You Can't Run From Christian Nationalism

As the midterms approach, there has been much focus on how to break the Trump coalition. But one bloc is either written off as hopeless or folded into other categories, when it has long deserved its own strategy and approach. Without the support of white evangelicals, Donald Trump would have never become president and certainly would not have dominated our politics for a decade. And MAGA will never be defeated until liberals approach white evangelicals with a strategy focused on their distinctive characteristics.

Those of us who follow white evangelicalism will tell you until we are blue in the face that our current political crisis is actually a religious one. White evangelicals voted for Trump all three times, at a level unmatched by any other demographic, roughly 80 percent, and they continue to hold him above water as his approval rating sinks below 50 percent with almost all other demographics. Their influence within the Republican Party is pronounced. They make up almost one-third of Trump's coalition, and they hold key positions of power in his government. Mike Johnson, Russell Vought, Pete Hegseth, and Marco Rubio are all evangelical Christians. JD Vance is a Catholic convert who codes evangelical; conservative Catholics as a group have been heavily influenced by white evangelicalism within the religious right.

Politically, white evangelicals are the ultimate prize. According to Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) data, they make up 13 percent of the population but punch above their weight electorally. PRRI puts them at roughly 25 percent of the electorate. That, combined with their remarkable cohesion, arguably makes them the single most influential political bloc in American politics. The only comparable party loyalty is Black voters' dedication to the Democratic Party; on average, 85 percent vote Democratic. But Black voters only make up 11 percent of the electorate.

Beyond the numbers, what most political analysts miss is how strong and specific the authoritarian appeal is for white evangelicals, and how critical it is to at least weaken it. The roots of this confluence go back decades, if not centuries, and are deeply entwined with white evangelical theology itself.

It's the theology, stupid

That is the argument of Robert P. Jones's new book, Backslide: Reclaiming a Faith and a Nation After the Turn Against Democracy. Jones is a sociologist and the founder and CEO of PRRI, the flagship collector of data on American religion. He's also a former Southern Baptist seminarian, born and bred in the white evangelical tradition, within its southern heartland.

Jones explains that the MAGA political movement is an outgrowth of white evangelical belief and culture, not a corruption of it. Political analysts miss this. They cite other drivers of MAGA that may also also apply to white evangelicals, like economic discontent or misinformation—because religious voters are often hesitant to get into the ins and outs of their theology or admit how it motivates them in a secular setting. 

But in fact their rigid theology, built on a scriptural interpretation they believe is "inerrant," is the filter through which white evangelicals interpret other issues, information, and experiences. It is a framework that has incorporated Republican loyalty for decades. It is also one that is highly compatible with authoritarianism more generally.

Jones focuses on a few aspects of white evangelical theology to explain those believers' lockstep with MAGA. First, he demonstrates in this latest book, but also in his previous books, how integral white supremacy has always been to white evangelicalism, which is descended most directly from southern evangelicalism (Backslide, pp. 62–82). In the 19th-century South, the radical implications of Great Awakening revivalism were tamed to preserve the racial and gendered hierarchy built atop slavery, channelling potentially disruptive religious fervor into less dangerous impulses, such as personal piety, concern for the afterlife, the maintenance of order, and submission to authority. 

For much of American history, that theology overtly served white supremacy, distracting from and discrediting any movement for racial justice. In the post-Civil Rights era, the white supremacist elements have been translated into "color-blindness." Overt racism is not acceptable (well, it's made a comeback), but neither is discussion of racism and discrimination, which is labeled "divisive." 

Jones calls white evangelicals' concept of race "a vigilant, willful ignorance" that has made so many of them "half-unwitting hosts of white supremacy" (Backslide, pp. 127–128). PRRI data demonstrate his point. Two-thirds of white evangelicals are either Christian nationalists or "sympathizers." PRRI measured Christian nationalist adherence by asking respondents to rate how strongly they agree or disagree with five statements (paraphrased): 

• The government should officially declare America a Christian nation.
• American laws should be based on Christian values.
• If America abandons its Christian foundations, the country will cease to exist.
• Being Christian is an important part of being truly American.
• God has called Christians to exercise dominion over every area of American society.

PRRI has also found that white evangelicals hold the most objectively racist views. Damningly, Jones finds that regular church attendance actually makes the racism worse. 

Reinforcing racial identity and conformity is white evangelicals' rigid, literalist view of the Bible, in which "correct" belief trumps moral character and critical thinking is discouraged. Like many evangelical kids, I grew up with the maxim, "The Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it." Jones argues, with data, that white evangelicals' elevation of scripture into a "biblical worldview" has long been "self-referential" and "self-reinforcing," convincing white Christians of their rightness and discrediting those who disagree with them, including Black Christians, who read the Bible with the same regularity but come to opposite conclusions on so many issues (Backslide, p. 75).

