Donald Trump is forming a task force, headed by Attorney General Pam Bondi, to “immediately halt all forms of anti-Christian targeting and discrimination within the federal government, including at the DOJ, which was absolutely terrible, the IRS, the FBI — terrible — and other agencies.”
Trump also said that Bondi will “fully prosecute anti-Christian violence and vandalism in our society and to move heaven and earth to defend the rights of Christians and religious believers nationwide.”
This is welcome news for the 224 million Christians in the United States. Prosecuting anti-Christian violence is a necessary good.
In the current context, Trump appears to be referring to the prosecution of people who protest in front of abortion clinics. Trump pardoned 23 protesters within a few hours of his inauguration, but the president will set up another commission on religious liberty, criticizing the Biden administration for prosecuting anti-abortion advocates.
The laws governing demonstrations in front of abortion clinics are bad laws, and the addition of making anti-abortion protesters eligible to be charged under racketeering statutes is absurd. But they are the law of the land until the Supreme Court says otherwise or they are repealed.
The Biden administration could have used the powers of discretionary prosecution, especially in cases where there was no violence at the clinics. Instead, federal prosecutors went after protesters with everything they had, with judges sentencing protesters to up to three years for blocking the entrance to an abortion clinic.
Grandmothers and other peaceful activists ran afoul of the FACE Act (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances). Efforts are underway to repeal this 1994 law, and given the GOP majority and what happened with peaceful protesters during the Biden administration, it has a chance of passing.
The usual suspects objected to the formation of a commission.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State President and CEO Rachel Laser said, “Rather than protecting religious beliefs, this task force will misuse religious freedom to justify bigotry, discrimination, and the subversion of our civil rights laws.”
If she's that good at predicting stuff, maybe she could throw a few stock tips my way.
Lest we forget, Trump had a real "Road to Damascus" moment during the campaign.
Trump, at both venues, reflected on having a bullet coming within a hair’s breadth of killing him at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last year, telling lawmakers and attendees, “It changed something in me, I feel.”
“I feel even stronger,” he continued. “I believed in God, but I feel, I feel much more strongly about it. Something happened.” Speaking later at a separate prayer breakfast sponsored by a private group at a hotel, he remarked, “it was God that saved me.’
He drew laughs at the Capitol event when he expressed gratitude that the episode “didn’t affect my hair.”
The Republican president, who’s a nondenominational Christian, called religious liberty “part of the bedrock of American life” and called for protecting it with “absolute devotion.”
“While I’m in the White House, we will protect Christians in our schools, in our military, in our government, in our workplaces, hospitals, and in our public squares,” he said. “And we will bring our country back together as one nation under God.”
The president also said he would create a White House Faith Office led by the Rev. Paula White, Trump's religious advisor for several years.
For people of faith, the commission and the task force signify that the times have definitely changed.
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