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THE BURKE FAMILY made headlines this week after they travelled to Washington DC and were removed from a gala attended by Taoiseach Micheál Martin on Thursday night.
Members of the family protested the event over ongoing legal issues faced by Enoch Burke, who has repeatedly been imprisoned for breaking a court order requiring him to stay away from the grounds of his former employer, Wilson’s Hospital School
It was not the first time that the Burkes have been removed by police during a protest, but it was unusual to see such scenes in the US – a place where the family’s cause has been taken up by religious groups.
Enoch Burke has no shortage of US supporters, as was evidenced when the latest episode in his case was heard at the High Court last week.
The hearing involved an application by the Attorney General to appoint a receiver who could collect fines that Burke owes the State, on foot of his refusal to comply with the court order
In the aftermath, the AG’s application was misleadingly framed by Burke and his supporters on social media as an attempt by the pillars of the State to silence him.
A video posted to Burke’s verified account on X.com featured his brother Josiah and mother Martina claiming that he was being “stripped of every right he has because he won’t accept transgender ideology”.
Another anonymous account on the platform, going by the handle @CilColmLFC, re-shared the video with an incorrect claim that Burke was having his salary taken off him for refusing to use they/them pronouns for a transgender student.
At some point the next day, the post caught the attention of Elon Musk, who re-shared it on X with a one-word comment: “Wow.”
But while Musk has become the most high-profile person in the US to have amplified misinformation about Enoch Burke, other parts of conservative America have also championed the former teacher in recent years.
Evangelical news outlets, members of the Christian right and US conspiracy groups have all promoted his case since the start of his legal issues, presenting him as a victim of the culture-war and religious persecution.
Ciaran O’Connor of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue suggested that Burke’s case could resonate among US conservative groups because they may see it as “similar to their own efforts to defend traditional or religious values”.
He said that misinformation about Burke’s case helped to play into a broader narrative around free speech and religious freedom.
“Religious freedom and free speech are unquestionably important topics that must be protected, but they have nothing to do with Burke’s imprisonment,” O’Connor said.
“It is misinformation peddled by supporters and others online that has helped fuel this misrepresentation.”
The activities of Burke and his family can be seen in the context of a wider culture war crusade by the religious right against LGBTQ+ people internationally.
In recent years, Christian groups have increasingly campaigned against laws or policies that recognise or include the LGBTQ+ community by referencing the importance of their religious beliefs.
They have claimed that their beliefs are at odds with the legalisation of same-sex relationships and the recognition of different gender identities, and believe that their views should be prioritised instead.
The tactic originated among the Christian right movement in the US, where religious groups sought to evolve their methods as public opinion on LGBTQ+ rights has softened over time.
It has led to dozens of cases in the US in which conservative Christians have argued they should be constitutionally protected from having to serve LGBTQ+ people.
This culminated in a 2023 US Supreme Court ruling in favour of a Colorado web designer who refused to create wedding websites for gay couples on free speech grounds.
However, members of the Burke family have been less successful in importing this legal approach to Ireland, where there is no constitutional protection for free speech as there is in the US.
Enoch Burke’s case against Wilson’s is the most high-profile instance of the family adopting such a strategy, but it is not the first time they’ve done so.
In 2021, Enoch and three of his siblings, Isaac, Kezia, Ammi, lost a case they brought to the Circuit Court, in which they claimed that a lifetime ban imposed on them from joining college societies at NUI Galway amounted to religious discrimination.
However, while the family have not been successful in the courts, Enoch’s imprisonment has earned him significant international support because of the way his case has been misleadingly framed as a wider culture war issue involving trans people and free speech.
Though it fundamentally centres on the mundane technicalities of civil court orders and a HR battle involving his former employer, his case has been painted by the Burkes and Enoch’s supporters as a straightforward battle around religious freedom.
They claim Burke was fired because of his refusal to address a student by their preferred pronouns, misrepresenting his initial suspension because of his behaviour towards his principal at Wilson’s Hospital School.
They also say his religious stance culminated in his imprisonment for more than 500 days, though he was actually jailed for contempt of court after repeatedly breaching a High Court injunction requiring him to stay away from the school.
After the latest hearing, the Burkes claimed the State is repressing Enoch’s freedom by taking his salary, which in truth is an attempt to recoup tens of thousands in unpaid fines handed to him in lieu of imprisoning him for breaching the court order.
By adopting the tactics of the American Christian right, the Burkes have amplified Enoch’s case to a much bigger audience.
When Enoch was first arrested on 5 September 2022, the case was reported on by media outlets across the world, many of them glossing over the facts behind his imprisonment to present him as a culture war victim.
They included a handful of Christian media groups based in the United States which leaned into or repeated the false claim that Burke had been suspended from work and jailed because he wouldn’t address a transgender pupil by their preferred pronouns.
These pieces often described Burke as a “Christian teacher” and prominently reported his quotes from court like “Transgenderism is against my Christian belief” and “I am here today because I would not call a boy a girl”.
As news of Burke’s imprisonment exploded online, it was picked up by prominent religious and politically conservative groups in the US, who pushed the narrative that Burke was being persecuted.
The Young America’s Foundation – a group led by Wisconsin’s former Republican governor Scott Walker – shared a news article about Burke to more than 2 million followers on Facebook the day after Burke was imprisoned.
“This brave teacher was hauled off to jail under threat of a government gun for refusing to submit to the Left’s ideology,” it incorrectly claimed.
Dave Rubin, a well-known conservative pundit who has almost 3 million followers on YouTube, also discussed Burke’s case in a video on the platform in which he warned that Americans could soon be imprisoned for the same reason.
“Guess what? They will try to figure out a way for people to do it here in the United States – thank God for that First Amendment,” he said.
A number of Evangelical pastors with large followings on social media also warned about Burke’s treatment in the days after he was first arrested as a sign of impending rapture.
Dr Jim Garlow, a well-known pastor who has been involved in politics in his home State of California, told his followers that Ireland was “only two steps ahead of the US”.
“This is what the Democrat-Fascists-Progressive-Leftist believe in this country,” he said. “Ireland today. America tomorrow.”
Since Burke’s initial arrest, repeated decisions by judges to release and re-imprison him for breaching the court order have only given his message more opportunities for publicity in the US – as Musk’s post last week showed.
But others have continued to support Burke between his court appearances.
Another pastor, Tennessee-based Ken Peters, initially called on his followers to pray for Burke after his first arrest in September.
Since then, he has posted regularly about Burke’s case to his tens of thousands of followers on Facebook and on X.
This week, he claimed incorrectly that Burke was still in prison and that the Burke family travelled to the US because they had been granted asylum by Donald Trump.
Peters was previously named in a CNN investigation as being near the Capitol building in Washington DC and for calling Mike Pence a “coward” on Twitter on the day of the 6 January riots.
Anti-trans NGOs in the US have also posted similar claims about the Burkes to motivate their followers, including a group called Gays Against Groomers, who re-shared an old video of Burke being arrested alongside links asking for donations.
Ciaran O’Connor of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue said that misrepresenting the true basis for Burke’s imprisonment has ultimately been key to his case going viral.
“This framing was adopted by popular online channels, influencers and social media figures, who then amplified this misrepresentation across the world,” he said.
“Notably, this framing played into a broader narrative that framed Burke as a martyr for free speech and religious freedom – two topics of great appeal to certain audiences.”
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