TX chief under fire for 'In God We Trust' motto on patrol cars tells critics to 'go fly a kite'

A Texas police chief said that the recent string of violent attacks against police officers led him to paste "In God We Trust" in capital letters on the back of his department’s patrol cars, despite protests from a nontheistic group asking him – and other police chiefs around the country – to take the words off the cars.

In response to a letter by Freedom From Religion Foundation, Childress, Texas police Chief Adrian Garcia told the group to "go fly a kite" after they asked him to take down the United States’ national motto from the vehicles.

"After carefully reading your letter I must deny your request in the removal of our Nations motto from our patrol units, and ask that you and the Freedom From Religion Foundation go fly a kite," Garcia wrote in a letter.

"In God We Trust" first appeared on U.S. coins in 1864 and became the official national motto in 1956, being added to paper money the following year. While there have been many challenges to the motto over the years, the Senate reaffirmed its status as the official motto in 2006 and in 2011 the House of Representatives passed another resolution to back the motto.

Free from Religion did not immediately respond to a request for comment From Fox News Latino. But one of the co-presidents of Free From Religion, Annie Laurie Gaylor, told the Los Angeles Times that the motto is a "johnny-come-lately" adage that only gained popularity when the U.S. was trying to distinguish itself from official atheist state of the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

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