Trump religious liberty commissioner says Israel views got her fired

• Carrie Prejean Boller was removed from the Religious Liberty Commission after its Feb. 9 hearing in which she criticized Israel and rejected notions that anti-Zionism equates to antisemitism.
• She said there was a monthslong "witch hunt" to remove her from the commission for her public statements against Israel, which do not align with the Trump administration's positions.
• Prejean Boller said Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, the commission's chair, at one point told her that, "Your job on this commission is to protect the president" and that her social media posts failed to do so.

A member of President Donald Trump's Religious Liberty Commission said she was fired for her statements about Israel and for not sufficiently backing the president, allegations that prompted a Republican House member to request a congressional investigation.

Controversy surrounding Carrie Prejean Boller has been swirling for months, including after a February commission hearing on antisemitism. But her removal came back into the spotlight in recent days after she posted an open letter to Trump on social media.

Prejean Boller’s March 12 X thread included a screenshot of an email from the White House saying her position on the commission, which began in May 2025, “is terminated effective immediately.” 

The thread included the open letter to Trump that outlined what she described as a monthslong “witch hunt” against her for speaking out against Palestinian suffering while serving on the commission.

Formed at the start of Trump's second term, the commission aims to “safeguard and promote America’s founding principle of religious freedom," according to the White House. 

In her interview with USA TODAY, Prejean Boller said Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, the commission’s chairman, told her at one point, “Your job on this commission is to protect the president.”  

She accused Patrick of telling her to refrain from social media, where she had made posts about the ongoing conflict in Gaza. In the same conversation, she said Pastor Paula White, who serves as both a commissioner and senior advisor of the White House Faith Office, asked her to run social media statements by her before posting them. 

USA TODAY reached out to the White House, the Department of Justice, which houses the Religious Liberty Commission, and Patrick and White’s respective offices for comment. 

Prejean Boller, who is Catholic, described the alleged actions against her as an “ironic” violation of her own religious liberty and said she was weighing her legal options. 

“This all started because as a Christian, I could not deny what I was witnessing in Gaza,” she said. 

U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Kentucky, sent a letter to the House Judiciary and Oversight committees on March 13 requesting that they review the circumstances of Prejean Boller’s dismissal. The letter outlined Prejean Boller’s allegations and asked that the committees determine whether the commission’s actions comply with the Federal Advisory Committee Act, a law that requires such groups to have viewpoint balance.  

“If the above accounts are accurate and Mrs. Boller’s removal was motivated by her refusal to refrain from expressing religious views or asking questions reflecting those views, such action raises concerns that a federal advisory body charged with defending religious liberty engaged in viewpoint discrimination and retaliation against protected speech,” Massie wrote. 

Neither committee responded to USA TODAY's inquiries as to whether they had made a decision on or were considering the request.

A group of organizations representing various religious traditions sued the Trump administration in February, alleging that the Religious Liberty Commission violated the Federal Advisory Committee Act by having a lack of religious and ideological diversity.  

The commission includes Protestant, Catholic and Jewish members, but no Muslims or members of other minority religious groups. There were three Muslims on the commission’s advisory board of lay leaders until Sameerah Munshi, who advocated for a group of Maryland parents that successfully sought a right to opt their children out of reading books with LGBTQ characters in public schools, resigned on March 12 in part because of Prejean Boller’s ouster. 

Clashes with commissioners over Israel

Both Prejean Boller and Munshi told USA TODAY the commission’s perceived lack of diversity was “concerning” to them. But Prejean Boller said she was committed to advocating for people of faith regardless of their religious tradition.  

Munshi described her decision to participate in the commission as “a choice between some inclusion and none.”  

Prejean Boller said Mary Sprowls of the White House’s Presidential Personnel Office asked for her resignation in August because of Patrick and White’s concerns about her criticism of Israel.  

She said she was “really shocked” by the request and declined to step down. 

It was around one week later that she said she had the conversation with Patrick and White, in which she was allegedly told to protect Trump and that her public statements about Israel had “run afoul” of the administration’s positions.  

“And he (Patrick) said, ‘So from between now and the end of your term, Carrie, you need to stay off of social media,’” Prejean Boller told USA TODAY in the interview.   

