Christian nationalists could resort to 'violence' if GOP loses midterms: Southern Baptist

Wildwood, New Jersey - January 28, 2020: Man holds hands together in prayer during opening ceremonies at President Donald Trump's "Keep America Great" rally held at the Wildwoods Convention Center. Shutterstock/ Benjamin Clapp

Carl Gibson

January 19, 2026 

ALTERNET

One religious scholar is warning that the 2026 midterm elections could prompt a violent response from far-right evangelical Christians.

During a Monday interview with Zeteo host John Harwood, Public Religion Research Institute founder and president Robert P. Jones – who holds an M. Div from the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from Emory University — spoke about how President Donald Trump's MAGA movement has captured a vast bulk of Christian evangelicals. Harwood asked Jones whether MAGA Christians were excusing Trump's "brutality and cruel behavior" due to innate racism, or if they were simply people fearing becoming a demographic minority and overwhelmed by the "loss of life they were accustomed to."

"Do you feel sorry for the people who are embracing what the Trump administration is doing because they're scared or what?" Harwood asked.

"Well, I should just say I am those people. These are my people. Like I said, I grew up in the deep, deep South," Jones said. "... This is deep for me, and personal. It's a big mix of emotions ... I feel some anger about it, for sure. But I also feel some compassion, mostly because I feel like what has happened is they have let their own fears take control of their lives, and they let it snuff out the primary vision of Christianity, which is supposed to be about love."

"There's even now, in some white evangelical circles, a straightforward and serious theological attack on the virtue of empathy," he continued. "Like that's where we are, right? They're deconstructing empathy because Elon Musk has cast empathy as the great weakness of the Western world ... I think those people are sincerely lost. They're lost religiously, they're lost politically, and I'm hoping we can call enough of them back to the fold in order to save the country."

Harwood then asked questions from viewers, including one who wanted Jones' perspective on whether the United States was on the brink of civil war given the Trump administration's actions in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The viewer pointed to Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and residents of Minneapolis asking local police to confront U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, calling it "extremely dangerous."

Jones responded by pointing to parallels from the 19th century, in which Christian denominations frequently split into North and South factions due to fundamental disagreements over the issue of chattel slavery. He added that the Episcopal Church felt compelled to dismantle its refugee resettlement program entirely due to its disagreement with the Trump administration prioritizing white Afrikaners from South Africa over Brown and Black refugees from other countries.

"So we're already seeing some moves, and even breaks within the Christian world," Jones said. "I think we may be heading for some very difficult days."

"You mean actual violence or do you mean very, very intense political disagreement? Harwood asked.

"I'm deeply, deeply worried about the midterm elections being a flashpoint for violence in this country," Jones responded.

Watch the segment below:

Christian nationalists believe Trump on a 'mission from God' to occupy cities: author

Members of law enforcement gather, as tensions rise after federal law enforcement agents were involved in a shooting incident in north Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S., January 15, 2026. REUTERS/Ryan Murphy

Alex Henderson

January 15, 2026

ALTERNET

President Donald Trump is threatening to invoke the Insurrection Act in response to escalating tensions between protesters and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The threat comes a little over a week after the fatal shooting of an unarmed 37-year-old U.S. citizen Renee Nicole Good by ICE agent Jonathan Ross.

Meanwhile, in Philadelphia, progressive District Attorney Larry Krasner and Sheriff Rochelle Bilal are threatening criminal charges against ICE agents if they violate the city's laws.

Minneapolis

In a Thursday conversation for The New Republic's podcast, "The Daily Blast," host Greg Sargent (a former Washington Post columnist) and author Sarah Posner examined the connection between ICE raids and far-right evangelical Christian nationalism.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is an aggressive defender of President Donald Trump's mass deportations and ICE raids, and according to Sargent and Posner, extreme Christian fundamentalism is a key part of that mindset.

