***NEWS RELEASE***
For Immediate Release December 6, 2016
CONTACT:
Jen Retallick, Hamilton Strategies, 610.584.1096, ext. 100, Media@HamiltonStrategies.com, or Deborah Hamilton, 215.815.7716 or 610.584.1096, ext. 102
Strong Trump-Pence Post-Campaign Transition Aligns with Christian Worldview
Trump Moral Advisory Board Member Dr. Richard Land Says Picks on Education, National Security, Health Care and Economic Fronts Should Be Encouraging to Conservative Evangelicals
CHARLOTTE, N.C.—Throughout the election season, Evangelical leader Dr. Richard Land, president of the Southern Evangelical Seminary (SES, www.ses.edu), served as a member of President-elect Donald Trump’s executive, non-endorsing board to provide advisory support on moral issues.
Now, Land is weighing in on Trump’s choices thus far for his leadership team—strong picks, Land says, in less than one month since the election. Just yesterday, Trump’s team announced that Dr. Ben Carson will be nominated as the next secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development—a fine choice to help reinvigorate America’s cities, Land added.
“Frankly, I’ve been more than pleasantly surprised at the performance of President-elect Trump’s transition team at this point,” Land continued. “As a conservative, pro-life Evangelical, I cannot imagine anyone more competent and more in-tune with my worldview running the transition team than Vice President-elect Mike Pence. There are many reasons for conservatives and Evangelicals to be encouraged by the selections that have been made so far.”
On the education front, Land said, Trump’s pick is especially encouraging.
“The selection of Betsy DeVos as education secretary is truly exciting,” he said. “It is tragic that we have been allowing the most precious natural resource we have, which is our young people, to continue to be sacrificed on the altar of teachers’ unions, particularly in our inner cities. There is manifest evidence that many of our public schools in our inner cities exist for teachers and administrators, not for the students they are supposed to educate.
“We are allowing whole generations of young people to be undereducated and not have their talents and resources developed,” Land continued. “It is no accident that one of the groups that most strongly supports school choice is the parents of these children. The selection of Mrs. DeVos shows that Mr. Trump is serious about breaking the monopoly that underperforming school districts have on school children across this country. He will empower their parents financially to make better choices on the education of their children. I can’t think of anything that will do more to break the cycle of poverty that plagues many in our inner-city communities.”
For instance, Land added, studies have shown that a child who is reading at his or her expected grade level by third grade has an 80 percent chance of graduating from high school and escaping the cycle of poverty. Those children who are not reading at their grade level by third grade, have more than a 50 chance of ending up in poverty or in prison—or both, he said.
“No third-grader is responsible for whether or not he or she is reading at grade level,” Land said. “That responsibility falls on the adults who supervise their lives and the teachers who either teach them or don’t. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, the No. 1 weapon to fight poverty and discrimination is education, and yet we deprive inner-city youth of a quality education.”
Regarding national security, Land said that Trump’s picks are also extremely strong and wise.
“Anyone who has been frustrated by the supine and feckless foreign and national security policies of the Obama administration cannot help but to be encouraged by the selection of Gen. James Mattis as Secretary of Defense and Gen. Mike Flynn as national security adviser,” Land said. “Gen. Mattis is probably more popular with the rank-and-file population of the military than any general since Patton. I know of several veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who were moved to tears upon learning of this selection. Both Gen. Mattis and Gen. Flynn know who the enemy is and know how to defeat them.
“On the pro-life and health care fronts, I cannot think of a better choice for the Secretary of Health and Human Services than Congressman Tom Price. He probably knows the history of the Obamacare legislation better than anyone. He knows its fatal flaws, and he has been working for years on legislative proposals to correct them. It will be helpful to have him working in tandem with Congress to correct the legislative Frankenstein that has befallen us over the past eight years.
“When it comes to the secretary of the treasury and secretary of commerce, it’s about time that we had people in those capacities who come from business, understand business and don’t see growth and profit as evil,” Land continued. “And Sen. Jeff Sessions’ nomination as attorney general indicates that Mr. Trump is serious about his campaign pledge to fix our nation’s completely broken immigration policies, starting with enforcing existing laws and securing America’s border.
