Earlier this year, I reported here on a major new initiative of the Christian Right called Project Blitz. Since then, the project itself has gained traction, and so had interest in the political community and the media. The short of it is that it is a package of model Christian Right state legislation ranging from efforts to display the national motto, In God We Trust in public schools and government buildings, to requiring religious exemptions for institutions that don’t want to place children in foster homes or up for adoption to LGBTQ parents.
The story was covered by, The New York Times, The Guardian, Religion News Service, and Church & State magazine, among others. I will be publishing a follow-up to my original report on Project Blitz at Religion Dispatches (now part of Rewire), in the next few days that will report on their 148 page strategy manual for 2019.
Meanwhile, you may want to check out this barn burner of a story by Paul Rosenberg at Salon. This story previews some of the 2019 manual, and reports on a recent webinar on Project Blitz in which I participated. It was called "Stopping the Blitz: A Coordinated Response to State Campaigns," hosted by the PFLAG Academy Online. (A recording is available here.) Rosenberg called it “an invaluable activist resource, covering both detailed specifics and broad frameworks for understanding what’s at stake and how to fight back. Anyone getting involved with Indivisible States, for example, should find it an hour well-spent.”
Here are a few excerpts from Rosenberg’s story.
Along with Clarkson, who is a senior research analyst at Political Research Associates, presenters included Alison Gill, legal and policy director at American Atheists and Elizabeth Reiner Platt, Director of the Public Rights/Private Conscience Project at Columbia Law School. It was hosted by Jamie Henkel, PFLAG's learning and inclusion manager. Clarkson presented an overview of Project Blitz, along with its background, Gill delved into the components of Project Blitz — legislative “prayer caucuses” formed to pass legislation and the state policy guide Clarkson discovered to guide them -- and Platt spoke about the meaning of religious freedom, how the religious right has distorted it, and how even those who oppose the religious right tacitly may accept key aspects of its dishonest framing.
“We do not often surface a document that fundamentally changes the way we view a subject. In the case of the strategy paper of Project Blitz, we have just that,” Clarkson said in his introduction. “The Project Blitz playbook shows us that while the Christian right see the bills as distinct, they are also envisioning a political building process that leads to a comprehensive vision of a conservative Christian nation, and even the more totalitarian idea of conservative Christian Dominion.”
“They start with the early phases with what are generally considered harmless or easy to pass low-hanging fruit,” [Alison] Gill said, “and basically build momentum to pass more destructive 'religious-exceptions' bills that limit equality and freedom.”
“For the most part, these are not directly attacking equality or LGBT people, but instead working build momentum, establish Christian nationalist narratives,” Gill explained. “For example, the display of the national motto in schools, or teaching the religious nature of the U.S. founding, establishing this Christian nationalist narrative. The book would classify this as low hanging fruit in order to basically gain early victories, and establish momentum.”
There are two fundamental kinds of sleight-of-hand here. First, the national motto “In God We Trust” dates from the height of the McCarthy Red Scare. But, as Clarkson told me afterward, “The original motto since 1782, E Pluribus Unum, which still appears on the Great Seal of the United States, much better reflected the founding aspirations of unity amidst diversity.” Christianizing America means erasing the founders’ vision, the exact opposite of what Project Blitz pretends.
“The third category is 'religious liberty' protection legislation, and this is the real attack on equality, and the most impactful policy changes” Gill said. “For example, policy statements that are passed as resolutions that favor married heterosexual couples, or maintenance of birth gender, which is a very awkward phrase I'd never heard before seeing it in this document.” Bills in this category, “are basically religious exceptions to the law, either broader or more narrow … that would allow people to discriminate on the basis of their religion.”
[Elizabeth] Platt identified three ways the Project Blitz exemption bills “”limit rather than enhance religious liberties.” First, they favor certain views, rather than protecting everyone’s views. Second, “they require people to subsidize religious beliefs that they don't themselves hold.” And third, “some of the proposed exemptions overtly allow discrimination against religious minorities,” such as a recently-passed Texas bill that “allows religious foster care agencies to refuse to place children in non-Christian families.”
“Without a well-informed opposition,” Rosenberg concludes, “there’s no telling how much damage Project Blitz could do.”
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