I would add to Jones's analysis that white evangelical biblicism has produced a closed epistemological framework—historian Mark Noll called it "the scandal of the evangelical mind"—that funnels all information to through a fixed aperture, makes certainty the goal, and prioritizes conformity over critical thought. Sociologists like Samuel Perry and Darren Sherkat have found heavy correlation between forms of white evangelical belief and lower scores on a verbally-based cognitive test, even controlling for education level. This doesn't mean white evangelicals are less intelligent; it means they are conditioned to control their thought. 

One of Jones's most keen insights is the connection he makes between doctrinal rigidity and the evangelical "war on empathy," an essential step in advancing authoritarianism (Backslide, pp. 164–168). Jones points out that white evangelicalism has long tamped empathy down, in order to maintain doctrinal purity by keeping people whose experiences challenge belief at an emotional distance. It is easier to believe that everyone who is different from you is bound for eternal torment when you choose not to empathize with them—harder, when you are confronted with their humanity, as Jones recounts his evangelical friend was when confronted with Jones’s Jewish wife, for whom the friend deeply cared.

I would add that another expression of the cognitive dissonance produced by rigid belief is evangelical compartmentalization, by which one can show kindness on an interpersonal level while supporting harmful policies and power structures that advance a "greater good" according to one's self-assured belief system. Evangelicalism's defenders often point to their charitable activities and giving (I wrote a whole book about their missionary work). But such enterprises are carefully segregated from broader political and social concerns and implications and have more often served to avoid rather than provoke introspection.  

In short, white evangelicalism, as it has evolved over many decades, exhibits many of the features of cultural authoritarianism: the prioritization of order, certainty, and conformity over justice, equality, and inclusion; a tribal identity that has often bled into bigotry; and an intellectual rigidity that wards off self-doubt. White evangelicals also have a track record of favoring political authoritarianism, in the context of America's de jure racist past. It's not that surprising so many have gravitated to an authoritarian strongman who promises to advance their tribal interests at a time of increasing secularism. 

Fear God and vote (R)

In her new book, How to Eat an Elephant: One Voter At A Time, political strategist Sarah Longwell describes the internal cultures of our political parties as entirely different planets. White evangelicalism's influence is a big reason for the divide. 

Longwell describes the Republican party as a "mercenary" culture, in which conformity to a singular cause produces disciplined organization and clear, relentless, simplistic messaging. She has noticed that Republican voters tend to begin sentences with "I am," an indication that their political beliefs are entwined with their identity. Specific positions and policy are secondary to being a Republican (How to Eat an Elephant, p. 164).

It's a political mirror of white evangelical religious culture in form and function. For white evangelicals, too, their beliefs are who they are, and those beliefs are presupposed to be correct by virtue of white evangelicals holding them. As religious belief has mapped onto politics, voting Republican has been incorporated into what it means to be a Christian. And because they are highly certain of their own fundamental rightness, they can combine extreme ideological homogeneity with tactical flexibility. Aside from a few true shibboleths, such as abortion, policies can be adopted with absolute certainty before being discarded during the next election cycle. Failure to understand that has consistently bamboozled Democratic politicians looking to make inroads yet lacking a real grounding in evangelical culture.

Conversely, Longwell describes Democrats as fractious, rebellious, inclusive to a fault, and overly nuanced and hesitant in their messaging. Democratic voters tend to preface their opinions with "I believe"—their politics are a perspective, not who they are. They believe in the rightness of certain cherished positions and policies, not in themselves as the measure of rightness (How to Eat an Elephant, p. 165).

That also describes more theologically liberal white Christians, especially mainline Protestants. Theologically and politically, mainliners are more fond of debate and discussion, see the world as morally complex, and factor varied sources of information and diverse experience into their religious beliefs, rather than imposing their religious beliefs onto broader reality. Their faith can be a cherished part of who they are and inform their experience, but it's not the sum total of who they are, or even the most important part of who they are. It may inform how they vote, but so will other things. 

As Longwell notes, the culture and tactics of the Republican party are more suited to the fight. She argues (pp. 159–174) that Democrats don't have to match Republicans in terms of base tribalism, but that they do need to learn from their communications and organizing strategies.

That's true on the religious front as well, as more theologically liberal Christians confront the white evangelical domination and definition of American Christianity. 

The only way out is through white Christians

Those of us who study American religion believe the only way to truly end the threat of authoritarianism is to address the white Christian elephant in the room. As Jones writes so powerfully across multiple books, white Christianity has long been a major source of authoritarianism in America. 

