (emphasis added)

Pushed increasingly leftward by a cadre of new members who demand it, the Democrat Party’s animus toward organized religion is becoming impossible to hide. In one of the more ugly displays of that animus, Senators Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Mazie Hirono (D-HI) attempted to impose their own religious test on Brian Buescher, an Omaha, Nebraska, lawyer nominated by President Donald Trump to sit on the U.S. District Court in that state. Both women asserted that Buescher belonged to an organization that promoted “extremist” views.

The organization? The Knights of Columbus (KOC). Since its founding in 1882, the Knights of Columbus has become the world’s largest Catholic fraternal organization. In the last 10 years, its two million members have raised more than $1 billion and provided hundreds of millions of man-hours to charitable causes. Its charities include the Christian Refugee Relief Fund, Disaster Relief, Ultrasound Initiative, and Coats for Kids. KOC also partners with international charities that include the Special Olympics, the Global Wheelchair Mission, and Habitat for Humanity.

Nonetheless, Harris and Hirono were incensed that a Catholic organization opposes the Left’s foremost religious “sacrament,” abortion on demand. It also opposes same-sex marriage and expressed that opposition in 2008 by supporting California’s Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage. Proposition 8 passed by a margin of 52.3% to 47.7% in the same year Barack Obama was elected president. The same Barack Obama who also opposed same-sex marriage until he, along with Bill and Hillary Clinton, “evolved.”

Evolution happens quite often among members of a Democrat Part with no core values other than the acquisition and maintenance of power. And once Democrats evolve, those who fail to immediately follow suit become bigots, homophobes, etc. (For those keeping track, the exact same dynamic is playing itself out with the wall. Democrats who once favored a barrier between America and Mexico now deem it “immoral” and those who favor it are racists.)

Thus as far as Harris and Hirono are concerned, the Knights of Columbus is composed of anti-women homophobes whose members have no place in positions of power. Thus, Hirono inquired if Buescher would end his membership with the Knights to “avoid any appearance of bias” and “recuse from all cases in which the Knights of Columbus had taken a position.”

Buescher swatted Hirono down. “If confirmed, I will abide by the Code of Conduct of United States Judges and will not affiliate with any organization in violation of the Code,” he wrote, adding that the KOC “does not have the authority to take personal political positions on behalf of all of its approximately two million members.”

Harris was equally obnoxious, labeling the Knights an “all-male society” that “opposed a woman’s right to choose” and “marriage equality.” She asked Buescher if he knew “the Knights of Columbus opposed marriage equality when [he] joined the organization.”

Again, Buescher responded in stride. “I do not recall if I was aware whether the Knights of Columbus had taken a position … when I joined at the age of 18,” he wrote. Harris also cited a statement from Supreme Knight Carl A. Anderson, who said that abortion constituted “the killing of the innocent on a massive scale” and asked Buescher if he agreed. “I did not draft this language,” he answered. “If confirmed, I would be bound by precedent of the United States Supreme Court and the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals and would not be guided by statements made by others.”

When Buescher ran as a Republican candidate for Nebraska attorney general in 2014, he described himself as “avidly pro-life.” This was too much for Sen. Cory “Spartacus” Booker (D-NJ), who asked Buescher, “Why should a litigant in your courtroom expect to get a fair hearing from an impartial judge in a case involving abortion rights?” Buescher rightly noted that there’s a difference “between taking political positions as a candidate for elective office and serving as a federal judge.” He added, “I believe a judge’s role and obligation is to apply the law without regard to any personal beliefs regarding the law.”

Buescher also fielded other written questions regarding the Trump administration’s Title IX policies regarding abortion-clinic funding and anti-discrimination laws as they pertain to gender “identity” and sexual orientation. Again, Buescher explained that his personal opinions will not prevent him from making fear and impartial rulings based on law and precedent.

The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board, which noted Democrat icon John F. Kennedy was also a KOC member, spelled out what today’s “new” Democrats are all about, writing, “If Mr. Buescher is unfit to serve as a federal judge because of his Knights membership, then so is every other Catholic American who doesn’t publicly repudiate the church’s moral teaching.”

Would that it were only the teachings of the Catholic Church. Anti-Semitic bigotry is an integral part of the party’s fabric as well. One of its newest members is Rashida Tlaib (D-MI). Fresh off her vow to “impeach the motherf —ke r” in reference to President Trump, she has accused her fellow lawmakers who support a bill that would permit local, state, and federal agencies to refrain from doing business with entities that support the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement as having “dual loyalty.” “They forgot what country they represent,” she tweeted.

Democrats have apparently forgotten the same thing. “As a leader of black Christians, I feel particularly strongly about the Knights of Columbus,” writes Eugene F. Rivers III, a Pentecostal minister and director of the Seymour Institute for Black Church and Policy Studies. “For more than a century they bravely defended minorities. … They stood against the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s, the height of its power, helping fund the Supreme Court case that defeated the Klan-backed ban on Catholic education in Oregon.”

That would be the same Ku Klu Klan institutionalized by the same Democrats who opposed the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution, banning slavery, guaranteeing due process and equal protection to former slaves, and granting black Americans the right to vote, respectively. The same Democrats who repeatedly elected former Klansman Robert Byrd — who led a filibuster against the 1964 Civil Rights Act — to the Senate.

“Sens. Harris and Hirono are playing a game: They are engaged in selective religious profiling and sexism,” asserts Catholic League President Bill Donohue.

It’s no game. An increasingly radical Democrat Party has made it clear that those who fail to adopt their bankrupt ideology — in its entirety and without reservation — will be targeted for destruction, by any and all means necessary.

Addendum: Rep. Tulsi Gabbard wrote an op-ed effectively rebuking fellow Aloha State Democrat Mazie Hirono: “For too long in our country, politicians have weaponized religion for their own selfish gain, fomenting bigotry, fears and suspicions based on the faith, religion or spiritual practices of their political opponents.”

Hirono wasn’t buying it. She responded, “It is unfortunate that Congresswoman Gabbard based her misguided opinion on the far right-wing manipulation of these straightforward questions.”