Some civlians are out to prove maybe you can mess with Texas.
A Texas school board has declined “In God We Trust” signs written in Arabic or with rainbow colors after a civilian living in the area offered them at a recent meeting, WFAA reported.
The board of the Carroll Independent School District in Southlake, Texas, declined the offer of the signs at a meeting earlier in the week after a civilian named Srivan Krishna tried to donate them, according to Washington Times.
However, the school district did accept "In God We Trust" signs from a Christian conservative cellphone company called Patriot Mobile on August 15 to be displayed at all schools, according to WFAA.
Patriot Mobile made the donation after Texas lawmakers passed a law in 2021 known as SB-797 that required schools to display posters featuring the saying “In God We Trust” if they are privately donated, WFAA reported.
SB-797 requires public schools to display donated signs containing the phrase “In God We Trust” and “may not depict any words, images, or other information other than [that].”
After the board declined Krishna’s offering, telling him they had enough signs, according to NPR, he said, “Why is more God not good?"
"The statute does not contemplate requiring the district to display more than one copy at a time," board president Cameron Bryan told Krishna during the meeting which was broadcast online.
The civilian disagreed, saying the law doesn't refer to how many posters should be displayed, "It doesn't say you have to stop at one. So that is your decision to stop at one."
"I think it's kind of un-American to reject posters of our national motto," Krishna added.
Inside Edition Digital has reached out to Krishna for comment but has not heard back.
Inside Edition Digital has also reached out to the Carroll Independent School District in North Texas for comment but has also not heard back.
Krishna’s offering comes less than a week after Florida activist Chaz Stevens launched a GoFundMe campaign to create “In God We Trust” signs in Arabic, as he pointed out on the crowdfunding site, “law seemingly presumes these signs are written in English. Oopsie.”
Stevens spoke to Inside Edition Digital via email last week about his campaign and he felt compelled to act on this because “sometimes an act of stupidity requires an even greater act of stupidity.”
Following the school board’s denial of Krishna’s offering, Stevens spoke to Inside Edition Digital again via email in a follow-up interview.
Stevens said the he does not know Krishna but praised what he did, saying, “good for him!”
“[I] saw he used our creative, and that cracked me up. We’re putting all of our content (digital assets) into an access library for everyone’s use. The more the merrier! Get off your tush and get in the game with Chaz!” Stevens declared.
Stevens said it's “not surprising,” that the school board reacted as they did, adding, “however, not good news … well, for those who want to have God’s name on the building,” because “this week, we’ll begin to flood the Texas public school system with our posters – Arabic, Hebrew, Vulcan, Klingon, Spanish, and hell, I’ve lost track of all the variations.”
Stevens said that his next steps in his process are to “send out a boatload of posters, a ton of really nice painted pieces, stick up a few billboards, continue to mercilessly troll the State of Texas. And get ready for filing a lawsuit or two. All made possible by the generous contributions of our amazing supporters. Keep the donations coming people!”
He said that he felt “violated” after the school board said it had no obligation to accept Krishna’s donations of signs because the district had already accepted signs from Patriot Mobile.
“First, it’s one God sign, and then copies of God signs across campus, but they don’t have time to deal with other donations? Seems to me, if lack of bandwidth is the issue, then everyone should play by the same rules, not just the first person, er, sign, across the finish line.”
As of press time, Stevens' GoFundMe campaign has raised over $47,000 and has a goal of $250,000.
