Court Enjoins Implementation of Ban on Transgender Individuals Serving in the Military

In Talbott v. United States, (D DC, March 18, 2025), the United States federal district court for the District of Columbia issued a preliminary injunction barring the military from implementing Executive Orders and military memoranda that exclude transgender persons from serving in the military. The injunction requires the military to maintain the pre-Trump status quo on military service by transgender individuals. Explaining its decision, the court's 79-page opinion said in part:

The Court agrees that “courts [are] ill-equipped to determine the impact upon discipline that any particular intrusion upon military authority might have” and that “the military authorities [not courts] have been charged by the Executive and Legislative Branches with carrying out our Nation’s military policy.”... Often, courts accept “the reasoned, professional analysis of Congress and the Executive on matters strictly within the realm of military expertise.”...   

Defendants carry deference too far, however.  By “defer” they basically mean the Court must side with the military’s position, end-stop.  And they contend the Court must defer even if the judgment, as here, does not make sense....

The Court ... applies Bostock’s reasoning to analyze the Military Ban.  In doing so, it does not “import[] the Title VII test for liability,” ... into the equal protection guarantee of the Fifth Amendment.  Rather, it borrows Justice Gorsuch’s reasoning to conclude that transgender discrimination is a form of sex discrimination for purposes of the equal protection inquiry....

... [B]ecause the Military Ban targets transgender persons for disparate treatment, it creates an explicit sex-based classification that requires application of intermediate scrutiny. ...

The court also concluded that the Military Ban is subject to intermediate scrutiny because transgender persons should be considered a quasi-suspect class. The court went on:

Defendants have articulated important government objectives in military readiness, unit cohesion, and saving costs.  But the Fifth Amendment requires more than pointing to such “broadly formulated interests.”...  Defendants must show that the discriminatory Military Ban is in some way substantially related to the achievement of those objectives.  And they must do so without relying on “overbroad generalizations about the different talents, capacities, or preferences of males and females.” ... They do not come close.  Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on their claim that the Military Ban fails intermediate scrutiny review.....

The Military Ban is soaked in animus and dripping with pretext.  Its language is unabashedly demeaning, its policy stigmatizes transgender persons as inherently unfit, and its conclusions bear no relation to fact.  Thus, even if the Court analyzed the Military Ban under rational basis review, it would fail....

The Court could stop here in its analysis and comfortably conclude that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on their claim that the Military Ban is motivated by animus and is not tailored to meet its stated goals.  But, as they say, there is more, for the Military Ban does not stand alone.  President Trump has signed an executive order recognizing the existence of only two sexes; blocked schools from using federal funds to promote the idea that gender can be fluid; directed the State Department to stop issuing documents that allow a third “X” gender marker; changed references to “LGBTQI+” on government websites to “LGB,” erasing not just transgender persons, but intersex people as well; revoked the ability of transgender federal employees to receive gender-affirming care; and directed that all incarcerated transgender persons be denied medical treatments and be housed by birth sex, where they are nine times more susceptible to violence....

NPR reports on the decision.

Trump Nominates Brian Burch as Ambassador to the Vatican

Yesterday, President Donald Trump formally submitted to Congress the nomination of Brian Burch to be U.S. ambassador to the Holy See. Burch is President of CatholicVote. According to Catholic News Agency, last December Trump announced on Truth Social that he intended to nominate Burch for the position. CNA's report in December said in part:

CatholicVote is a political advocacy group that endorsed Trump in January and ran advertisements in support the president-elect during his campaign. According to CatholicVote, the organization spent over $10 million on the 2024 elections.

Trump Issues Ash Wednesday Greetings

Today the White House released an Ash Wednesday Message (full text) from President Trump and the First Lady. The Message reads in part:

This Ash Wednesday, we join in prayer with the tens of millions of American Catholics and other Christians beginning the holy season of Lent—a time of spiritual anticipation of the passion, death, and Resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ....

As we solemnly contemplate Jesus Christ’s suffering and death on the cross this Lent, let us prepare our souls for the coming glory of the Easter miracle.

We offer you our best wishes for a prayerful and enriching Lenten season....