She said she pushed back against that directive and told them she uses her social media accounts to discuss issues that matter to her as a person of faith. 

White responded by asking her to “please just run everything by me for approval" before posting on social media, Prejean Boller said.   

The situation came to a head at the commission’s Feb. 9 hearing on antisemitism, during which Prejean Boller rejected notions that anti-Zionism equates to antisemitism. An audience member was removed at one point for outbursts during her remarks.  

Patrick announced on Feb. 11 that Prejean Boller was no longer on the commission, saying no member “has the right to hijack a hearing for their own personal and political agenda on any issue.”  

He said the commission has "done outstanding work" in its hearings thus far, which have touched on topics including religious liberty in public education and the Trump administration's belief that former President Joe Biden's administration weaponized the law against religious Americans.

"The President respects all faiths," Patrick said. "He believes that all Americans have a right to receive the great inheritance given to them by our founding fathers in the First Amendment."

He also said her removal was his decision, though Prejean Boller responded with an X post of her own saying he lacked the authority to take such action.  

“As the name states, this is President Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission, not yours,” she wrote. 

Prejean Boller rejected notions that she “hijacked” the hearing in her interview with USA TODAY, stating her belief that it is the other commissioners who have a political agenda. 

“Those who bless (Israeli Prime Minister) Bibi Netanyahu will be blessed, that’s their doctrine ... that they live by,” she said. 

'I don't even recognize you,' Prejean Boller tells Trump

Prejean Boller said she is “disappointed” in Trump, both for not communicating with her directly about her removal from the commission and for the fact that she was removed in the first place. 

Their relationship goes back nearly 20 years, she said.  

Trump defended her in 2009 when she stirred controversy by saying “marriage should be between a man and a woman” during the Miss USA 2009 competition. She described her avid support for Trump throughout his political career, saying she has proudly donned MAGA gear and attended both of his inaugurations.  

“Now, I don’t even recognize you,” she wrote in her open letter to the president, which also criticized him for increasing the United States’ military presence in the Middle East despite his proclamations of being a “President of peace.” 

“He’s betraying himself, and he’s betraying MAGA, and he’s betraying me, and he’s betraying the millions of people who voted for him,” Prejean Boller told USA TODAY. “I don’t know how he sleeps at night.” 

A lack of confidence in commission's future work

Prejean Boller said she is “grateful” for Massie’s effort to have a congressional review of her removal from the commission and hopes it comes to fruition. 

In the meantime, she announced on March 16 that she would be directing and producing a documentary, “Mandated by Faith,” about nurses who were fired for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine on religious grounds. 

As for the report on the state of religious liberty that the commission is tasked with producing in the months ahead, neither Prejean Boller nor Munshi expressed confidence in its eventual findings.  

“I just don’t think that this commission was legitimate,” Prejean Boller said. “I think it was very one-sided, very biased.”  

She called for what she described as the "fake commission” to be “shut down” in a March 17 X post. 

Munshi similarly said the remaining commissioners are “interested in protecting the image of this administration” more than protecting religious liberty for all.  

Prejean Boller is set to receive a “Catholic Champion Award” from the social welfare organization Catholics for Catholics in Washington, D.C., on March 19. The organization is among those participating in Trump’s “America Prays” initiative.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations commended both Prejean Boller and Munshi for what it described as their courage in the face of perceived political pressure by the Religious Liberty Commission.

“The Trump administration has repeatedly paid lip service to free speech and religious freedom while obsessively trying to smear and silence Americans who dare to criticize a foreign government, especially American Muslims and even American Catholics like Carrie Prejean Boller,” the council's March 13 statement read. “The commission is now clearly meant to protect Israel from criticism, not to protect religious freedom for the American people.” 

The Religious Liberty Commission is scheduled to hold a “capstone hearing to discuss the past, present and future of religious liberty in America” in Washington, D.C., on April 13.  

BrieAnna Frank is a First Amendment Reporting Fellow at USA TODAY. Reach her at [email protected].

USA TODAY's coverage of First Amendment issues is funded through a collaboration between the Freedom Forum and Journalism Funding Partners. Funders do not provide editorial input.