It’s no secret why Donald Trump remained standing despite some of the worst approval ratings on record for a president. The religious right has spent almost six years convincing evangelicals that Trump was actually a righteous and holy man who was being used by God, rather than a gangster and thug who was an embryonic fascist at best.
One of the biggest drivers of this false narrative is Elijah List, a media ministry that distributes “prophetic manna” from some of the more prominent “prophets” in the charismatic Christian world. On Thursday, the Elijah List dropped a “word” from Donna Rigney, a self-proclaimed prophetess who leads His Heart MInistries International in Salt Springs, Florida; near Ocala. She claimed that on June 3, she got a vision of herself riding with Jesus on a white horse when he told her that “wicked rulers would lose their thrones”—and one of those “wicked rulers” was Biden.
As Rigney tells it, Jesus told her that he was about to sweep out politicians who were “grandstanding” and “robbing My children of their freedom to worship Me,” replacing them with leaders who “have a heart like David.” Supposedly, Jesus added that he was about to “remove the ‘Sauls’ who are illegitimately ruling over nations—even your own.”
To Rigney, the meaning was unmistakable.
As I listened, I knew the Lord was saying that Donald Trump, and those who had their rightful offices stolen from them, would be restored very soon. He was comparing King David to Donald Trump and King Saul with Joe Biden and his illegitimate administration. Saul ruled with an iron fist and oppressed the people, as is happening now, here in the USA, under the Biden administration. When David assumed the throne, the people were blessed and well cared for, and they were encouraged to worship God wholeheartedly! This will come when Donald Trump is restored.
Um, Donna? Either you have a funny definition of oppression, or you been paying attention? I don’t recall Biden claiming that any remotely critical story about him was fake news. I don’t recall him inciting violence in an effort to steal an election he didn’t win. Nope, that would be your guy—The Messiah, Lord Donald Trump, The Most Merciful.
It’s rather interesting that Rigney likened Trump to David. After all, most of my left-leaning and never-Trump Christian friends believe that Trump is actually more of a Saul. When we looked at how much Trump had evangelicals in thrall, we remembered how the Israelites begged God to give them a king, even though God had warned them time and again that a king wasn’t what was best for them. To our minds, the fundies wanted a king—and they got their Saul.
It turns out that Rigney was doubling down on what she said a few days earlier when she sat down with Elijah List impresario Steve Shultz. Right Wing Watch got a clip.
When Shultz asked Rigney what she would say to those who just wanted to pray that Biden would be a righteous president, Rigney said it would be like someone stealing everything you own—and contenting yourself with praying that the thief would “enjoy all my property.” Instead, she believed we should pray that Biden would “repent for his sin” and admit he stole the election. After all, she said, Biden is “in an illegitimate place” and “does not have God’s favor on him.”
Watch the whole thing on YouTube, on the Elijah List Facebook page, or on the Elijah Streams Facebook page. She claims that there will be a great blessing once Trump returns to office—much like what happened when David replaced Saul. It’s all the more reason she believes we should pray for Trump to be restored to office.
It’s almost tempting to feel some sympathy for Rigney. After all, in all likelihood, she doesn’t know that Trump was ranting about the election being stolen when he almost certainly knew he had lost. At risk of sounding like a broken record—Trump knew as early as Nov 7-8 that he was shooting his last legal bolt to stay in office, and he knew as early as Nov. 12 that said last-ditch effort had failed.
But then I considered that Rigney, and these other pro-Trump prophets and prophetesses, are trafficking in the same rhetoric that led to the horror of Jan. 6. They are doing so knowing that this kind of talk resulted in election officials and voting systems employees being harassed and trolled. This so-called woman of God is announcing in capital letters that she has no regard for the horror these people endured.
It’s equally mind-boggling that she’s claiming Trump is a good man and Biden is evil, in the face of all we know about both. I’m reminded of how Palpatine turned Anakin to the dark side by making him think the Sith were good and the Jedi were evil. I’m also reminded of what I saw in a bat guano crazy charismatic campus ministry in my student days at Carolina. Even when I discovered irrefutable evidence that the pastor of their church was hiding his past in an outright cultish campus ministry from the 1970s and 1980s, my now-former friends didn’t care. All that mattered to them was that people were being saved.
I’m also reminded of a February poll by the Survey Center for American Life. It showed a whopping 75% of white evangelicals did not consider Joe Biden’s win to be legitimate. Trumpists can’t dismiss this as fake news; the Survey Center is an affiliate of the American Enterprise Institute. If you’re wondering how so many evangelicals can be that far removed from reality, it’s because they listen to this seditious “prophecy” from the likes of Rigney and Elijah List.