Court Enjoins Cutoff of Funds to Institutions Offering Gender-Affirming Care to Minors

In PFLAG, Inc. v. Trump, (D MD, March 4, 2025), a Maryland federal district court issued a nationwide preliminary injunction against enforcement of provisions in two Executive Orders that threaten to cut off federal funding to medical institutions that offer gender-affirming care to individuals under 19 years of age.  The court found that plaintiffs are likely to succeed on three claims, saying in part:

Because the Executive Orders direct agencies to withhold funding on a condition that Congress has not authorized, the President has exceeded his authority. The Plaintiffs have thus sufficiently shown likelihood of success on the merits of their ultra vires claim that the Executive Orders violate the separation of powers....

Plaintiffs accurately note that the Executive Orders foist upon hospitals receiving federal funds an impossible choice: (I) keep providing medical care to transgender patients under the age of nineteen in compliance with the anti-discrimination statutes and risk losing federal funding under the Executive Orders, or (2) stop providing care on the basis of trans gender identity in violation of the statutes, but in compliance with the EOs. Because the challenged portions of the Executive Orders are facially discriminatory on the basis of transgender identity, and therefore sex under Kadel and Bostock, in violation of Section 1557 of the ACA and Section 1908 of the PHSA, the Court finds that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their ultra vires statutory claim....

Guided and bound by Fourth Circuit's analysis in Kadel, and with a barer record than the one before the Fourth Circuit there, the Court is compelled to find that the Executive Orders' effective ban on all gender-affirming care for those under nineteen by federally funded institutions is not substantially related to the important government interest of protecting children. As such, Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their Equal Protection claim....

Last month, the court issued a nation-wide temporary restraining order in the case. (See prior posting.)  ACLU issued a press release announcing yesterday's decision.

Trump Issues Ramadan Greetings

On Monday, The White House posted President Trump's Message on Ramadan (full text), saying in part:

As millions of Muslim Americans begin their Ramadan observances, my Administration recommits to upholding religious liberty that is such an integral part of the American way of life.  Above all, we renew our resolve to building a future of peace, and to recognizing the dignity imprinted on every human soul.

This Ramadan, I offer my best wishes for a season of joyous reflection on God’s endless grace and infinite love.  May God bless you and your families during this wondrous season.

Court Issues TRO Barring Cutoff of Funds to Institutions Offering Gender-Affirming Care to Minors

In PFLAG, Inc. v. Trump, (D MD, Feb. 14, 2025), a Maryland federal district court set out its reasons for issuing a nation-wide temporary restraining order barring enforcement of the sections of two Executive Orders that prohibit federal funding for institutions that provide gender affirming care for patients under 19 years of age. At issue are provisions in Executive Order 14168, titled Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government and in Executive Order 14187, titled Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation. The court said in part:

Defendants admit in the very first line of their response in opposition to the motion for a TRO that the President "issued two Executive Orders directing agencies to take steps, as permitted by law, to condition certain federal grant funding on his policy preferences."23 ECF 55, at 3. This is a clear violation of the Constitution as "attempt[s] [by the Executive Branch] to place new conditions on federal funds [are] an improper attempt to wield Congress's exclusive spending power and is a violation of the Constitution's separation of powers principles."....

Because the challenged portions of the Executive Orders are facially discriminatory on the basis of transgender identity, and therefore sex under Kadel and Bostock, in violation of Section 1557 of the ACA and Section 1908 of the PHSA, the Court finds that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their ultra vires statutory claim....

Defendants assert that the challenged portions of the Executive Orders are based on the important government interest of "protecting the physical and emotional well-being of youth."...  Defendants assert that the Orders are substantially related to this important government interest because "[ e ]vidence. abounds that treatments covered by the Protecting Children EO 'are dangerous and ineffective."'... Though Defendants might well have support for this argument, the en banc Fourth Circuit in Kadel rejected a similar claim by noting that "those criticisms do not support the notion that gender-dysphoria treatments are ineffective so much as still developing."... Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their Equal Protection claim....

AP reports on the decision.

Trump Establishes White House Faith Office

Last Friday, President Trump issued an Executive Order (full text) establishing the White House Faith Office. The White House also issued a Fact Sheet summarizing the President's Executive Order and related initiatives.  The Executive Order comes less than three weeks after President Trump as part of an earlier Executive Order (full text) titled Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions revoked President Biden's Executive Order (full text) that created a White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. President Trump's new Executive Order reads in part:

The executive branch wants faith-based entities, community organizations, and houses of worship, to the fullest extent permitted by law, to compete on a level playing field for grants, contracts, programs, and other Federal funding opportunities.  The efforts of faith-based entities, community organizations, and houses of worship are essential to strengthening families and revitalizing communities, and the Federal Government welcomes opportunities to partner with such organizations through innovative, measurable, and outcome-driven initiatives.

