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On 7 April 2017, the web site USA Politics Today published a report, followed by a series of posts from questionable web sites, saying that the United States Supreme Court had ruled it illegal for U.S. schools to teach Sharia law: In reality, the high court has not considered the matter of Sharia law, a set of Islamic religious principles that various scholars and governments interpret differently. Sharia -- or the fear of it -- has been the subject of several anti-Muslim claims, including one stating that President Donald Trump had banned it nationwide. Following Justice Neil Gorsuch's appointment to the court on 10 April 2017, some versions of the story falsely cast him as the decisive vote in a 5-4 ruling on the issue. These versions also tended to include a statement, in all-caps, from his supposed first opinion for the court: Gorsuch, who was appointed by Trump, did not cast his first vote until 20 April 2017, when he joined four other justices in denying a stay of execution to Ledell Lee, an Arkansas man who was sentenced to death for killing a woman by strangling her in 1993. On 9 May 2017, the Federalist Tribune web site published another version of the story, based on the equally false claim that the high court ruled on a complaint by the Volusia County Republican Party in Florida. There was no such case. But the group did promote an online petition a month earlier criticizing the Department of Education for allowing school districts to use the documentary series Access Islam as a learning tool. The petition stated: But the program, which was created using federal funding in 2005, is not required viewing in Florida schools. We contacted both the Department of Education and WNET-TV (which co-produced the series) seeking further comment but had not received a response by press time.
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