The doors had not yet closed at caucus locations across the state of Iowa, but MSNBC had already entered into the “maligning the voters” portion of the program. Joy Reid, the network’s flagship racebaiter, decided that this was a good opportunity to dump on white evangelicals voting for Donald Trump.
Watch as Reid cites woke religion author Robert Jones (he/him), using his quote as the cudgel with which to bash Christians:
JOY REID: But I feel like the important sort of data point, and you know, Steve talks about it a lot, he’s gonna probably talk about it a little more tonight, is that these are white Christians. That this is a state that is overrepresented by white Christians that are gonna participate in the caucuses…
CHRIS HAYES: Particularly tonight.
REID: …especially tonight. I, today, earlier today, reached out to Robert Jones. Robby Jones from the Public Religion Research Institute, knowing that we were gonna talk about Iowa. And this is a hyper-evangelical, white state. And he said the following to me. Iowa is about 61% white Christian. The country as a whole is approximately 41% white Christian. And in Iowa, we’re talking about evangelical white Christians. He said the following. -Because I asked him- what do they get out of supporting Donald Trump? Because he keeps losing, he keeps delivering losses, and losses, and losses. And he said the following. “They see themselves as the rightful inheritors of this country, and Trump has promised to give it back to them”. All the things that we think about, about electability, about, you know- what are people gaming out, or- none of that matters when you believe that God has given you this country, that it is yours, and that everyone who is not a white, conservative Christian is a fraudulent American. Is a less- a less real American. Then you don’t care about electability. You care about what God has given you.
It bears noting that Reid opened the show by speaking apologetically about having to work on the holiday commemorating the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who devoted his life to the proposition that we are all children of God, and whose famous line of his most famous speech is about his aspiration that his 4 little children one day be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin.
Thus, Reid cites the author of such works as The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy, The End of White Christian America, Progressive and Religious, Liberalism’s Troubled Search for Equality, and White Too Long. Talk about confirmation bias.
Reid’s statements say more about MSNBC than they do about whites, whether evangelical or otherwise. Recall that this was the same person who speculated not too long ago, without evidence, that Harvard ousted serial plagiarist Claudine Gay so that white men could run the institution once again.
Such bitter race essentialism, disguised as political analysis, can only serve to further inflame our discourse and exacerbate racial polarization. That’s the exact opposite of Martin Luther King’s message, for which he ultimately gave his life.