The executive branch is committed to ensuring that all executive departments and agencies ... honor and enforce the Constitution’s guarantee of religious liberty and to ending any form of religious discrimination by the Federal Government.

The President also announced the following appointments to the White House Faith Office:  Pastor Paula White-Cain as a Special Government Employee and Senior Advisor to the Office; Jennifer S. Korn as a Deputy Assistant to the President and Faith Director of the Office; and Jackson Lane as Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Director of Faith Engagement.

The Hill reports on the President's action. Wikipedia traces the history of similar offices in successive Administrations since that of George W. Bush. [Thanks to Scott Mange for the lead.]

President Trump Creates Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias

Yesterday, President Trump issued an Executive Order titled Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias (full text). The Order establishes within the Justice Department a temporary Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Chrisian Bias chaired by the Attorney General and made up of 16 other Cabinet level and high-ranking Administration officials. The Executive Order sets out at length the reasons for creating the Task Force, saying in part:

... [T]he United States Constitution enshrines the fundamental right to religious liberty in the First Amendment....

Yet the previous Administration engaged in an egregious pattern of targeting peaceful Christians, while ignoring violent, anti-Christian offenses.  The Biden Department of Justice sought to squelch faith in the public square by bringing Federal criminal charges and obtaining in numerous cases multi-year prison sentences against nearly two dozen peaceful pro-life Christians for praying and demonstrating outside abortion facilities....

At the same time, Catholic churches, charities, and pro-life centers sought justice for violence, theft, and arson perpetrated against them, which the Biden Department of Justice largely ignored. ...

... [A] Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) memorandum asserted that “radical-traditionalist” Catholics were domestic-terrorism threats and suggested infiltrating Catholic churches as “threat mitigation.”  This later-retracted FBI memorandum cited as support evidence propaganda from highly partisan sources.

  The Biden Department of Education sought to repeal religious-liberty protections for faith-based organizations on college campuses.  The Biden Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sought to force Christians to affirm radical transgender ideology against their faith.  And the Biden Department of Health and Human Services sought to drive Christians who do not conform to certain beliefs on sexual orientation and gender identity out of the foster-care system....

 My Administration will not tolerate anti-Christian weaponization of government....

Also yesterday, President Trump spoke for 24-minutes (full text of Remarks) at the National Prayer Breakfast held in the U.S. Capitol

U.S. Withdraws from UN Human Rights Council

On Tuesday, President Trump issued an Executive Order (full text) withdrawing the United States from the United Nations Human Rights Council and ordering a review of the United States membership in UNESCO. The United States currently holds a seat on the Human Rights Council. The Executive Order provides in part:

The United States helped found the United Nations (UN) after World War II to prevent future global conflicts and promote international peace and security.  But some of the UN’s agencies and bodies have drifted from this mission and instead act contrary to the interests of the United States while attacking our allies and propagating anti-Semitism.....

Three UN organizations that deserve renewed scrutiny are the UNHRC; the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO); and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA)....

The United States will not participate in the UNHRC and will not seek election to that body.  The Secretary shall terminate the office of United States Representative to the UNHRC and any positions primarily dedicated to supporting the United States Representative to the UNHRC.

... The United States will also conduct a review of its membership in UNESCO....  In particular, the review will include an analysis of any anti-Semitism or anti-Israel sentiment within the organization.

Military Ends Travel Reimbursements to Service Members and Dependents for Out-of-State Abortions

In a January 29 Memorandum (full text), the Department of Defense removed the section of the military's Joint Travel Regulations that permit travel and transportation allowances for service members and their dependents to obtain abortions and other reproductive health care when it is not lawfully available in the local area where they are stationed. The travel allowance policy was announced in 2023. (See prior posting.) The policy was removed in accordance with President Trump's Executive Order, Enforcing the Hyde Amendment. (See prior posting.) The Hill reports on these developments.

Executive Order Encourages School Choice

Yesterday, President Trump issued an Executive Order (full text) titled Expanding Educational Freedom and Opportunity for Families. The Executive Order focuses on methods for expanding the availability of school choice. It says in part:

When our public education system fails such a large segment of society, it hinders our national competitiveness and devastates families and communities.  For this reason, more than a dozen States have enacted universal K-12 scholarship programs, allowing families — rather than the government — to choose the best educational setting for their children.  These States have highlighted the most promising avenue for education reform:  educational choice for families and competition for residentially assigned, government-run public schools....

