Donald Trump urged evangelical pastors to encourage their congregations to vote Republican in the upcoming midterm elections, suggesting they will be the targets of violence if Democrats carry the House.
US President Donald Trump, facing scrutiny for hush money payments to a porn star and a former Playboy model, pleaded with evangelical leaders for political help during closed-door remarks on Monday, warning of dire consequences to their congregations should Republicans lose in November’s midterm elections.
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“It’s not a question of like or dislike, it’s a question that they will overturn everything that we’ve done and they will do it quickly and violently. And violently. There is violence. When you look at Antifa — these are violent people,” Trump said, describing what would happen should his voters fail to cast ballots. “You have tremendous power. You were saying, in this room, you have people who preach to almost 200 million people. Depending on which Sunday we’re talking about.”
It’s hard to overstate the cynicism of this.
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There is no reason on earth to think that Antifa will erupt in celebratory violence against churches if Democrats carry the House in November. None. Antifa makes an appearance only when white nationalists and neo-Nazis make an appearance. And, of course, Antifa isn’t linked to anything near the violence of those nutjobs.
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The Johnson Amendment has not been repealed — so Trump is urging the pastors to break the law.
It’s a good pointer into how much contempt Trump, and a lot of pastors, actually have for the people in the pews. They don’t view them as thinking adults capable of exercising independent, informed moral judgment, but a bloc of votes to be purchased with favors.
The pastors are not spiritual leaders; they are brokers.
Unfortunately, Trump and the pastors are more right than wrong. After all, we’re talking about people who have been told all their lives that they’re no damn good, that their minds are untrustworthy, that pastors are an elevated class of men — more trustworthy, more honest, more honorable. If those pastors stand in their pews and (unlawfully) howl and bellow that Jesus needs for them to vote and wants this man or that to win an election, most of their congregants will mindlessly do as they’re told.
Christianity, with its relentless messages that you’re no damn good, that belief without evidence is the greatest virtue of all, is a force for infantilizing and then exploiting people. Most of the pastors in that room know that and know how cynical Trump and themselves actually are. And there is no doubt in my mind whatever that, at least here and across the south, the pastors will do as Trump asks — and their congregants will do as they’re told.