President Donald Trump is set to sign an executive order declaring English as the official language of the United States. A source familiar with the matter confirmed this information to Reuters on Friday.
Earlier, The Wall Street Journal reported that President Trump has decided to officially designate English as the national language. He is expected to sign the executive order soon, although the exact date remains unknown.
The United States has never had an official language at the federal level, which has posed challenges for certain states.
Language Controversy in the U.S.
The use of Spanish in public life has been a controversial issue in states like Texas for years. In 2011, a Texas senator insisted that an immigrant rights activist should testify in English instead of Spanish during a Senate hearing.
This event reignited a long-standing debate on whether Spanish should be widely spoken in Texas, a state that was once part of Mexico and, before that, under Spanish rule.
For many older Mexican-Americans, language policies have been a painful issue. Reports suggest that in the 1950s, some students were punished in schools for speaking Spanish.