"We are Americans and Americans kneel to god, and god alone!” - Donald Trump, July 24, 2022

Few people have accused Donald Trump of being unclear about his goals. Trump makes it plain where he stands.

At a rally organized by Turning Point USA yesterday, ex-President Trump shouted out his continuing loyalty to Christian nationalism, declaring that “Americans kneel to god, and to god alone!”

Turning Point USA is an organization founded, operated, and funded by middle-aged adult Republican political operatives that nonetheless poses as if it is a “youth organization”. Unforgiving Christian nationalism is at the core o the Turning Point USA ideology. “Together we can restore America’s biblical values,” Turning Point USA states, “We’re on a mission to engage, equip, and empower Christians to change the trajectory of our nation.” The group organizes “faith events” to illegally use Christian churches as political campaign machines, holds “biblical citizenship” classes, and monthly meetings that “unite millions of Christians”.

Turning Point USA refers to itself as a “conservative grassroots activist network on high school and college campuses across the country”. What happens, though, if a Jewish, Hindu, Muslim student wants to join Turning Point USA? What if an atheist student wants to join?

They’re out of luck, of course. Turning Point USA has no place for non-Christian youth, no matter how conservative their political ideology may be.

Turning Point USA is a Christian nationalist organization, dedicated to using the power of government and the network of the Republican Party to elevate Christianity, and denigrate non-Christians, even if those non-Christians are conservatives.

In the vision promoted by Turning Point USA, the Republican Party is for Christians only.

It gets worse than that. As is always the case with Christian nationalism, the theocratic zealotry of Turning Point USA demands that its members follow a very specific form of Christianity, one that’s harsh, demanding, judgmental and angry.

On December 12, 2020, Turning Point USA leader Graham Allen (not a high school or college student, but a guy in his mid-30s) announced that “If you’re a Pro-Choice pastor, you’re not a pastor!”

As much as Donald Trump may bellow that “Americans kneel to god, and to god alone,” Christian nationalist groups like Turning Point USA conveniently put themselves in the place of the Christian god, declaring which political policies the Christian god wants, which political candidates the Christian god supports, which Christians the Christian god accepts as genuine Christians, and which ones are fake.

It’s a reminder that Christian nationalists don’t speak for Christianity in general. Christian nationalism is just one form of Christianity among many, and as eager to turn its rage against fellow Christians as any other target.

Of course, Donald Trump is wrong. Americans don’t all kneel to the Christian god. Some Americans kneel to other gods. One out of three Americans doesn’t kneel to any god at all.

Interestingly, no gods at all showed up to yesterday’s Turning Point USA rally in Tampa, Florida. All the speakers were human, and Republican.

Among the prominent Republican leaders promoting Turning Point USA’s Christian-against-Christian agenda are US Senator Marsha Blackburn and US Senator Marco Rubio, both of whom have agreed to appear as spokespeople for the Christian nationalist organization. There are large numbers of non-Christian and non-nationalist citizens in both Tennessee and Florida, the states that Blackburn an Rubio are supposed to represent.

But then, politicians like Blackburn, Rubio, and Trump are betting that they can get away with abusing the rights of non-Christians, so long as they keep kowtowing to their Christian nationalist base.

They know that Turning Point isn’t about kneeling to any god, really. It’s about kneeling to power.