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Spreading Christian Nationalist Lies in the Name of 'True History'

The Victory Channel's Greg Stephens and Gene Bailey on a live "FlashPoint" program Jan. 6, 2021.

On multiple(link is external) occasions(link is external), Gene Bailey and Greg Stephens have used their "Revival Radio(link is external)" program on televangelist Kenneth Copeland's Victory Channel network to spread(link is external) the false claim(link is external) that George Washington and Congress used the first presidential inauguration to make a covenant with God on behalf of the nation. That claim, which serves as  the foundation of a recent book(link is external) written by Copeland and Stephens, has been debunked(link is external) on multiple occasions(link is external) by Right Wing Watch.

Contrary to Copeland’s assertion, Congress never made any such covenant with God; not in its official capacity(link is external) as a legislative body(link is external), nor during the “divine service” that followed Washington’s inauguration, which was presided over(link is external) by Rev. Samuel Provoost, chaplain of the U.S. Senate, who merely read(link is external) from The Book of Common Prayer.

Stephens and Bailey, of course, don't actually care about the truth because the myth is useful in bolstering their Christian nationalist political agenda, which is why they repeated it once again during the latest episode(link is external) of their program.

"[Washington] invoked God's name and his blessing in his first leadership role as the president of the United States," Stephens claimed. "He [did] on purpose invoke God's name and his blessing for this land and he put his hand the Bible. That's his very first act as president. The very first Speaker of the House when we get our Constitution will be a pastor. Our Founding Fathers were not winging it. These guys had a biblical worldview."

"Right after he puts his hand on the Bible and takes the oath of office, he walks down to a church with everybody with him and he gets down on his knee and he says, 'We will be your people and you will be our God,'" Stephens added. "So we aligned ourselves with the God of Israel at the very beginning."

As we already noted, Stephens' claim is false, but he was quickly outdone by his co-host, Gene Bailey.

"Nowadays, public schools don't teach that [Washington] was such a man of faith," Bailey complained. "In fact, he was so committed, he was a man of prayer and if you go back and read true history, you'll find that's exactly who he is. And here's a quote: 'The American cause would have come to a complete disaster except for one thing, the direct intervention of God to save us.'"

Washington, of course, never said this. The quote Bailey cited actually came from Andrew Allison, author of the book "The Real George Washington(link is external)," during a 2010 appearance(link is external) on Glenn Beck's program on Fox News.

We don't know anything about Allison, but the fact that his book was edited by conspiracy theorist(link is external) W. Cleon Skousen doesn't fill us with confidence regarding the credibility of his scholarship. Regardless, the quote Bailey cited originated with Allison, who was offering his interpretation of Washington's beliefs, and was not something that Washington actually said.

So this is not "true history," as Bailey claimed, but an outright lie.

As RWW has noted countless times before, the willingness(link is external) to misrepresent history(link is external) is(link is external) a common theme(link is external) among Christian nationalists(link is external) who time(link is external) and again(link is external) spread(link is external) blatant(link is external) falsehoods(link is external) in defense(link is external) of their right-wing ideology,(link is external) inevitably leading one to wonder(link is external) why, if their position is true, do they have(link is external) to keep lying(link is external) to try and “prove” it?

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