A federal labor union and several employees with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently filed a lawsuit alleging that Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins violated the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution by sending emails with overtly Christian content.

The lawsuit, which was filed May 13 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on behalf of the National Federation of Federal Employees and seven USDA workers, alleged Rollins “has engaged in an escalating pattern of subjecting all USDA employees to proselytizing Christian messaging promulgated from her position of authority.”

“She has adopted a practice of sending increasingly proselytizing communications to the entire USDA workforce, promoting her own preferred brand of Christian beliefs and theology to the captive audience of employees that report to her, directly or indirectly,” the lawsuit said.

The suit offered several emails Rollins sent to the agency’s roughly 90,000 employees as examples of her alleged “evangelizing,” which began last year with all-staff emails referring to God on the Fourth of July and Thanksgiving.

In a video sent to USDA employees on Dec. 23, 2025, that the lawsuit claimed “dramatically escalated her religious sermonizing in a Christmas message,” Rollins said: “The spirit of generosity flows from the very first Christmas when God gave us the greatest gift possible, the gift of his Son and our Savior Jesus Christ, who came to free us from our sins and open the door to eternal life.”

In an April 5 email, which the lawsuit described as an “Easter sermon,” Rollins proclaimed, “He is Risen, indeed!” and went on to offer an explicitly Christian message, describing Jesus Christ as “our risen Lord” and the Resurrection as “the greatest story ever told, the foundation of our faith, and the abiding hope of all mankind.”

“From the foot of the Cross on Good Friday to the stone rolled away from the now empty tomb, sin has been destroyed. Jesus has been raised from the dead. And God has granted each of us victory and new life. And where there is life — risen life — there is hope,” she wrote in part, according to the lawsuit.

The plaintiffs, including one atheist USDA employee who claimed he felt Rollins’s emails were “conveying to him that he is unwelcome and ‘going to hell,’” allege that her religious communications made them “feel excluded and unwelcome, and they fear the negative consequences of not sharing the Secretary's religion or expressing their own different beliefs in the workplace.

In addition to a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the lawsuit alleges that the messages also violated the Administrative Procedure Act. It asks the court to declare Rollins’s messages unconstitutional and to permanently enjoin her and the USDA from sending such messages in the future.

Rollins is an outspoken Christian who has advocated for policies grounded in Christian faith. She also participates in the Capitol Ministries White House Cabinet Bible Study with other White House cabinet officials, according to an interview she gave last summer to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s Decision Magazine.

She told the outlet that she and other cabinet members at the time were “very deep into studying service and being servants of God and servant leaders but also being able to resist the temptation that comes with power — staying humble and serving God in these positions.”

Rollins posted to X about the lawsuit last week, writing, “It’s just another opportunity to remind everyone: He is Risen.”

A USDA spokesperson told The Christian Post that they do not comment on pending litigation, but that “we will keep the plaintiffs in our prayers during this process.”

Rachel Laser, who serves as president and CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, claimed the Trump administration is “waging a relentless and increasingly brazen crusade against church-state separation and the religious freedom of federal workers,” according to USA Today.

“Trump is not Jesus, federal agencies are not churches, and cabinet secretaries are not government preachers,” added Laser, who also spoke out last Saturday against Rededicate 250, an all-day prayer festival on the National Mall in which multiple public officials participated.

Jon Brown is a reporter for The Christian Post.

This article was originally published in The Christian Post.