Posner told Sargent: "For Johnson, he represents only Republicans. In his mind, he doesn’t represent all American people. He thinks that he is on a mission from God to carry out a biblical or a Christian kind of government. And in his mind, that kind of government does not represent the ideals of, you know, helping your neighbor, welcoming the stranger — things that many people would think are biblical values. But for him, the biblical values are a strong, powerful, militarized government that lays down the law and protects America from what he sees as America's enemies: The left."

Johnson and other white Christian nationalists, according to Sargent and Posner, view ICE violence in Minneapolis in decidedly religious terms.

Posner continued: "They would like Americans to believe that the violence that we're seeing on the streets of Minneapolis and elsewhere is caused by protesters, is caused by neighbors with whistles — not caused by the ICE agents themselves or the Customs and Border Protection agents. And so, to him, he would like America to believe that, yes, there are riots in the street. He used that word: riots. And to him, by definition, those are not caused by ICE, because ICE is carrying out a mission from God to defend America from an invasion of illegal immigrants — from the left who would harbor those illegal immigrants. That's the kind of narrative that he's trying to draw here."

She added, "So he would never even conceive of reining in ICE, of putting restrictions on what they can do with their weapons or in terms of detaining people. To him, they are carrying out a government and a God-given mission to protect America. "

Listen to the full New Republic podcast at this link or read the transcript here.

 

Trump’s Christian Nationalist Pseudo-Historians Attack the Smithsonian

by Bill Berkowitz / January 17th, 2026

If you’re planning a visit to the Smithsonian, you may want to go sooner rather than later — before the nation’s most important public history institution becomes another casualty of Trump-era historical revisionism.

For example, on January 10, People magazine’s Charlotte Phillipp reported that Trump complained that his portrait in the Smithsonian Institution’s Portrait Gallery pointed out that he was “impeached twice, on charges of abuse of power and incitement of insurrection.” The White House provided an updated portrait, “along with a new caption that has omitted text that mentioned his impeachments and the Jan. 6 insurrection.”

According to January 8 report by the New York Times’ Graham Bowley and Robin Pogrebin, “After a months long lull in tensions, the Smithsonian is facing an ultimatum from the White House to comply next week with a comprehensive review of the institution’s content and plans — or risk potential cuts to its budget. … [Secretary Lonnie Bunch III ] noted that it would be impossible to turn over the full volume of records sought in the time frame, and he reiterated that the institution is autonomous.”

The Smithsonian is one of the largest and most respected cultural institutions in the U.S., and its exhibits influence public understanding of American history. Efforts to politically pressure or intervene in how it presents history raise serious questions about academic independence, historical accuracy, and the role of ideology in public education.

In a recent story titled “Father-Son Christian Nationalist Pseudo-Historians David And Tim Barton Are Shaping The Trump Administration’s War On The Smithsonian,” Right Wing Watch points out how the pseudo historian David Barton and his apple-not-falling-far-from-the-tree son Tim, are on assignment by the Trump administration “to control how American history is presented at the federal level.”

David Barton, and now his son, have built their careers “spread[ing] demonstrably false claims about the Founding Fathers, the Founding Era, and the founding of the United States to bolster their modern-day Christian nationalist political agenda,” Right Wing Watch’s Kyle Mantyla reported in mid-April of last year. Barton has even gone so far as to attempt to make a biblical case for Trump’s tariffs, Mantyla noted in an early April story.

David Barton, who has no formal academic credentials in history, has long been the go-to guy for the Religious Right and Christian nationalists’ maintaining that the Founding Fathers intended to establish America to be a Christian nation that operates according to the laws of God as set out in the Bible.

Tim Barton has taken over as president of the WallBuilders organization, serving as co-host of the daily “WallBuilders Live” radio program, and traveling the nation delivering presentations filled with Christian nationalist disinformation.

Right wing Watch reported that on their WallBuilders radio program “Tim and his father celebrated the news that the White House is now threatening to withhold funding from the Smithsonian if the institution does not submit additional documentation amid the administration’s review of its content and displays.”

