No, James Talarico Is Not a Christian Nationalist

In a 2023 sermon, Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico called Christian nationalism “a cancer on our religion” and denounced Republicans for trying to transform America into a “Christian theocracy.” 

Yet, at the same time, Talarico—a Presbyterian seminary student—has made his Christian faith a core message of his campaign. He mentions biblical teachings like “love thy neighbor” when discussing partisan division. He talks about the angel Gabriel appearing to Mary as a model for consent and a justification for abortion rights. 

To some, these positions may seem to be in tension. If you oppose Christian theocracy, how can you use Christian theology to justify your political positions in the public sphere? When Christian beliefs are presented as the moral arbiter of politics, isn’t that the definition of Christian nationalism?

As a Jewish atheist, I’m sensitive to these kinds of concerns. As I have written at Sojourners before, I do think that progressive Christians can sometimes advance arguments that privilege Christians and even reinforce structures of Christian supremacy when they insist that an authentic Christianity can never be used to oppress, or by defining all Christian abuse as “non-Christian.” When the Christian and the good are conflated in public life, how can non-Christians claim equality or virtue? As I wrote, “The fact that intra-Christian debates are so central to U.S. political outcomes is itself evidence of just how much power Christians, of whatever theological bent, have over the rest of us.”

I do not, though, think that this criticism really applies to Talarico or his campaign. That’s in part because Talarico mostly avoids this kind of “no true Christian” rhetoric (e.g., “no true Christian would oppose food stamps.”). It’s also because Christian nationalism is not just a narrow theology of Christian privilege; Christian nationalism, in the U.S. context, is a particular, sweeping demand to enforce a hierarchy of white patriarchy—a hierarchy that Talarico and Talarico’s coalition are currently opposing.

A candidate in a multi-racial coalition who is working against a white supremacist coalition is not advancing Christian nationalism, because Christian nationalism is inextricably tied to white supremacy. In that context, it is not Talarico’s discussion of faith that sometimes aligns him with white nationalists. It’s his ugly backsliding on trans rights, as when he endorsed a ban on trans surgery for minors and said he would be opposed to trans girls participating in girls’ sports if their inclusion “risks safety and fairness.” Talarico did not argue these positions on theological grounds. But he nonetheless aligned himself with Christian nationalist hierarchies and programs.

It is true that Talarico is sometimes discussed in the media in a way that presents Christianity as uniquely righteous. For example, the New York Times columnist and conservative anti-Trump Christian David French writes that Talarico is “decent” and “one of the few openly Christian politicians in the United States who acts like a Christian.” French says that is a “profound contrast” with MAGA politicians, who don’t act like Christians.

Christians who fail to act decently are failing to behave like Christians. Following this logic, righteous behavior becomes synonymous with being a real Christian, which gives credence to the idea that Christians are uniquely situated for positions of power.

Talarico himself, however, doesn’t phrase things in this way. On the contrary, he generally works to acknowledge the value of other traditions. His pastor, Jim Rigby, cites the Bhagavad Gita and the Buddha in sermons. Talarico himself has talked about being influenced by Islamic mystics; in his 2023 sermon, he said, “God is not a Christian.” That’s a statement that highlights, in Talarico’s words, that “God is so much bigger than our human categories.” He also means it as a rebuke to Christians who want to make the U.S. a “theocracy”; if God is not a Christian, then Christians do not have a privileged relationship to the divine, to the good, or to the true.

READ MORE: Andrew Garfield on the Spiritual Power and Peril of Rage

This kind of effort at theological inclusion is welcome, and it functions, in and of itself, as a refutation of Christian nationalism. But it’s also important to recognize that Christian nationalism is not only—nor primarily—a theological movement. It is a political program of subjugation tied to white supremacy and patriarchy. In our current moment, that political program has become increasingly partisan—which means that the most direct and most consequential opposition to Christian nationalism comes from those who oppose the Make America Great Again movement, the political Right, and white supremacy.

The links between Christian nationalism and white supremacy have deep roots. Scholar Robert P. Jones has explained that white supremacy in the U.S. began before the U.S. existed, with the Papal Bull known as the Doctrine of Discovery. According to Jones, the doctrine argues that “if you encounter any lands where the people are not Christian, you have permission and the blessing of the church and the power of the state to conquer, to kill, to subdue, and to reduce their persons to perpetual slavery.” This is “the thing that unleashes the entire colonial project, including the transatlantic slave trade and the conquest of the Americas.” Christian supremacy legitimizes racial oppression and genocide, even as racism legitimizes Christian conquest.

President Donald Trump and his party have not been subtle about embracing this genocidal and brutal tradition. During Trump’s first term, in 2020, the National Guard tear-gassed antiracist protesters while the president was photographed holding up a Bible at a nearby church—a dramatic example of Christian symbolism as white supremacy and vice versa.

Now that Trump is president again, his administration has put in place rules that allow Christians to proselytize in the federal workplace while purging Black workers—especially Black women—from the civil service. His administration has launched an all-out assault on transgender people and abortion rights in the name of the Christian right; he and the right-wing Supreme Court have also fought to decimate Black voting rights through gerrymandering.

Attacks on LGBTQ+ people and women fire up the white Christian base to entrench white supremacy; entrenching white supremacy allows for attacks on LGBTQ+ people and women. Christian nationalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy are a single program.

Christian nationalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy are a single program.

The Democratic Party certainly has its own issues with racism, Islamophobia, transphobia, and other forms of bigotry—as Talarico’s own cowardly backtracking on trans rights demonstrates. It is also a party that depends on multi-racial democracy. The gerrymandering that has gutted Black voting districts in the South is designed to give white voters the power to elect Republicans—white voters being the only demographic group that consistently casts ballots for the GOP. And of course, the core of Republican support is white evangelical voters, 84% of whom voted for Trump in 2024.

Not every Black person votes Democratic. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who is Black, is one of the most powerful and influential supporters of the GOP, Christian nationalism, and white supremacy in the country. Similarly, not every white person—and not every Christian—is Republican. But the coalitions are fairly straightforward: Republicans are the party of an ascendant, violent Christian nationalism and white supremacy; Democrats are the party that is attempting, with whatever hesitations and vacillations, to find a better way.

The race in Texas reflects these divides. In terms of favorability, 79% of Black voters who are likely to vote in the election support Talarico; his opponent, the stunningly corrupt Ken Paxton, has only 12% support among the same group. Paxton’s favorability with Hispanic voters is 33.9%; Talarico’s is 50.5%.

Progressive Christians do need to make sure they are speaking thoughtfully with Muslim, Jewish, atheist, and other non-Christian coalition partners. Talarico has done so for the most part—his decision to throw trans people under the bus being a notable and painful failure. 

We’re facing a Christian nationalist crisis, and that crisis is tied to the rise of a fascist, Christian nationalist party that is working to destroy democracy and entrench a white Christian authoritarian hegemony. When politicians like Talarico work to break the stranglehold on power of that party and that hegemony, they are fighting Christian nationalism, whether they point to their own Christian values or not. And when they compromise with hate, as Talarico has on trans rights, they are helping the Christian nationalists, whatever faith they do or don’t profess.