Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-418_i425.pdf
Page Number: 47

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

7 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

next day after the October 16 homecoming game.1 

Before  the  homecoming  game,  Kennedy  made  multiple 
media appearances to publicize his plans to pray at the 50-
yard line, leading to an article in the Seattle News and a 
local television broadcast about the upcoming homecoming 
game.  In the wake of this media coverage, the District be-
gan receiving a large number of emails, letters, and calls, 
many of them threatening.

The  District  responded  to  Kennedy’s  letter  before  the 
game on October 16.  It emphasized that Kennedy’s letter 
evinced  “materia[l]  misunderstand[ings]”  of  many  of  the 
facts  at  issue.    Id.,  at  76.  For  instance,  Kennedy’s  letter 
asserted that he had not invited anyone to pray with him; 
the District noted that that might be true of Kennedy’s Sep-
tember  17  prayer  specifically,  but  that  Kennedy  had 
acknowledged inviting others to join him on many previous
occasions.  The District’s September 17 letter had explained 
that Kennedy traditionally held up helmets from the BHS 
and opposing teams while players from each team kneeled 
around him.  While Kennedy’s letter asserted that his pray-
ers “occurr[ed] ‘on his own time,’ after his duties as a Dis-
trict  employee  had  ceased,”  the  District  pointed  out  that
Kennedy  “remain[ed]  on  duty”  when  his  prayers  occurred
“immediately  following  completion  of  the  football  game, 
when students are still on the football field, in uniform, un-
der  the  stadium  lights,  with  the  audience  still  in  attend-
ance, and while Mr. Kennedy is still in his District-issued 
and  District-logoed  attire.”    Id.,  at  78  (emphasis  deleted). 
—————— 

1 The Court recounts that Kennedy was “willing to say his ‘prayer while
the players were walking to the locker room’ or ‘bus,’ and then catch up 
with his team.”  Ante, at 4 (quoting App. 280–282); see also ante, at 5. 
Kennedy made the quoted remarks, however, only during his deposition 
in the underlying litigation, stating in response to a question that such
timing would have been “physically possible” and “possibly” have been 
acceptable to him, but that he had never “discuss[ed] with the District
whether that was a possibility for [him] to do” and had “no idea” whether
his lawyers raised it with the District.  App. 280.