The Christian nationalist Bartons, claim they were integral in bringing this about.

“This is one that is dear to our heart,” Tim Barton said. “The White House warned the Smithsonian that if the museum did not submit more documentation to the administration to enable a review of its contents, funds may be withheld from the institution.”

“What they said is, ‘We want to know [the] chain of command. Who approved all this?'” he continued. “What they’re asking is, who is accountable? Who’s going to be responsible? Who gets held accountable for all of the nonsense. This is not a crazy request. Museums are supposed to keep record of who approved what, what areas, what displays, what wall mounts.”

“The Smithsonian failed to tell them who put up some of the crazy stuff that is there,” Tim Barton said. “And dad, you and I have gone through and reviewed several of the Smithsonians and there’s some crazy stuff there.”

“Yeah, I was going to point out that earlier in the year, the White House asked us to look at some of that,” David Barton responded. “At that point, you were leading a tour of legislators in Washington, D.C. … By the way, we love the American History Museum, the Smithsonian because of the artifacts, but not because of the way they present them. The way they present them is terrible. And so as the legislators went through, Tim, they came back to you and said, ‘Oh man, this is terrible and this is bad.’ And so you turned that over to the White House on how bad the stuff was, how misleading it was.”

“You were right in the middle of that story,” David celebrated.

“This is so encouraging that we actually have an administration saying, ‘Let’s tell the truth, let’s stop this woke propaganda nonsense, let’s tell the truth,'” Tim responded. “This is such good news and I’m so excited for what this could mean for the 250th celebration because this is part of what they’re gearing it for; they want to make sure we’re telling good stories for the 250th.”

The Smithsonian exists so Americans can confront their past honestly, in all its achievement, cruelty, contradiction, and struggle. The Bartons are not defending history, they are prosecuting it. And in the Trump administration, they have found a willing partner. They would eagerly replace historical inquiry with ideological loyalty; reshaping the public memory with Christian nationalist myths.

The Smithsonian was never meant to serve any administration’s political narrative — let alone the theological agenda of Christian nationalist activists who reject mainstream scholarship. If Trump succeeds in bending the institution to his will, the loss will not belong to historians alone. It will belong to every American who believes history should be examined, not edited.

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Bill Berkowitz is a longtime observer of the conservative movement. Read other articles by Bill.

 

Locust swarms destroy crops. Scientists found a way to stop that

Arizona State University

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Arizona State University PhD student Sydney Millerwise holds a migratory locust in ASU’s Global Locust Initiative lab. A new study by an ASU team and international collaborators identifies a strategy to manage locust populations and prevent damage to crops.

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Credit: Quinton Kendall/ASU Knowledge Enterprises

“They’re very destructive when there's a lot of them, but one-on-one, what's not to love?” says Arianne Cease. She’s talking about locusts.

As the director of Arizona State University’s Global Locust Initiative, Cease has a healthy admiration for these insects, even as she studies ways to manage locust swarms and prevent the destruction they cause.

Locust swarms, which may conjure images of biblical plagues and ancient famines, remain a serious problem worldwide. They can destroy crops across entire regions, ruin people’s livelihoods, and in some places, impact children’s education and future economic opportunities. Swarms can cover hundreds of square miles — equal to a major metropolitan area like New York City or Phoenix.

So, when Cease and her international team of scientists discovered a simple soil-based method to keep locusts from eating crops, they knew their work could change people’s lives. To the team’s knowledge, theirs is the first study to test this new method in real-world farming conditions and confirm that it works.

The researchers partnered with farmers in Senegal who experience outbreaks of the Senegalese grasshopper. This grasshopper does not form the extreme swarms like the desert locust, but its consistent outbreaks and smaller swarms can be more devastating for Senegalese farmers. These communities, which worked with Cease for previous studies, advocated for this larger study.