“There are still significant choices to be announced, but one of the oldest notions in government is that ‘personnel is policy,’” Land concluded. “Pro-life, pro-strong national defense, pro-law and order, and pro-growth Americans have reason to be encouraged by the nominations that President-elect Trump, Vice-president elect Pence and their transition team have made so far.”
SES is a leader in apologetics education—teaching students to defend their faith and talk intelligently, passionately and rationally about what they believe and why they believe it. Many courses focus on societal issues from a Christian worldview, delve into scientific apologetics or contemplate creation research.
At SES’s apologetics blog, www.WhyDoYouBelieve.org, Land and other SES voices address the most pressing issues of the day. SES also explores ethical issues through its “Ethics in Emerging Technology” program; for more information, visit www.ethics.ses.edu.
Land is featured in his nationally syndicated daily radio commentary, “Bringing Every Thought Captive,” which airs on nearly 800 stations nationwide, including nearly 200 on the American Family Radio Network, 100 on the Bott Radio Network and almost 400 on the CSN radio network. “Bringing Every Thought Captive” is also podcast daily on the free SES mobile app and airs locally in the Charlotte, N.C., area every weekday. The “Bringing Every Thought Captive” television program, hosted by Land, airs on the NRB Network Wednesdays at 8 p.m. and midnight EST. “Bringing Every Thought Captive” also reaches nearly 2 million households in the Chicago area on the Total Living Network. For details about stations, times, downloads and more, click here.
Land has taught as a visiting or adjunct professor for several seminaries and has authored or edited more than 15 books. He earned his Doctor of Philosophy degree from Oxford University in England and his bachelor’s degree (magna cum laude) from Princeton University. Land also earned a Master of Theology (Honors Program) degree from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, where he received the Broadman Seminarian Award as the Outstanding Graduating Student. Dr. Land was the 2013 Watchman Award recipient from the Family Research Council for his leadership on moral and cultural issues. He also received the Phillip E. Johnson Award for Liberty and Truth from Biola University in 2010. Land served previously (1988-2013) as president of The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the Southern Baptist Convention’s official entity assigned to address social, moral and ethical concerns, with particular attention to their impact on American families. In 2014, he was appointed as a Senior Research Fellow of the ERLC’s Research Institute, and in 2015, he was named in the top 15 of Newsmax’s “Top 100 Christian Leaders in America.”
Southern Evangelical Seminary invites visitors to its web site to join the more than 20,000 people who have already downloaded the SES Apologetics App for Windows mobile devices and Android and Apple phones and tablets. Those with the app can get the very best news and information in Christian apologetics, including articles, audio, video, blogs and more from today’s most able defenders of the Christian faith—William Lane Craig, Lee Strobel, Josh McDowell, William Dembski, Frank Turek, Hugh Ross, Gary Habermas and other well-known speakers, authors and teachers.
Southern Evangelical Seminary has been ranked as one of the top graduate programs for General Christian Apologetics by TheBestSchools.org’s “Top 10 Graduate Programs in Christian Apologetics.”
For more information on SES, visit its web site at www.ses.edu or its Facebook page, follow the SES Twitter feed, @sesapologetics, or call (800) 77-TRUTH. For more information about SES’ “Ethics in Emerging Technology” program, visit www.ethics.ses.edu.
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For information on SES or to set up an interview, contact Jen Retallick, 610-584-1096, ext. 100, Media@HamiltonStrategies.com, or Deborah Hamilton, 215-815-7716 or 610-584-1096, ext. 102.
Southern Evangelical Seminary is a leader in apologetics education—teaching students to defend their faith and talk intelligently, passionately and rationally about what they believe and why they believe it. The Christian college and seminary offers a wide variety of bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees. Programs can be completed through residence in the Charlotte area or online. The award-winning education at SES is distinctively Christian and focused on evangelism and world-engaging defense of the Christian faith—Christian Apologetics.