... It is the policy of my Administration to support parents in choosing and directing the upbringing and education of their children....

...  [T]he Secretary of Education shall issue guidance regarding how States can use Federal formula funds to support K-12 educational choice initiatives....

... [T]he Secretary of Defense shall review any available mechanisms under which military-connected families may use funds from the Department of Defense to attend schools of their choice, including private, faith-based, or public charter schools, and submit a plan to the President describing such mechanisms....

[T]he Secretary of the Interior shall review any available mechanisms under which families of students eligible to attend BIE [Bureau of Indian Education] schools may use their Federal funding for educational options of their choice, including private, faith-based, or public charter schools, and submit a plan to the President describing such mechanisms....

President Issues New Executive Order on Combatting Antisemitism

President Trump yesterday issued a new Executive Order (full text) titled Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism. The Order reaffirms Executive Order 13899 issued by Trump during his prior term as President. That Order called for the use of Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to combat antisemitism, and provided that federal agencies should use the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's definition of antisemitism in their enforcement activities. The new Executive Order issued yesterday provides in part:

Sec. 2.  Policy.  It shall be the policy of the United States to combat anti-Semitism vigorously, using all available and appropriate legal tools, to prosecute, remove, or otherwise hold to account the perpetrators of unlawful anti-Semitic harassment and violence.

Sec. 3.  Additional Measures to Combat Campus Anti-Semitism.  (a)  Within 60 days of the date of this order, the head of each executive department or agency (agency) shall submit a report to the President ... identifying all civil and criminal authorities or actions within the jurisdiction of that agency, beyond those already implemented under Executive Order 13899, that might be used to curb or combat anti-Semitism, and containing an inventory and analysis of all pending administrative complaints ... against or involving institutions of higher education alleging civil-rights violations related to or arising from post-October 7, 2023, campus anti-Semitism....

(c)  The Attorney General is encouraged to employ appropriate civil-rights enforcement authorities, such as 18 U.S.C. 241, to combat anti-Semitism.

The White House yesterday, ahead of releasing the text of the Executive Order, distributed a Fact Sheet (full text) titled: "President Donald J. Trump Takes Forceful and Unprecedented Steps to Combat Anti-Semitism." The Fact Sheet says in part that:

Immediate action will be taken by the Department of Justice to protect law and order, quell pro-Hamas vandalism and intimidation, and investigate and punish anti-Jewish racism in leftist, anti-American colleges and universities.

The Order demands the removal of resident aliens who violate our laws.

Trump Removes 2 EEOC Commissioners; New Acting Chair Says Agency Is Rolling Back Biden's "Gender Identity Agenda"

Federal News Network on Tuesday reported that President Donald Trump has removed two Democratic members of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. One of those removed was Charlotte Burrows, formerly the Chair of the Commission until President Trump designated a new Acting Chair last week. The other Commissioner removed was Jocelyn Samuels who served as Vice Chair of the Commission until removed by President Trump from that position last week. These removals appear to leave the Commission without a quorum necessary to act.

Meanwhile, in a press release issued Tuesday, the EEOC's new Acting Chair Andrea Lucas said that the agency is "rolling back the Biden administration’s gender identity agenda," and announced the removal of various references to transgender and non-binary gender markers in forms and publications. She pointed out however that she is unable unilaterally to remove provisions in strategic plans and enforcement guidance documents that relate to protection of transgender individuals because those documents were adopted by votes of the full Commission. The press release added, in part:

... Acting Chair Lucas has been vocal in her opposition to portions of EEOC’s harassment guidance that took the enforcement position that harassing conduct under Title VII includes “denial of access to a bathroom or other sex-segregated facility consistent with [an] individual’s gender identity;” and that harassing conduct includes “repeated and intentional use of a name or pronoun inconsistent with [an] individual’s known gender identity.”

Although Acting Chair Lucas currently cannot rescind portions of the agency’s harassment guidance that are inconsistent with Executive Order 14166, Acting Chair Lucas remains opposed to those portions of the guidance.

“Biology is not bigotry. Biological sex is real, and it matters,” Lucas said. “Sex is binary (male and female) and immutable. It is not harassment to acknowledge these truths—or to use language like pronouns that flow from these realities, even repeatedly.”