Each farmer grew two plots of millet — one treated with nitrogen fertilizer and one untreated.

Compared to the untreated plots, the treated plots showed three clear differences: fewer locusts, less crop damage and a doubled crop yield.

"This breakthrough represents an important step forward in the sustainable management of migratory pests, offering a community-based tool that expands the available treatment options," says Cease, also an associate professor with the ASU School of Sustainability and School of Life Sciences.

The study published today in the journal Springer Nature. Associate Professor Mamour Touré of Université Gaston Berger in Saint-Louis, Senegal, was the lead author of the study, while Cease served as the principal investigator of this USAID-supported project.

“The results are of major importance to the scientific community and also to Senegalese farmers,” says Touré. “The study gave them a better understanding of grasshoppers and locusts, as well as a practical way to control them at the local level.”

The Global Locust Initiative, part of the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory, focuses on locusts and the systems that surround them. Environmental factors, biology and behavior, economic impacts, policies, and landscape management all feed into the cycle of locust destruction — and offer opportunities to break it.

Over 15 years of studying locusts, Cease found that plants growing in nutrient-poor soil promote locust outbreaks. These plants are high in carbs and low in protein.

“This carbohydrate bias, or the ‘donut diet,’ is optimal for populations of locusts and swarming grasshoppers,” Cease says. Just like runners who load up on carbs before a marathon, locusts need more carbs to fuel their migration.

In nitrogen-rich soil, plants are higher in protein and lower in carbs. These plants are bad for locusts to eat — their bodies can’t handle the extra protein and don’t get enough energy.

Protein-packed plants prevent pests

All this work led to the question: can we prevent locust damage by changing the protein-to-carb ratio of plants? Small lab studies and field surveys suggested the answer might be yes, but no one had tested it in open, working farmland. To Cease, that was the next logical step.

Two villages in Senegal that collaborated with Cease on previous studies advocated conducting the new study in their communities. Farms there suffer heavy crop damage from swarms of the Senegalese grasshopper.

In the experiment, 100 farmers grew two millet plots each—one treated with nitrogen fertilizer and one left untreated for a controlled comparison.

The scientists were uncertain whether locusts might still enter treated plots via untreated areas, or whether the increase in plant protein would attract different pests.

The team assessed the number of locusts and damage to farmers’ plots three times throughout the growing season. They also recorded millet yields for each plot at harvest time.

The difference between the treated and untreated plots was significant. Treated plots had fewer locusts, less leaf damage to crops and a doubled millet yield at harvest. The team also found no evidence that nitrogen fertilizer made pest problems worse.

While the research team provided nitrogen fertilizer for the purpose of the study, it’s not practical for communities to use on a regular basis. To really work long-term, they need a way to add nitrogen to the soil that is affordable and good for the farmland.

“Ongoing work is focused exclusively on compost, and we seem to be getting the same results,” Cease says.

The project’s funding, provided through USAID, was cancelled in early 2025. However, the farmers on the ground in Senegal are so encouraged by the results that they are continuing the compost system on their own.

“Farmers unanimously stated that they no longer burn crop residues after land clearing, but instead practice composting to fertilize their fields, thereby helping to reduce grasshopper infestations. This technique was fully mastered thanks to the project,” Touré says.

The team is applying for additional funding to expand the project into other regions hard-hit by locusts.

Staying a step ahead of locusts

The U.S. has no locust species inside its borders. Why study them here at all? Cease says it won’t stay that way forever. She’s keeping her eye on the Central American locust, whose range reaches about 200 miles from our border.

“We can say with pretty high certainty that Texas will be very suitable for locusts in about 10 to 15 years,” Cease says. “Whether or not they will create a problem is yet to be determined, but it’s something that we should definitely be aware of.”

Even without locusts, we have enough reasons to study grasshoppers in the U.S. — 12 of them, in fact. They’re called the Dirty Dozen.

