Gabriel Rench, a Christian man arrested for refusing to wear a mask while participating in an outdoor church service in September 2020, was awarded a $300,000 settlement from the city of Moscow, Idaho.
Rench sued the town alongside two fellow churchgoers, Sean and Rachel Bohnet, one year after they were arrested and detained for several hours, alleging their Fourth and First Amendment rights had been violated.
“You guys should not be doing this, and doing this kind of crap for the mayor. This is embarrassing. You guys are stronger than this, your more capable than this, you guys are tough people,” Rench told the arresting officer as he was escorted to a police cruiser.
Rench celebrated the ruling in a Monday Fox & Friends interview but expressed concern that many Americans who had their rights violated during the Covid lockdowns did not receive similar justice.
“I’m very grateful that I got a victory. How many people nationwide didn’t get a victory?” Rench told Fox & Friends on Monday following the announcement. “They violated my First Amendment rights in a small town. And I think really what you’re seeing in the city of Moscow is a microcosm of what’s going on nationwide.”
“Liberalism is really turning into kind of a modern-day cult,” Rench added. “They use coercion, they want power, and they have no real moral standard that is kind of fixed for them.”
“[I am] happy that we came to a settlement and the case is over,” Sean Bohnet told the Idaho State Journal. “What’s frustrating is when slander and lies get involved. Like, ‘Oh, you guys do this, you support that, you support that.’ That’s the frustrating part when people slander and tell lies about us, which happened.”
Rench, a former Republican candidate for the Latah County Commission, told the outlet that Moscow’s mayor, police chief, and a city council member all refused to meet with him following the incident.
“This is why I don’t take their admission, their tacit admission, seriously, because they really don’t care about justice,” Rench told the Journal. “The insurance premiums are going to go up, and all they’re doing is using the citizens’ money…not to admit and cover up.”
Moscow, home to the University of Idaho, has a reputation for being a liberal town.
“Our mayor was breaking social distancing and masking rules,” Rench said later in his interview on Fox. “He went and played golf and drank beer with his buddies the day he shut down our town in March 2020…He was officiating open-door – excuse me – outside weddings a month before he had me arrested.”
“They don’t really want to have real conversations, but that’s just liberalism 2.0 and cancel culture for sure.”