Carroll Independent School District (ISD) has declined to accept several “In God We Trust” signs for display on its campuses, including one written in Arabic as well as numerous versions featuring colors associated with various groups within the LGBTQ community, specifically the rainbow flag and transgender pride flag.

The school district had accepted donations on August 15 of “In God We Trust” signs for all 11 of its campuses from telecommunications company Patriot Mobile, as previously reported by The Dallas Express.

The donations were made under the provisions of a recently passed state law that mandates the display of signs featuring the national motto —”In God We Trust”— donated to a “public elementary or secondary school or an institution of higher education.”

The statute required that the posters “must contain a representation of the United States flag centered under the national motto and a representation of the state flag” but stipulated that they “may not depict any words, images, or other information other than the representations listed in Subdivision.”

The bill passed unanimously in the Texas Senate but received 39 “no” votes in the Texas House, all from Democrats, before being signed into law by Governor Abbott.

Srivan Krishna, who attempted to donate the signs in question at a recent Carroll ISD board meeting, said that the signs were designed by current and former students.

The board declined to accept these donations, citing that it already had signage on every campus from the previous donation.

“The statute does not contemplate requiring the district to display more than one copy at a time. Instead, the statue requires a durable poster or framed copy which limits displays to one poster or framed copy in an effort not to overwhelm schools with donations,” remarked Cam Bryant, Carroll ISD board president, to Krishna at the meeting.

“It doesn’t say you have to stop at one. That is your decision to stop at one. Why is more God not good? Are you saying you don’t have one square [foot] of space in our buildings?” retorted Krishna.

In an email correspondence with The Dallas Express, First Amendment attorney and expert Tony McDonald stated that it “certainly looks like someone may be setting up a test case to me,” indicating that a legal challenge to the district may soon follow.

The Dallas Express asked McDonald if he felt the incident involving Krishna could open the district up to litigation.

“The question will likely hinge on whether the signs are considered government speech or whether the district has opened up a forum for private speech by accepting the initial signs,” answered McDonald. “I would tend to think this will be seen as government speech, in which case the district can likely make the selections, but that’s complicated by the state setting the content of the signs that can be accepted. So there’s a question whether it’s speech by the state, the district, or both.”

In closing, McDonald commented that he “would not be surprised if someone sued and we got answers to these questions from a court at some point.”

In an interview with WFAA, Krishna said, “All of us are stakeholders in this community. In this state, we’re all taxpayers, we’re all voters, and we’re all citizens, so we wanted to be a part of this as well. I felt incredibly frustrated and disappointed.”

In the same article, the Carroll ISD board stood by their statement at the meeting and said they had no additional comments.