These 12 rangeland grasshoppers (plus one cricket) are top species of management concern in the western U.S., according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. When they swarm, they can outcompete livestock for grass, creating a huge problem for ranchers.

The department relies on chemical pesticides to control the grasshoppers, but through the Global Locust Initiative, it’s identifying alternative treatments that are safer for human health and the environment.

The more we learn about locusts in other parts of the world, the better we can address migratory pests at home and prepare for the day when locusts make their way to the U.S.

---

DOI

10.1038/s41598-025-27884-z 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

Soil amendments suppress migratory pests and enhance yields

Article Publication Date

15-Jan-2026

Arianne Cease (left) served as the principal investigator of this USAID-supported project, and Associate Professor Mamour Touré (right) of Université Gaston Berger in Saint-Louis, Senegal, was the lead author of the study.

Credit

Arianne Cease/Global Locust Initiative

“All locusts are grasshoppers, but not all grasshoppers are locusts,” says Cease, an associate professor with the ASU School of Sustainability in the College of Global Futures. A locust in a “solitarious” phase is shy. It acts like a regular grasshopper: avoiding others of its kind, appearing a camouflage green and staying in one area. A locust in a “gregarious” phase is just the opposite — it gathers with other locusts, wears bright colors to stand out and migrates huge distances in search of food. Here, gregarious locusts gather inside their enclosure in the Global Locust Initiative lab at Arizona State University.

Like a werewolf exposed to moonlight, a locust is a grasshopper with the potential to completely transform under the right conditions. Out of approximately 6,800 described species of short-horned grasshoppers, only 19 are considered locusts. Over 15 years of studying locusts, Associate Professor Arianne Cease with the ASU School of Sustainability, discovered that plants growing in nutrient-poor soil promote locust outbreaks. These plants are high in carbs and low in protein. A key goal of her research is to improve sustainable ecosystem management and rural livelihoods.

An ASU and international research team partnered with 100 farmers from two villages in Senegal for the study. Farmers grew two plots of millet — one treated with nitrogen fertilizer and one untreated. Here, a Senegalese farmer works in the field during the experiment.

Credit

Quinton Kendall/ASU Knowledge Enterprise

A participating Senegalese farmer shows his field with improved soil from composting. Composting is also the focus of ongoing research by the science team.

Credit

Arianne Cease

A Senegalese farmer and study participant inspects ripening millet in a field.

Credit

Marion Le Gall

How Christian Reconstructionism influences US politics: scholar

A Christian chruch service on July 8, 2024 (Paul Shuang/Shutterstock.com)

Art Jipson
The Conversation

January 12, 2026 

Christian Reconstructionism is a theological and political movement within conservative Protestantism that argues society should be governed by biblical principles, including the application of biblical law to both personal and public life.

Taking shape in the late 1950s, Christian Reconstructionism developed into a more organized movement during the 1960s and 1970s.

It was born from the ideas of theologian R. J. Rushdoony, an influential Armenian-American Calvinist philosopher, theologian and author. In his 1973 book, “The Institutes of Biblical Law,” Rushdoony argued that Old Testament laws should still apply to modern society. He supported the death penalty not only for murder but also for offenses listed in the text such as adultery, blasphemy, homosexuality, witchcraft and idolatry.

As a scholar of political and religious extremism, I am familiar with this movement. Its following has been typically very small – never more than a few thousand committed adherents at its peak. But since the 1980s, its ideas have spread far beyond its limited numbers through books, churches and broader conservative Christian networks.

The movement helped knit together a network of theologians, activists and political thinkers who shared a belief that Christians are called to “take dominion” over society and exercise authority over civil society, law and culture.

These ideas continue to resonate across many areas of American religious and political life.
Origins of Christian Reconstructionism

Rushdoony’s ideas were born from a radical interpretation of Reformed Christianity – a branch of Protestant Christianity that follows the teachings of John Calvin and other reformers. It emphasizes God’s authority, the Bible as the ultimate guide and salvation through God’s grace rather than human effort.