Despite how seemingly immovable white evangelicals are, I think there is a glimmer of hope. In the short term, there are indications that some white evangelicals are finally starting to weary of Donald Trump; Pew data show his approval rating in that group declined from 78 percent in early 2025 to 69 percent in January of this year. However, as I know from personal experience, and from repeated rounds of election results, white evangelicals are highly prone to holding their noses while voting. The better short-term prospect is that more of them will be too demoralized to venture to the polls.  

Any communications strategy aimed at white evangelicals should take their stated values seriously (despite evident hypocrisy), confuse their categories, and dismantle their compartments. Trump's refugee policies offer an ideal opportunity for targeting evangelicals. Refugees are generally a more sympathetic category than undocumented immigrants, white evangelicals have a long history and extensive ministries with refugees, and they particularly care about Christians who have fled religious persecution. In my circles, I have found they don't reliably know that Trump has virtually ended the refugee program (only excepting white South Africans) and admitted zero religious refugees in the last year. They also don't realize that Temporary Protective Status recipients are essentially refugees, and the Trump administration has unnecessarily revoked their status and is deporting many of them, including persecuted Christians, back to dangerous countries. 

Similarly, appeals to white evangelicals must take into account that a major litmus test of faith in white evangelicalism is opposition to abortion. You can disagree with their stance or doubt its motivations, but it must be reckoned with as a deeply held belief. Demonstrating the real-world impact of abortion laws on maternal mortality, telling stories of suffering by married women pregnant with wanted babies who could not get care, or presenting data showing that legal bans are less effective than other policies in preventing abortions have a better chance of breaking through than arguments on grounds of women's rights. 

Another short-term strategy for Democrats is to focus more intently on theologically liberal Christians, who are a true swing demographic. Fifty-seven percent of white mainline Christians voted for Trump in 2024. But again, faith for these Christians is often one piece of who they are and how they behave politically, so a specifically religious appeal to them probably won't carry the same punch as it does for white evangelicals. 

In the longer term, however, Democrats, liberal Christian leaders and congregants, and especially pro-democracy white evangelicals need to clearly and unceasingly tell a different Christian narrative of America and to separate mandatory Republican voting from Christian faithfulness. 

A liberal Christianity?

The narrative that has been loudest and has dominated the imagination of the most influential American Christians for centuries has been white Christian nationalist-adjacent, if not the pure distilled substance: America is a nation founded for and by white Christians, as destined by God. The new narrative needs to not only attack Christian nationalism theologically, point-by-point, scripture-by-scripture, doctrine-by-doctrine, but to demonstrate the compatibility of Christian belief and ethics with the values of pluralistic democracy itself. This project is already underway, particularly with candidates like James Talarico and Adam Hamilton leaning into their faith in explaining their support for religious pluralism, immigration, and equitable economics. 

Of course, as Jones's The Convocation Unscripted podcast co-host Jemar Tisby regularly reminds white Christian audiences, the Black church has been trying to tell this democratic Christian story all along. It's a well established moral and political tradition waiting to inspire and instruct white American Christians. Unfortunately, white evangelicals are used to dismissing out of hand Christians who disagree with them politically as less than "true" Christians. 

The real key is for the 20 percent of white evangelicals who do not support Trump to become bolder and clearer in making the Christian case for democracy. They, too, might be dismissed as heretics—as have David French, Russell Moore, and others who have tried—according to the syllogistic tests of white evangelicalism, in which dissent disproves bonafides. Building vocal critical masses, within congregations and organizations, is essential. As Longwell says, Republican voters need a permission structure that allows them to get off the Trump train. White evangelicals need that structure to be a God-ordained superhighway with blinking neon lights citing quotable Bible verses.

I've seen secularists bemoan greater Democratic comfort with religion as a kind of erosion of church and state from the left. But they miss the point, which is not to lay any Christian claim to the American state. It is purposefully and strategically countering a dangerous ideology rooted in a form of Christianity. 

As Longwell discusses in her book (pp. 57–63), you have to beat your opponents at their own communications game, using their own language and frameworks when possible, and you need to do it preemptively and repetitiously. White evangelicalism has a highly specific lexicon. Democrats need to learn it. 

White evangelicals may never be ardent liberals, but their bloc can be cracked, their enthusiasm dampened, and their turnout decreased. American politics are fought on the margins, and shaving off even a few percentage points of white evangelical allegiance to the Republican Party will make a difference. Political strategists and donors need to try. 

Featured image is "Lakewood Worship," CC BY 3.0 ToBeDaniel 2013.