Who is Kim Davis? Former Kentucky Clerk ordered to pay $100,000 over violating gay couple's constitutional rights

Kentucky Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who caused an international uproar for refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, was ordered to pay $100,000 to the plaintiffs who sued her for violating their constitutional rights.

In 2015, after the Supreme Court struck down laws banning gay marriages, Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis refused to sign a couple's marriage certificates, claiming that it would violate her religious beliefs.

Davis then spent five days in jail for contempt of court after she refused to abide by the Judge’s order to issue the licenses to two gay couples. Davis was released eventually after a deputy clerk approved the gay couples' request. Shortly after, the state legislature changed the law to remove clerks’ names from the licenses.

However, Kim Davis was sued by two same-s*x couples to whom she refused to grant marriage licenses. While the district court ruled that Davis had violated the constitutional rights of the gay couples, they only awarded damages to one couple, David Ermold and David Moore.

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Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis is a member of the Apostolic Church

Kim Davis, Rowan County Clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, claiming that it went against her beliefs as a member of the Apostolic Church, was ordered to pay $100,00 in damages. According to CNN, Davis had converted to Apostolic Christianity, a faith that believes marriage should only be between one man and one woman, a few years before the Supreme Court legalized same s*x union.

Kim Davis, a Republican, filed for reelection in 2018 after she became a conservative Christian poster child for refusing to sign a gay couple’s marriage certificates three years ago. However, she lost the county clerk election bid to Democrat Elwood Caudill Jr., who won by 650 votes.

The verdict, awarding $100,000 in damages to the gay couple, came a year after a federal judge ruled that Davis had violated their constitutional rights.

Judge David Bunning arrived at the decision after determining that Davis, as a government official, could not invoke her personal religious beliefs when she had been elected to serve the public without discrimination.

The plaintiff Ermold and Moore's co-counsel, Joe Buckles, told NPR that the case was not about religious beliefs but about a government employee who refused to do her job.

"The Supreme Court says that my clients have a constitutional right to marry under the 14th Amendment. But this case isn't really about [Davis's] religion. The case isn't really about our client's right to marry. The case is about a government official who just refused to do her job. It's a pretty simple case."

However, Rene Heinrich, the attorney who represented the other gay couple in the lawsuit, James Yates and Will Smith, told NPR that she was disappointed at the verdict of no damages for her clients.

"I can only say that our clients were gutted and even more dejected when after 8 years yet another group of people decided that while their Constitutional rights were broken and they were thrust into a circus not of their making, they suffered no damages."

Meanwhile, Davis’ attorney, Mat Staver, said that they plan to appeal the verdict.