Executive Orders Call for Military Reinstatement of Vaccine Objectors, Military Exclusion of Transgender Individuals

Yesterday, President Trump issued an Executive Order titled Reinstating Service Members Discharged Under the Military's Covid-19 Vaccination Mandate (full text). The Order reads in part:

The vaccine mandate was an unfair, overbroad, and completely unnecessary burden on our service members.  Further, the military unjustly discharged those who refused the vaccine, regardless of the years of service given to our Nation, after failing to grant many of them an exemption that they should have received.  Federal Government redress of any wrongful dismissals is overdue.

The Executive Order calls for reinstatement with back pay for those who left the service rather than be vaccinated.  Many service members who refused vaccination did so on religious grounds.

Yesterday, the President also issued an Executive Order titled Prioritizing Military Excellence and Readiness (full text) which ordered the military to revise its Medical Standards for Military Service to exclude transgender individuals from service in the military. The Executive Order reads in part:

Consistent with the military mission and longstanding DoD policy, expressing a false “gender identity” divergent from an individual’s sex cannot satisfy the rigorous standards necessary for military service.  Beyond the hormonal and surgical medical interventions involved, adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual’s sex conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life.  A man’s assertion that he is a woman, and his requirement that others honor this falsehood, is not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member....

It is the policy of the United States Government to establish high standards for troop readiness, lethality, cohesion, honesty, humility, uniformity, and integrity.  This policy is inconsistent with the medical, surgical, and mental health constraints on individuals with gender dysphoria.  This policy is also inconsistent with shifting pronoun usage or use of pronouns that inaccurately reflect an individual’s sex.

Trump Takes Actions to Limit Federal Funding of Abortions

On January 24, President Trump issued an Executive Order (full text) titled Enforcing the Hyde Amendment. The Hyde Amendment bars federal funding of elective abortions. The Executive Order revokes two Executive Orders issued by President Biden: Executive Order 14076:  Protecting Access to Reproductive Health Care Services and Executive Order 14079:  Securing Access to Reproductive and Other Healthcare Services. (See prior posting.) President Trump also signed a Presidential Memorandum (full text) reinstating a 2017 Memorandum which enforced the Mexico City Policy -- a policy that has been enforced by Republican Administrations since 1985 and suspended by Democratic Administrations since then. The Policy is described by Wikipedia as follows:

The policy requires non-governmental organizations to "agree as a condition of their receipt of [U.S.] federal funds" that they would "neither perform nor actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations". The policy has exceptions for abortions performed in response to rape, incest, or life-threatening conditions.

The Memorandum also directs the State Department to ensure that federal funds do not go to organizations or programs that support coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.

The Trump White House issued a Fact Sheet titled President Donald J. Trump Enforces Overwhelmingly Popular Demand to Stop Taxpayer Funding of Abortion describing the President's actions.

Pardons and Policy Changes Limit Use of FACE Act Against Abortion Protesters

On Thursday, President Trump granted full and unconditional pardons to 23 defendants who were convicted of violations of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act. (Full text of Pardon document.) The pardons which were issued a day before the annual January 24 March for Life in Washington D.C. cover defendants in five separate cases: United States v. Handy (blockade of a Washington, D.C. abortion clinic); United States v. Gallagher (barricading of a clinic in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee); United States v. Zastrow, (blockading of abortion clinics in Sterling Heights and Saginaw, Michigan); United States v. Williams (Blocking entrance to Manhattan Planned Parenthood Clinic); United States v. Moscinski (blocking access to Hempstead, N.Y. Planned Parenthood Clinic). AP reports on the pardons.

The Trump Administration also took steps to limit future prosecutions under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.  AP reports that a memo sent by the Attorney General's Chief of Staff, Chad Mizelle, to the head of the Civil Rights Division orders dismissal of three pending cases growing out of 2021 clinic blockades in Tennessee, Pennsylvania and Ohio. The memo also says that future prosecutions or civil actions under FACE Act will only be permitted in extraordinary circumstances or in cases presenting significant aggravating factors. Mizelle called prosecutions against anti-abortion protesters a weaponization of law enforcement because few prosecutions were brought against attacks on crisis pregnancy centers and other pro-life organizations.

