Trump 'supercharged' decades of work to remake GOP as Christian nationalist party: column

Travis Gett
December 13, 2023 

Trump at St. John's Episcopal Church (Photo: White House/Flickr)

Donald Trump "supercharged" decades of work by right-wing Christians to remake the Republican Party as an "ethno-nationalist party," according to a new column.

Polling data shows a majority of Republicans – 54 percent – identify with Christian nationalism, compared to just 31 percent in 2010 who identified as merely conservative Christians, and Salon columnist Amanda Marcotte said that shift has been the result of a long-term project by religious extremists that had accelerated since Trump was first elected.

"These numbers likely are not the result of millions of Americans suddenly finding Jesus, but about the way that Trump and the MAGA movement have cemented the GOP as an ethno-nationalist party, instead of merely a conservative party," Marcotte wrote. "Which is to say, now that they're a tribe they need ways to define their tribal identity. Religion offers one aspect of that identity. (Whiteness, too, though most will rarely, if ever, say so out loud.)"

"This is why polls show over 40 percent of self-described 'evangelicals' don't even go to church," she added. "'Christian' has morphed from a faith tradition to a marker of ethnic/political identity."

Religious fundamentalists have spent decades generating propaganda and disinformation to form a myth that the U.S. was founded as an explicitly Christian nation, and no figure has been more important to that charade than "huckster" historian David Barton, whose research is considered a joke by scholars and whose claims are rejected by even conservative Christian academics.

"Yet Barton's influence is so vast in the world of Republican thought it's immeasurable," Marcotte wrote. "He's heavily promoted through right-wing media and consults with major Republican leaders, including the new speaker of the House, Mike Johnson. But even people who have never heard his name have likely absorbed his ideas through the right-wing media ecosystem, which is infused with them. When Republicans repeat false talking points, like 'separation of church and state is a myth' or 'the Founders envisioned a Christian nation,' most of that goes straight back to Barton and his fake histories."

So how did Trump, of all people, usher these dubious assertions into the political mainstream?

"That this all got supercharged under Trump is a little odd, no doubt, because Trump's 'Christianity' is as transparently false as Barton's historical research," Marcotte wrote. "Perversely, however, Trump's fake faith likely boosted the widespread embrace of an 'evangelical' identity by Republican voters who previously weren't especially religious."

"By waving around a Bible he doesn't read and talking up a Jesus he doesn't believe in, Trump has underscored how much 'Christian' is a tribal identity marker more than a faith tradition, at least in the MAGA world," she added. "That's encouraged a lot of people who don't really want to get involved in a church community to start projecting a 'Christian' identity out into the world, without worrying overmuch about their lack of faith at home."