Across the country, children are being denied access to education simply because their families hold religious or conscientious beliefs that conflict with extreme vaccine mandates. In states like California, New York, Connecticut, and Maine, religious exemptions have already been eliminated. On July 28, 2025, the American Academy of Pediatrics issued a policy statement attempting to remove religious exemptions nationwide. Families are being forced to choose between their deeply held convictions and their child’s right to attend school, pre-school and daycare. This isn’t just discriminatory; it’s unconstitutional.
Add your name to our letter: as a faith leader, organization, and citizen to the letter today and be part of a movement that defends our children, upholds the Constitution, and restores equal access to education and protects religious liberty for every American family.
Letter to the President:
Dear President Donald J. Trump,
United with faith leaders, we urgently request you sign an executive order to protect religious freedom in the United States. There is and has been an active attempt to remove religious liberties across the nation. Parents have a fundamental right to raise their children according to their religious beliefs, and any government policy infringing on this right has alarmed the faith leaders, citizens, and families of this great nation who are unified to protect religious liberty. Our mission at PERK is to advocate for medical freedom, bodily autonomy, civil rights, parental sovereignty, and to protect children including their right to an education.
Children are being denied access to education and prohibited from enrolling in public and private schools, pre-schools and daycare because there is no religious exemption to vaccinations. Families’ religious liberties are under assault. Education and religious liberties must be protected. Currently, there are states within the United States that do not provide equal access to education for children and families with religious objections and conscientious beliefs. These practices are discriminatory, a poor investment in our nation’s future, and are a violation of the fundamental liberties enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.
We cannot force families to choose between their faith and their children’s education. As leaders we declare that a child’s access to public education cannot be conditioned on a family violating their deeply held religious convictions.
There are 5 current states that completely deny religious exemptions include California, New York, Connecticut, Maine, and West Virginia. Furthermore, we have seen an increase recently by additional states to attempt to remove religious freedom and exemptions, including, Massachusetts and Hawaii. On July 28, 2025, the American Academy of Pediatrics came out with a full attack on religious freedom nationwide with an official policy statement and recommendation to remove all religious exemptions across the country. State legislatures often have laws that rely on following the “recommendation” of the AAP.
Parents and young adults should be empowered, informed, and educated with accurate data regarding the remote risks of serious illness associated with all diseases for children and young adults, as well as how those risks can be mitigated through various measures, and left free to make their own decisions accordingly. Given the serious violation of religious liberty against families, children, and young adults, threatening to shut children out of an education is an intolerable infringement on personal freedom. Such mandates usurp parental authority and burden students of many faiths.
Religious liberty is the cornerstone of the Constitution of the United States. In preservation of religious liberty, parental rights, and halting the unconstitutional breech of religious freedom, educational access must be granted to all children. Failure to provide an allowance for religious exemptions is unconstitutional and interferes with children’s right to an education.
The first amendment was clearly the first and most important to the founding of this nation. The Supreme Court upheld a broader religious belief founded in deeply held moral convictions. The American people must retain their ability to make all their own medical decisions through education and informed consent, with equitable alternatives. The Supreme Court has held that “religious beliefs need not be acceptable, logical, consistent, or comprehensible to others in order to merit First Amendment protection.”
From here forward, we ask you to let it be codified that religious, philosophical, and conscientious reasons are allowed and constitutionally protected. We request that it become the policy of your administration that Health and Human Services discretionary Federal funds should not be used to directly or indirectly support or subsidize an educational service agency, State educational agency, local educational agency, Head Start program, pre-school, daycare, elementary school, secondary school, or institution of higher education that deny the sincerely held religious beliefs, personal beliefs, and philosophical beliefs of students to have received a vaccination to attend any in-person education program. We seek your urgent support in the United States Government to preserve religious liberty and educational access for all.
Sincerely,
Amy Bohn
PERK President of Protection of the Educational Rights of Kids
Faith Leader, Organizations, Citizens, Sign below
