North Dakota State Rep. Brandon Prichard went on a Christian nationalist posting spree on social media last week, declaring, among other things, that every member of Congress must "submit to the Gospel of Jesus Christ" and that "every conservative state should put into code that Jesus Christ is King and dedicate their state to Him."
Every conservative state should put into code that Jesus Christ is King and dedicate their state to Him.
Force RINOs to say no to Jesus and then brutalize them in elections.
We need a government of Christians, not fakers.
— Rep. Brandon Prichard (@RealPrichard) October 1, 2023
Prichard appeared on "The Todd Starnes Show" last Thursday to discuss his views and laughably insisted that he is not, in fact, a Christian nationalist.
"I believe that Christ and Christian values are at the center of our founding," Prichard said. "At the Constitutional Convention, it was Benjamin Franklin that called for prayer, who probably was one of the most agnostic of them all."
The claim that the United States is a Christian nation because Franklin called for prayer during the Constitutional Convention is a common argument made by Christian nationalists, who inevitably fail to mention that the delegates to the convention rejected Franklin's suggestion.
"We need to have a firm foundation in Christ and Christian values," Prichard continued. "I'm not saying that we have a state religion, but I'm saying that we have to have the values of Christianity based in our lawmaking."
When Starnes asked Prichard how he would respond to someone accusing him of being a Christian nationalist, Prichard insisted that he is nothing of the sort.
"I don't think we should have a national religion. I think that would be against our Constitution," Prichard asserted. "What I am arguing for is actually something that has both a religious and secular purpose, which is that the morals of the Bible, of Jesus Christ, is something that our country was founded on, and then that should be put in the code, that should be put in the law, and that should be a benchmark for lawmakers around the country on the state and federal level. So, I think that it's bizarre and I think it's a cop out to say that I'm a Christian nationalist when all I'm saying is exactly what our Founding Fathers would have said, which is, 'Our nation has to be built for a moral people and that morality is based on things like Christian morality.'"
It is hard to take seriously Prichard's declaration that he is not a Christian nationalist when his explanation of what he wants to see—a nation in which "the morals of the Bible" are put into law and states "put into code that Jesus Christ is King"—is pretty much the textbook definition of Christian nationalism.
The Christian nationalism promoted by Prichard and others represents a very real danger to core constitutional values, as they are frequently used by politicians and political operatives to push for harmful public policies that will weaken the separation of church and state, undermine women’s rights, deny legal equality to LGBTQ Americans, and fundamentally reshape the Constitution.
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