News Digest

 ESTABLISHING A FAITH OFFICE: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to establish the White House Faith Office. The White House Faith Office will empower faith-based entities, community organizations, and houses of worship to better serve families and communities. The Office will be housed in the Domestic Policy Council and will consult with experts within the faith community and make recommendations to the President regarding changes to policies, programs, and practices to better align with the American values. The Office will coordinate with agencies on religious liberty training and on identifying and promoting grant opportunities for non-profit faith-based entities, community organizations, and houses of worship.   The Office will work in collaboration with the Attorney General to identify failures to enforce constitutional and Federal statutory protections for religious liberty. DEFENDING RELIGIOUS LIBERTY: President Trump is committed to protecti...

 ENDING THE FORCED USE OF PAPER STRAWS: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to end the procurement and forced use of paper straws. The Federal government is directed to stop purchasing paper straws and ensure they are no longer provided within Federal buildings. The Order requires the development of a National Strategy to End the Use of Paper Straws within 45 days to alleviate the forced use of paper straws nationwide. BRINGING BACK COMMON SENSE: The irrational campaign against plastic straws has forced Americans to use nonfunctional paper straws. This ends under President Trump. Cities and states across America have banned plastic straws, caving to pressure from woke activists who prioritize symbolism over science. Paper straws use chemicals that may carry risks to human health – including “forever chemical” PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) which are known to be highly water soluble and can bleed from the straw into a drink. A study found that whil...

 In the latest release of federal test scores, educators had hoped to see widespread recovery from the learning loss incurred during the Covid-19 pandemic. Instead, the results, from last year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress, tell a grim tale, especially in reading: The slide in achievement has only continued. The percentage of eighth graders who have “below basic” reading skills according to NAEP was the largest it has been in the exam’s three-decade history — 33 percent. The percentage of fourth graders at “below basic” was the largest in 20 years, at 40 percent. There was progress in math, but not enough to offset the losses of the pandemic. Recent reading declines have cut across lines of race and class. And while students at the top end of the academic distribution are performing similarly to students prepandemic, the drops remain pronounced for struggling students, despite a robust, bipartisan movement in recent years to improve foundational literacy skills “Our...

 DEFENDING PARENTAL RIGHTS AND EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITY: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order expanding educational freedom and opportunity for families. It recognizes that parents, not the government, play a fundamental role in choosing and directing the upbringing and education of their children. It directs the Department of Education to issue guidance on how the States can use federal funding formulas to support their K-12 scholarship programs. It directs the Secretary of Education to prioritize school choice programs in the Department’s discretionary grant programs. The Order requires the Department of Health and Human Services to issue guidance on how states receiving block grants for children and families can use those funds to support educational alternatives, including private and faith-based options. It directs the Secretary of Defense to submit a plan to the President for how military families can use Department of Defense funds to send their children...

 President Trump launched a broad attack on the wind power industry in the United States, with a sweeping executive order that could block not just new offshore wind farms in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans but potentially many smaller wind farms on federal land and even on private property across the country. The order, which Mr. Trump signed in the Oval Office on Monday night, would halt all leasing of federal lands and waters for new wind farms pending a fresh government review of the industry. It also directs federal agencies to stop issuing permits for all wind farms anywhere in the country for the time being, a move that could disrupt projects on private land, which sometimes need federal wildlife or other environmental permits. While the order does not call for a freeze on wind projects that are already under construction, Mr. Trump directed the U.S. Attorney General and secretary of the interior to explore the possibility of “terminating or amending” any leases that have al...

 REMOVING BARRIERS TO AMERICAN AI INNOVATION: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order eliminating harmful Biden Administration AI policies and enhancing America’s global AI dominance. President Trump is fulfilling his promise to revoke Joe Biden’s dangerous Executive Order that hinders AI innovation and imposes onerous and unnecessary government control over the development of AI. The Biden AI Executive Order established unnecessarily burdensome requirements for companies developing and deploying AI that would stifle private sector innovation and threaten American technological leadership. Today’s executive order: Revokes the Biden AI Executive Order which hampered the private sector’s ability to innovate in AI by imposing government control over AI development and deployment. Calls for departments and agencies to revise or rescind all policies, directives, regulations, orders, and other actions taken under the Biden AI order that are inconsistent with enhancing ...

 By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in order to promote United States leadership in digital assets and financial technology while protecting economic liberty, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1.  Purpose and Policies.  (a)  The digital asset industry plays a crucial role in innovation and economic development in the United States, as well as our Nation’s international leadership.  It is therefore the policy of my Administration to support the responsible growth and use of digital assets, blockchain technology, and related technologies across all sectors of the economy, including by: (i)    protecting and promoting the ability of individual citizens and private-sector entities alike to access and use for lawful purposes open public blockchain networks without persecution, including the ability to develop and deploy software, to participate in mining and validating, to ...

 By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Purpose. The United States has long been at the forefront of artificial intelligence (AI) innovation, driven by the strength of our free markets, world-class research institutions, and entrepreneurial spirit. To maintain this leadership, we must develop AI systems that are free from ideological bias or engineered social agendas. With the right Government policies, we can solidify our position as the global leader in AI and secure a brighter future for all Americans. This order revokes certain existing AI policies and directives that act as barriers to American AI innovation, clearing a path for the United States to act decisively to retain global leadership in artificial intelligence. Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States to sustain and enhance America’s global AI dominance in order to promote human flourishing, ec...

 day, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to establish regulatory clarity for digital financial technology and secure America’s position as the world’s leader in the digital asset economy, driving innovation and economic opportunity for all Americans. The Executive Order establishes the Presidential Working Group on Digital Asset Markets to strengthen U.S. leadership in digital finance. The Working Group will be tasked with developing a Federal regulatory framework governing digital assets, including stablecoins, and evaluating the creation of a strategic national digital assets stockpile. The Working Group will be chaired by the White House AI & Crypto Czar and include the Secretary of the Treasury, the Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the heads of other relevant departments and agencies. The White House AI & Crypto Czar will engage leading experts in digital assets and digital markets to ensure that the actions of the Working Group a...

 oday, President Donald J. Trump signed a Presidential Memorandum to deliver emergency price relief for American families and defeat the cost-of-living crisis. The Presidential Memorandum recognizes a critical component of the crushing cost of everyday living. The Biden Administration imposed complex regulatory burdens and radical policies designed to weaken American production.  President Trump is ordering all Federal agencies to untangle the American economy from Biden constraints and improve affordability of necessary goods and services and increase the prosperity of the American workers. This includes action to: Drastically lower the cost of housing and expand housing supply; Eliminate unnecessary administrative expenses and rent-seeking practices that drive up healthcare costs; Eliminate counterproductive requirements raising the costs of home appliances; Create employment opportunities for American workers including drawing discouraged workers into the labor force; and E...