Trump’s Executive OrderOn the National Day of Prayer May 4, 2017, President Trump signed the Executive Order on Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty. The Presidential Executive Order on Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty adheres to the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America. By signing the Order, President Trump attempted to guide the executive branch to formulate and implement relevant policies implied to the religious liberty of persons and organizations in the United States.

The executive branch should enforce Federal law’s protections for religious freedom as an indispensable constituent of public rights that enable religious people and institutions practice their faith freely and without any discrimination by the Federal Government. This is how the US Constitution protects the Americans’ fundamental freedom. Pursuant to the Federal law, the Federal Government should not unduly interfere with religious practices of Americans and their organizations. Further, the Executive Order protects the freedom of religious and political speech. The Order enforces executive departments and agencies to respect and protect the religious and political speech freedoms and practices.

Adherence to the UN principles
By signing the Order, President Trump claimed that “tolerance is the cornerstone of peace,” which complies with the cornerstone principles of the United Nations Organization of non-discrimination and non-violence. This prioritizes the individual and organizational rights on free expression unless it violates the rights and freedoms of other people or organizations. In particular, the Executive Order allows religious organizations to take more active part in political activities and processes. To this extent, the order bans the IRS to take “adverse action” against tax-exempt religious organizations that take active political stance.

More religious freedom opens fresh prospects for enhancing the rights and freedoms of the individuals and religious organizations in politics. There is no way of signaling out religious groups from political views. From now on, the Order will serve as a precedent to other countries, particularly the UN member states, to protect and promote the rights and freedoms of people of faith and save them from biased targeting, bullying and/or prejudiced silencing. This means that Trump has taken a solid stance against religious discrimination in all its possible forms.

Controversy
To a great extent, every order serves as a political declaration of intent. Apparently, the declarative nature of this Order will contradict practical implications in many ways. While the US Constitution bars religious discrimination, Trump’s political rhetoric now contrasts with the recent “Muslim ban” imposed by his administration. So far, the executive orders have been put on hold by the US courts. Another discrepancy according to the legal experts is that the Order will not affect the US policy discernibly for the Order fails to ease the applicable restrictions on political activities executed by religious organizations. Many deem that the Executive Order will enable the IRS to restrict the activities it considers political, and meanwhile will prohibit the IRS from extending the restrictions on the political activities not embraced prior to the executive order.

Final remarks
Obviously, Trump’s administration wants to be as politically tolerant as possible. By offering more political value to individuals and religious organizations, it highlights respect to the freedom of speech and political expression. The question is how the Order will benefit the religious liberty in practice and whether other countries will be able to benefit from the Trump’s precedent. Seemingly, providing churches and religious organizations with more solid voice in politics is Trump’s brave attempt to solidify the freedom of speech in the United States as part of his “America above all” legacy. Time will show whether the United States will be able to export the idea worldwide and correlate it with the “Muslim ban” controversy.