Trump Executive Order Reverses Agency Policies Protecting Transgender Individuals

Yesterday President Trump signed an Executive Order titled Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government (full text). The Executive Order seeks to eliminate the recognition of transgender individuals in federal agency policies interpreting antidiscrimination provisions.  The lengthy Executive Order provides in part:

Across the country, ideologues who deny the biological reality of sex have increasingly used legal and other socially coercive means to permit men to self-identify as women and gain access to intimate single-sex spaces and activities designed for women, from women’s domestic abuse shelters to women’s workplace showers.  This is wrong.  Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex fundamentally attack women by depriving them of their dignity, safety, and well-being.  The erasure of sex in language and policy has a corrosive impact not just on women but on the validity of the entire American system.  Basing Federal policy on truth is critical to scientific inquiry, public safety, morale, and trust in government itself.

This unhealthy road is paved by an ongoing and purposeful attack against the ordinary and longstanding use and understanding of biological and scientific terms, replacing the immutable biological reality of sex with an internal, fluid, and subjective sense of self unmoored from biological facts.  Invalidating the true and biological category of “woman” improperly transforms laws and policies designed to protect sex-based opportunities into laws and policies that undermine them, replacing longstanding, cherished legal rights and values with an identity-based, inchoate social concept....

It is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female.  These sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality....

Agencies shall remove all statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications, or other internal and external messages that promote or otherwise inculcate gender ideology, and shall cease issuing such statements, policies, regulations, forms, communications or other messages....

 The prior Administration argued that the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), which addressed Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, requires gender identity-based access to single-sex spaces under, for example, Title IX of the Educational Amendments Act.  This position is legally untenable and has harmed women.  The Attorney General shall therefore immediately issue guidance to agencies to correct the misapplication of the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020) to sex-based distinctions in agency activities....

Trump Designates New Acting Chair of EEOC

In one of the first actions taken after he was sworn in as President, Donald Trump designated new Chairmen and Acting Chairmen of 15 federal agencies. Among these was the designation of EEOC Commissioner Andrea R. Lucas to be Acting Chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. She replaces Charlotte A. Burrows who will remain a member of the Commission. The EEOC adjudicates claims of employment discrimination, including religious discrimination in employment.

6 Clergy Will Offer Prayers at Trump Inauguration Today

Donald Trump's inauguration as President begins at 11:30 AM Eastern Time today. The ceremony includes prayers offered by clergy from a variety of faiths. According to CBS News, opening invocations will be delivered by Timothy Cardinal Dolan, the Archbishop of New York and Christian evangelist Rev. Franklin Graham.

The ceremony will conclude with benedictions offered by four clergymen: Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University; Imam Husham Al-Husainy, a founder of the Dearborn, Michigan Karbalaa Islamic Education Center;  Pastor Lorenzo Sewell of 180 Church in Detroit, Michigan; and the Rev. Father Frank Mann of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, New York.

The inauguration ceremony will be streamed live by numerous news organizations, including PBS News livestream beginning at 10:30 AM Eastern Time.

Oklahoma Specs for Classroom Bibles Apparently Limited To 2 Versions Endorsed by Donald Trump [UPDATED]

As previously reported, last June the Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction issued a Memo to all public-school superintendents in the state requiring them to incorporate the Bible into their schools' curriculum. On Wednesday, the Oklahoma State Department of Education issued a Request for Proposal for the purchase of 55,000 Bibles for Oklahoma classrooms. The RFP specified that bids must be for 

King James Version Bibles that contain The United States Pledge of Allegiance, The U.S. Declaration of Independence, The U.S. Constitution, and The U.S. Bill of Rights documents.

The Oklahoman reported yesterday: 

A salesperson at Mardel Christian & Education searched, and though they carry 2,900 Bibles, none fit the parameters. 

But one Bible fits perfectly: Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the U.S.A. Bible, endorsed by former President Donald Trump and commonly referred to as the Trump Bible. They cost $60 each online, with Trump receiving fees for his endorsement. 

Mardel doesn’t carry the God Bless the U.S.A. Bible or another Bible that could meet the specifications, the We The People Bible, which was also endorsed by Donald Trump Jr. It sells for $90.

According to The Hill, a spokesperson for the Superintendent of Public Instruction:

There are hundreds of Bible publishers and we expect a robust competition for this proposal.

UPDATE: On Nov. 7, the Oklahoma State Department of Education amended its RFP (Attachment A) to provide that the bibles covered by the bid may have the Pledge of Allegiance, Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights bound separately rather than bound together with the Bible. This presumably opens bidding to many additional publishers. It also extends the deadline for submitting bids. Los Angeles Times reports on the change.