The ACLU Just Humiliated Trump By Calling His Religious Liberty Executive Order Fake News

The ACLU looked at Trump’s religious liberty executive order and determined that it was fake news.

American Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Anthony D. Romero said in a statement provided to PoliticusUSA:

Today’s executive order signing was an elaborate photo-op with no discernible policy outcome. After careful review of the order’s text we have determined that the order does not meaningfully alter the ability of religious institutions or individuals to intervene in the political process. The order portends but does not yet do harm to the provision of reproductive health services.

President Trump’s prior assertion that he wished to ‘totally destroy’ the Johnson Amendment with this order has proven to be a textbook case of ‘fake news.’

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The directive to federal agencies to explore religious-based exceptions to healthcare does cue up a potential future battle, but as of now, the status quo has not changed.

What President Trump did today was merely provide a faux sop to religious conservatives and kick the can down the road on religious exemptions on reproductive health care services.

We will continue our steadfast charge to defend Americans’ right to exercise their religion and ensure their freedom from having others’ beliefs forced upon them. The ACLU stands ready to sue the Trump administration and in the event that this order triggers any official government action at all, we will see Trump in court, again.

There is a future legal battle coming down the road on the Johnson Amendment, but the actual Trump executive turned out not to live up to the White House hype. Trump is desperate for stunts he can sell as political victories to keep his base behind him. The political math is straightforward. Trump isn’t attracting any new supporters as president. His poll numbers suggest that he has already lost the swing voters who supported him last November. If Donald Trump is going to politically survive, he needs to keep his base happy.

The ACLU looked at Trump’s executive order and found that there was no policy to it. It is a bunch of empty words that were designed to make it look like Trump was doing something when he really wasn’t.

For the first time since he has been president, a major national organization has called out Trump for spreading fake news. Trump’s tricks have run their course. The United States is catching on that the reality television star in the White House has no substance behind the loud style.



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