In 2017, Gupta argued that Christian business owners should be forced to serve events they are morally opposed to.
Colorado Christian baker Jack Phillips was at the Supreme Court after he was sued for not baking a cake for a same-sex wedding ceremony. Phillips said that he could not in conscience serve a same-sex wedding ceremony, and said that he should not be forced to do so against his religious beliefs.
Gupta compared the case to segregation-era cases of racial discrimination where business owners flatly denied all service to people based on their race. She argued that religious freedom at times must yield to claims of discrimination.
“On that principle, there ought to be no question that Colorado’s law allowing Charlie Craig and David Mullins to buy a wedding cake from any bakery they choose – notwithstanding that they are gay – should trump claims by a bakery that providing the cake would violate the owner’s religious beliefs,” Gupta wrote in a SCOTUSblog symposium on the case Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission.
“At times, the free exercise of religion yields to other foundational values, including freedom from harm and from discrimination,” she wrote.
While previously at the Justice Department, Gupta also praised the agency’s work on behalf of people identifying as transgender.
In a May 9, 2016 press conference announcing a Justice Department complaint against North Carolina’s bathroom bill, Gupta reiterated the agency’s support for people identifying as transgender.
”Here are the facts. Transgender men are men – they live, work and study as men. Transgender women are women – they live, work and study as women,” she said.
Gupta has also supported abortion in previous statements. After the Supreme Court struck down Louisiana’s abortion regulations last summer, she called for passage of federal legislation that would overturn many state limits on abortion.
“Despite this victory, depending on where they live, too many people in America face insurmountable obstacles to obtaining an abortion. Congress must pass the Women’s Health Protection Act to ensure reproductive freedom is available to all,” Gupta stated. The proposed legislation would subject state abortion laws to increased legal scrutiny.