Why Evangelicals Can’t Shake Off Suggestions They’re Racist
The resignation of A.R. Bernard from the White House Evangelical Advisory Board was nearly ignored
.. More extreme members made headlines by defending the president, and echoed his blame of “both sides.” Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, told the Christian Broadcasting Network, “the media has painted, the liberals have painted—a false narrative that the president is a racist.” Jerry Falwell Jr. claimed the president “does not have a racist bone in his body,” and in a tweet praised his initial statements regarding Charlottesville as “bold” and “truthful,” saying that he was “so proud of Donald Trump.”
.. Johnnie Moore, a lay pastor on the council, has said, “We believe it would be immoral to resign.”
.. the media attention given to this story is part of a larger, ever-tightening narrative connecting racism and the evangelical church.
.. Evangelical voters were never expected to support Trump in the first place—a candidate who, for countless reasons, seemed antithetical to their traditional values. But they did.
.. Dan Cox, the research director at the Public Religion Research Institute, described white evangelical support as “incredibly consistent and incredibly loyal,” and said that “it’s hard to conceive of an event or an action taken by Trump that would lead them to abandon him at this point.”
.. During that time, support for the ban declined across every religious category, except among white evangelicals
.. Pew has also reported that Trump’s support was strongest among evangelicals who attend church most frequently. Among those who attend church at least monthly, 67 percent “strongly approve of Trump” as opposed to 54 percent of those who “attend less.”