Spectators knocked over members of the marching band while racing to join the prayer and directed profanity at Bremerton's head coach, who said he feared being "shot from the crowd.

"[2] After Kennedy continued this prayer for two more games, the district superintendent put him on paid leave for violating the school's policies and endangering students.

[6][7] In 2019, the Supreme Court denied his first petition for a writ of certiorari, but Justice Alito, joined by Thomas, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh said the case was "troubling and may justify review in the future.

[11] The Ninth Circuit was split in this denial; while Judge Milan Smith, writing for the majority in denying en banc, said that "Kennedy made it his mission to intertwine religion with football", Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain in the dissenting opinion wrote that the majority went against Tinker v. Des Moines in that "It is axiomatic that teachers do not 'shed' their First Amendment protections ‘at the schoolhouse gate'.

According to Adam Liptak of The New York Times, the Court's conservative majority appeared to favor Kennedy's arguments though their questioning likely looked towards a narrow ruling that would not fully disrupt past case law on religion in public schools.

He further wrote "We are aware of no historically sound understanding of the Establishment Clause that begins to '(make) it necessary for government to be hostile to religion' in this way".

Gorsuch rejected the school district’s argument that it could prohibit Kennedy’s post-game prayers so that students did not feel compelled to join him in praying.

Gorsuch reasoned that unlike those earlier cases, Kennedy’s prayers "were not publicly broadcast or recited to a captive audience" and students “were not required or expected to participate".

Gorsuch concluded that the school district’s actions "rested on a mistaken view that it had a duty to ferret out and suppress religious observances even as it allows comparable secular speech", and that "The Constitution neither mandates nor tolerates that kind of discrimination".

Kennedy prayed during a period when school employees were free to speak with a friend, call for a reservation at a restaurant, check email, or attend to other personal matters.

Sotomayor in the dissent wrote the situation as "The record reveals that Kennedy had a long-standing practice of conducting demonstrative prayers on the 50-yard line of the football field.

Sotomayor summarized these points as "To the degree the court portrays petitioner Joseph Kennedy’s prayers as private and quiet, it misconstrues the facts.

"[19] Sotomayor also wrote that the Supreme Court "has consistently recognized that school officials leading prayer is constitutionally impermissible."

Justice Sotomayor's dissent further establishes that the majority opinion "overrules" Lemon, and "calls into question decades of subsequent precedents that it deems offshoots".

[23] An analysis by Ian Millhiser of Vox suggests that the decision's impact may be limited, as the opinion's description of Kennedy's actions as "private" would have already been permissible under Lee v.