Rushdoony’s ideas led him to found The Chalcedon Foundation in 1965, a think tank and publishing house promoting Christian Reconstructionism. It served as the movement’s main hub, producing books, position papers, articles and educational materials on applying biblical law to modern society.

It helped train Greg Bahnsen, an Orthodox Presbyterian theologian, and Gary North, a Christian reconstructionist writer and historian, both of whom went on to take key leadership roles in the movement.

At the heart of reconstructionism lies the conviction that politics, economics, education and culture are all arenas where divine authority should reign. Secular democracy, they argued, was inherently unstable, a system built on human opinion rather than divine truth.

These ideas were, and remain, deeply controversial. Many theologians, including conservatives within the Reformed tradition, rejected Rushdoony’s argument that ancient Israel’s civil laws should apply in modern states.
Christian dominionism and different networks

Nonetheless, reconstructionist ideas grew as people who more broadly believed in dominionism began to align with it. Dominionism is a broader ideology advocating Christian influence over culture and politics without requiring literal enforcement of biblical law.

Dominionism did not begin as a single, unified movement. Rather, it emerged in overlapping strands during the same period that Christian Reconstructionism was developing.

Between the 1960s and 1980s, Christian Reconstructionism helped turn dominionist beliefs into an explicit political project by grounding them in theology and outlining how biblical law should govern society. Religion historian Michael J. McVicar explains that Rushdoony’s work advocated applied biblical law as both a theological and political alternative to secular governance. This helped in influencing the trajectory of the Christian right.

At the same time, parallel streams – especially within charismatic and Pentecostal circles – advanced similar claims about Christian authority over society using different theological language.

The broad network of those who believe in Christian dominionism includes several approaches: Rushdoony’s reconstructionism, which provides the theological foundation, and charismatic kingdom theology.

Charismatic kingdom theology, which emerged in Pentecostal and charismatic circles, teaches that believers – empowered by the Holy Spirit – should shape politics, culture and society before Christ’s return.

Unlike reconstructionism, it emphasizes prophecy and spiritual authority rather than formal biblical law; it seeks influence over institutions such as government, education and culture.

What unites them is the idea that Christian faith should be the basis of the nation’s moral and political order.

Taken together, I argue that these strands have reinforced one another, creating a larger movement of thinkers and activists than any single approach could achieve alone.
From reconstructionism to the New Apostolic Reformation

Christian reconstructionist and dominionist ideas gained wider popularity through C. Peter Wagner, a leading charismatic theologian who helped shape the New Apostolic Reformation, or NAR, by adapting elements of Christian Reconstructionism. NAR is a charismatic movement that builds on dominionist ideas by emphasizing the use of spiritual gifts and apostolic leadership to shape society.

Wagner emphasized spiritual warfare, prophecy and modern apostles taking control of seven key areas – family, church, government, education, media, business and the arts – to reshape society under biblical authority. This is known as the “Seven Mountains Mandate.”

Both revisionist and dominionist movements share the belief that Christians should lead cultural institutions.

Wagner’s dominion theology, however, adapts Christian Reconstructionism to a charismatic context, transforming the goal of a Christian society into a spiritually driven movement aimed at influencing culture and governments worldwide.
Doug Wilson and homeschooling

Another key bridge between reconstructionism and contemporary dominionist thought is Doug Wilson, a pastor and author in Moscow, Idaho.

Though Wilson distances himself from some of reconstructionism’s harsher edges, he draws heavily from Rushdoony’s intellectual framework. Wilson’s influence can be seen in publications such as “Reforming Marriage,” where he argues for applying biblical principles to law, education and family life.

He has promoted Christian schools, traditional family roles and living out a “Christian worldview” in everyday life, bringing reconstructionist ideas into new areas of society.

