CNN: Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush Responds to Trump's Religious Liberty Commission
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Analysis
Tracking Trump's executive orders: Vouchers
Executive Order 14191: Expanding Educational Freedom and Opportunity for Families
Date Signed: January 29, 2025
Key Provisions:
- Executive Order 14191 announced that within ninety days, the Secretary of Education will issue guidance on how the federal government can use discretionary grant funding to support K-12 educational choice initiatives
- This includes information about how federal grant programs can support “educational freedom” and offers federal support for families who choose to send their children to alternative institutions, “including private and faith-based options”
Interfaith Alliance Counterpoints:
- Interfaith Alliance strongly supports the right of parents to send children to schools of their choosing, but we reject the idea that the government should divert critical funding away from public schools, sending it instead to private, charter, or faith-based institutions, which educate only a small portion of our country’s young people.
- Instead of funding a private school education system through school vouchers, we believe the government should invest in our public schools, which educate 90% of students across the country.
- Our public education system is the only one which guarantees religious freedom protections to all students, since faith-based and other sectarian private schools are exempt from some nondiscrimination requirements.
Transcript
The Trump Administration’s Latest Attacks on Muslim Community Leaders
After months in detention, we finally received the good news that Ohio chaplain Ayman Soliman was released from jail as the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) dropped his deportation case. Soliman was an interfaith chaplain at a children’s hospital and a longtime leader of the Ohio Muslim community with deep ties to interfaith work across the state. As ProPublica reported, Soliman’s asylum status was restored and his application for a green card was revived. This news came through the dedicated hard work and advocacy of many organizations, particularly CAIR-Ohio and his colleagues at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, who were fired for speaking out on his behalf.
Mahmoud Khalil’s deportation case has alarming implications
Earlier this year, during the holy month of Ramadan, ICE agents followed Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil home after he broke his fast and forcibly detained him without a warrant. Khalil, a Palestinian activist, was then disappeared into an unmarked vehicle and taken to an unknown location as his pregnant wife watched and pleaded for information. It was later revealed that Khalil had been moved to a detention center in Jena, Louisiana, where he faced deportation. He was held for over three months in poor conditions, missing his graduation and the birth of his first child.
True Religious Freedom Means Protecting Our Faith Leaders, Not Detaining Them
In early July, Ayman Soliman, a former Cincinnati Children’s Hospital chaplain, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after his asylum status was terminated in June. In response, local faith leaders organized a prayer vigil, rally, and peaceful march; during the march at least 15 protesters were detained by local police and charged with felony rioting.