Daily Signal Exclusive: Police Officer Resigns after Being Put on Leave for Facebook Post on Traditional Marriage

Virginia Allen : Jan 25, 2023
The Daily Signal

"I am grateful for the opportunity that I was given to be a police officer. I do not take that honor and responsibility lightly. However, my integrity and Christian beliefs are at the core of who I am, and I will not abandon them." -Jacob Kersey

[DailySignal.com] A Georgia police officer has resigned after he was told by superiors that he could not share his personal religious views on social media. (Screengrab image)

"If someone somewhere considers an opinion I have—that isn't a direct quotation from Scripture—to be offensive, then that would be a fireable offense," Jacob Kersey, the former officer, told The Daily Signal.

Kersey, 19, who began working last May at the Port Wentworth Police Department, in a jurisdiction just outside Savannah, says "everything was going well" until the start of the new year.

On Jan. 2, Kersey posted a 20-word message about his view of marriage on Facebook. 

"God designed marriage. Marriage refers to Christ and the Church," he wrote, paraphrasing the Apostle Paul's teaching in the Book of Ephesians. "That's why there is no such thing as homosexual marriage."

The next day, Kersey said he received a phone call from his supervisor, who told him that someone had complained about the post and to take it down.

When Kersey refused, the supervisor warned him that failure to delete the Facebook post on marriage could result in his termination.

Kersey said he then was contacted by Lt. Justin Hardy, who told him that the Port Wentworth Police Department didn't want to be held liable in a "use of force" situation involving someone in the LGBTQ community. Kersey still refused to delete the post.

The police officer received a phone call later that day from the police department's Maj. Lee Sherrod, ordering him to come to the office the following morning, Jan. 4, and turn in everything he had that belonged to the city.

Kersey told The Daily Signal that he believed he was going to be terminated.

When he arrived at the police station, the young officer met with Sherrod, Hardy, Capt. Nathan Jentzen, and Police Chief Matt Libby.

He was told that he was "being placed on administrative leave while the city investigated to see if I could keep my job," Kersey said. "I was told that I was wise beyond my years, an old soul, and that they brag on me all the time, but that I couldn't post things like that"... Subscribe for free to Breaking Christian News here

Click Here to read what happened next.

Virginia Allen is a senior news producer and podcast host for The Daily Signal. She is the co-host of The Daily Signal Podcast and Problematic Women.