The FFRF Action Fund warns that Donald Trump’s running mate pick, Sen. J.D. Vance, confirms Trump’s alignment with two things he’s been trying to distance itself from: Christian nationalism and Project 2025.
Previously an outspoken “Never Trumper,” Vance has undergone a dramatic transformation, and since becoming a U.S. senator he has been a Trump sycophant. He has adopted Trump’s most outlandish claims, such as that the 2020 election was stolen. When Vance ran for the Senate to represent the Buckeye State in 2022, he revealed shockingly authoritarian positions based on his personal religious beliefs.
For example, Vance said that he would vote for a national 15-week abortion ban, arguing that the United States should “bring back” a “Christian moral and economic worldview” regarding the “sanctity of marriage [and] sanctity of life.” A writer at the National Catholic Reporter commented that Vance is a Catholic who “gives Catholicism a bad name” based on his radical Christian nationalistic policies — ranging from “immigration to labor rights to climate change” and all at odds with current Church teachings.
Vance’s extreme politics are also aligned with the Heritage Foundation’s now-infamous Project 2025, a 920-page authoritarian playbook. In fact, the lobbying arm of the Heritage Foundation itself gives Vance a 93 percent lifetime score. The Biden campaign recently shared a video of Vance thanking Heritage leaders for their “incredible work.”
Speaking at a conservative, Catholic academic conference in 2022, Vance advocated for “Common Good” conservatism, which is closely aligned with Christian nationalism and the authoritarian goals of Project 2025. He proposed ideas such as cutting off government funding for universities that teach anything he deems to be “woke,” and imposing taxes on progressive nonprofits based on their ideology. Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., has noted that Vance represents a “new wave” of extremist politicians who are “united by nationalism, economic populism and the rejection of the separation of church and state.”
Vance’s fierce loyalty to Trump is obviously much stronger than any love he has for his country. He has criticized Mike Pence for his handling of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, hinting that if he had been vice president he would have sacrificed the rule of law, democracy and the Constitution for Trump’s benefit. Vance once called Trump an “idiot” and compared him to Hitler. Now, Vance has decided to fully ally himself with the would-be dictator and help him achieve goals that subvert U.S. democracy under the banner of Christian nationalism.
It is crucial that Americans who respect the separation between state and church, as well as our other cherished fundamental rights, band together to oppose Trump and Vance. We must work to ensure that Trump and Vance’s un-American anti-democratic principles and policies are rejected by voters.
Project 2025 and the extremist U.S. Supreme Court are paving the way for Trump and his cronies to seize the reins of power and never let go. We must not let that happen.
FFRF Action Fund is a 501(c)(4) organization that develops and advocates for legislation, regulations and government programs to preserve the constitutional principle of separation between state and church. It also advocates for the rights and views of nonbelievers, endorses candidates for political office, and publicizes the views of elected officials concerning religious liberty issues.