MOREHEAD, Ky. (AP) — A defiant county clerk in Kentucky has again refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples despite a ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court.
On Tuesday morning, as Rowan County clerk Kim Davis' office opened, two couples were denied licenses.
A deputy clerk told April Miller and Karen Roberts, who walked into the office trailed by dozens of television cameras, that no licenses would be issued and refused to make Davis available.
A second couple, David Moore and David Ermold, rejected a fourth time, are demanding to speak with Davis.
Ermold shouted: "Tell her to come out and face the people she's discriminating against."
Davis is in her office, with the door and the blinds closed.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to intervene in the case, leaving Davis no legal grounds to refuse to grant licenses to gay couples. A district judge could now hold her in contempt, which can carry steep fines or jail time.
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Gay couples in a Kentucky county are expected at the courthouse door Tuesday morning after the Supreme Court ruled against a defiant clerk who has refused to hand out marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
The court rejected Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis' last-ditch appeal for a delay in her case Monday. On Tuesday morning, she'll have to choose whether to issue marriage licenses, or continue to refuse them and risk being fined or even possibly jailed.
Davis stopped issuing licenses the day the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage. A federal judge ordered her to issue them, and an appeals court upheld that decision. Still, she's turned away couples again and again.
The Supreme Court declined to intervene, leaving her no legal grounds to refuse.