Through his writings, teaching and leadership within the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches – the CREC – network, Wilson encourages a vision of society shaped by Christian values, connecting reconstructionist thought to contemporary cultural engagement.

Wilson’s publishing house, Canon Press, and his classical school movement have brought these ideas into thousands of Christian homes and classrooms across the U.S. His local congregation – the Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho – numbers around 1,300.

The Christian homeschooling movement offers parents a curriculum steeped in reformed theology and resistance to secular education.
Enduring influence

Some critics warn that the fusion of dominionist and reconstructionist theology with political action can weaken pluralism and democratic norms by pressuring laws and policies to reflect a single religious worldview. They argue that even moderated forms of these visions challenge the separation of church and state. They risk undermining the rights of religious minorities, nonreligious citizens and others who do not share the movement’s beliefs.

Supporters frame their mission as the renewal of a moral society, one in which divine authority provides the foundation for human flourishing.

Today, Christian Reconstructionism operates through small but influential networks of churches, Christian homeschool associations and media outlets. Its reach extends far beyond its original movement.

Even among those unfamiliar with Rushdoony, the political and theological patterns he helped shape remain visible in modern evangelical activism and the ongoing debates over religion’s place in American public life.

Art Jipson, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Dayton

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

MAGA claims of 'massive religious revival' meticulously debunked

CEO of Turning Point USA Erika Kirk reacts as she speaks during AmericaFest, the first Turning Point USA summit since the death of Charlie Kirk, in Phoenix, Arizona, U.S. December 18, 2025. REUTERS/Cheney Orr

Alex Henderson

January 07, 2026

ALTERNET


Christian nationalist themes were alive and well at Turning Point USA's AmericaFest 2025 gathering at the Phoenix Convention Center, which found Vice President JD Vance declaring that the United States "always will be a Christian nation." But that claim was debunked by MS NOW's Steve Benen, who noted what the Founding Fathers had to say on the subject — for example, John Adams, in 1797, writing that "The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion," and Thomas Jefferson saying, in 1802, that the U.S. Constitution created "a wall of separation between church and state."

Another prominent Christian nationalist theme at AmericaFest 2025 is that the U.S. is seeing a widespread evangelical renaissance, which is also what the Moral Majority's Rev. Jerry Falwell Sr. claimed during the 1980s. But Salon's Amanda Marcotte, in an article published on January 7, counters that the U.S. is moving in a more "secular" direction — not converting to evangelical Christian fundamentalism in huge numbers.

"For decades now," Marcotte explains, "the Christian Right has been the most powerful and influential force in the GOP, and yet even by their standards, this marked a dramatic shift toward the theocratic impulse. From a purely rational perspective, this is bad politics. Only 23 percent of Americans identify as evangelicals. Trump was able to win in 2024 only by convincing large numbers of people outside of evangelical Christianity that he has a secular worldview. This was aided by the fact that he quite clearly doesn't believe all the Christian language, both coded and overt, his aides coax him to say."

The Salon journalist continues, "But none of that seems to register with MAGA leadership right now. They've convinced themselves — or at least are trying to persuade their donors and followers — that the U.S. is undergoing a massive religious revival. Right-wing media has been pushing the view that huge numbers of Americans, especially young Americans, are converting to fundamentalist Christianity."

Right-wing media, Marcotte observes, are claiming that the murder of Turning Point USA's Charlie Kirk in September is fueling a "tidal wave of Americans, especially young Americans, discovering or returning to Christianity." But that "imaginary religious awakening," she stresses, isn't materializing.

"There is no evidence-based reason to believe there's a religious revival among the young that is about to create massive election windfalls for Republicans," Marcotte writes. "On the contrary, a December report from Pew Research found that, 'on average, young adults remain much less religious than older Americans. Today's young adults also are less religious than young people were a decade ago.'"

Amanda Marcotte's full article for Salon is available at this link.