An organization
founded by billionaire George Soros on Friday filed a
federal lawsuit against the U.S. Agency for International
Development, claiming that its requirement that all
groups receiving U.S. AIDS grants sign a pledge
opposing commercial sex work is unconstitutional and
hampers efforts to prevent HIV infections overseas, The
Wall Street Journal reports. The Open Society
Institute says the pledge requirement undermines efforts to
"provide lifesaving services and information to sex
workers, who are at significant risk of infection and
can also transmit HIV to others," according to
the Journal. The lawsuit also claims that the
pledge requirement is unconstitutional because it forces
private organizations to endorse the Bush
administration's political positions and can be
applied arbitrarily because it is too vague.
DKT
International, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit
group that provides HIV prevention and education
services to sex workers overseas, filed a similar
lawsuit against USAID last month. That lawsuit says the
policy violates DKT's First Amendment right to
free speech.
The Bush
administration began applying the pledge requirement to all
USAID grants recipients in June. The policy stems from two
2003 laws that prohibit U.S. tax dollars from going to
any group that does not have a policy opposing sex
work and sex trafficking. The pledge is required for
all grant recipients, including those based in foreign
countries and all organizations that receive funding
through the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS
Relief. (Advocate.com)