We Dissent co-host Rebecca Markert was recently featured on the Progress Texas Podcast. Please enjoy this bonus episode while you wait for our next episode!
From Dan Patrick's declaration that the separation of church and state is dead, to Texas Republicans kicking Muslims out of their state convention in Houston, to the Ten Commandments and bible stories permeating our public schools, the takeover by Christian Nationalism of Republican politics is no longer a theory – it's real, and it's here, right now. How to resist is now one of the primary questions for progressive people – and we've brought on Rebecca Markert to discuss that question. She's the Vice President and Legal Director of Americans United For Separation of Church and State, a national organization dedicated solely to the protection of the foundational American principles of freedom of religion – and freedom from religion.
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Chris Mosser:
Okay, everybody. Welcome back to In Progress. This is our weekly round table discussion of the political stories and issues and ideas that are top of mind for progressive folks all across the Lone Star State this week. My name is Chris Mosser. I'm the communications director here at Progress Texas. Welcome if you're hearing us on the radio, KPFT FM 90.1 Houston, Texas. Progress Texas amplifies progressive values, leaders and actions, and we operate a major digital network including social media podcasts, legacy media contributions and more. We reach millions of people across Texas every single month. This week, joined by executive director Kathleen Thompson. Hi, KT.
Kathleen Thompson:
Hey folks. This week we welcome a guest that we think will be most insightful into the dilemma of Christian nationalism, which has become most prominent in Republican and conservative messaging and policy priorities. Committees on religious freedom, which really means the freedom of government to shove far right doctrine into our laws and our schools, our neighborhood public schools, and a blatant rise in open hatred and exclusion against Muslim Texans by these same officials.
Chris Mosser:
We're also coming out of the Texas Democratic Convention in Corpus Christi, which was largely a positive and unified affair, but some conflict among progressives and Democrats over religion continues and can undermine progressive unity. And we're thinking about what all of this means as the United States arrives at its 250th anniversary this July 4th weekend. So we're super proud to welcome Rebecca Markert. She is the vice president and legal director at Americans United for Separation of Church and State or Americans United for short, a national organization dedicated to that solely to defending the separation of church and state in the USA. Hi, Rebecca.
Rebecca Markert:
Hi, thank you so much for having me.
Chris Mosser:
Absolutely. As we get going, tell us all about AU and what you do for them.
Rebecca Markert:
Sure. Americans United is an organization that is dedicated to preserving this American original idea of separating church and state. And we do that in a myriad of ways, one of which is what I do on a daily basis and that is working in the courts to preserve this constitutional principle. So we litigate in courts across the country when there are religious incursions happening by our government.
Kathleen Thompson:
Rebecca, Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick recently made headlines at an Oval Office press conference delivering a report from the so – called Religious Liberty Commission that he leads. And that explicitly is targeting the phrase separation of church and state from a constitutional law standpoint. Should this commission exist at all in your opinion? And how dangerous is it to see a top Texas leader use federal power to attack this 250-year-old precedent? And what does Americans United see in this regarding the national strategy of Christian nationalism?
Rebecca Markert:
I think the lieutenant governor who is also the head of this Religious Liberty Commission that was formed by an executive order from President Trump, I think that he really needs to be called out for perpetuating this lie that church state separation is not a constitutional principle. Are these words in the Constitution verbatim? No, but neither is the right to a fair trial. But I think that we would all agree that that is a principle that Americans hold dear and would really consider it to be a part of the American ethos. And as I said earlier, the separation between church and state is an American original. It is really an American invention. It was an idea that was first implemented in the American experiment and until we came up with it, no other nation had sought to protect people's right to think and worship freely by separating religion and government.
Americans should be proud of this heritage and we should fight any disinformation that threatens this ideal, especially as we're coming up to America's 250th. With regard to the Religious Liberty Commission, having a commission like this is certainly laudable, especially when we want to increase religious pluralism and understanding in our country. But the way that this particular commission has come about is not the way to do that. The Religious Liberty Commission is biased and one-sided, and it recently issued a report on the state of religious liberty in America. And this is an ahistorical report that's aimed at advancing the Trump administration's Christian nationalist agenda. It was a document that's about 200 plus pages and it makes a variety of suggestions on how the federal government should impose one set of narrow religious beliefs on everyone. And this report also reiterates this lie. It falsely claims that church state separation doesn't exist and also that those of us who have advocated for it for decades are really trying to erase religion in the public square when, in fact, this constitutional principle is one that really protects religious freedom.
It protects everyone's right to live as themselves and to believe as they choose as long as they don't harm others.
Chris Mosser:
We've talked to lots of people. This is one of our most tried and true topics at least over the last year or so since all this stuff has really amped up in terms of the educational parts of all this and we'll talk more about that. But it's interesting to see the way that the argument has flipped around because from what I understand as recently as maybe like the '60s or the '70s, the entire concept of the separation of church and state was very much to the benefit of religion, like you say, that religious groups didn't want the government interfering in what they were trying to do. And so it was framed at that point as a protection to be able to worship as you please, not so much as a license to push religious doctrine into schools or government or any other official public sphere.
Rebecca Markert:
Yes, that's absolutely true. And it's something that we see Christian nationalists really fighting against. What they want is the ability to believe as they choose and then also to impose that on all other Americans. They really want to get all the benefits of a truly religiously pluralistic society, but then not have to take any of the guardrails that protect other people. All of our constitutional rights aren't absolute and religious liberty is one of those.
Chris Mosser:
We don't see them rushing real fast to sign up to pay taxes on their church properties necessarily, but that's a whole different topic. Rebecca, so dialing this back to Texas in particular, we're seeing this ideological push having very much real time impact here in Texas, especially as it comes to education here from the mandating of the Ten Commandments to be posted in our classrooms, to the replacing of degreed and qualified school counselors with uncertified religious chaplains. Those have been developments really over the last couple of years to the recent, and this is brand new, the bombshell Texas State Board of Education vote that just happened last week to implement Bible lessons throughout our K-12 public school curriculum. So tell us, I don't know how much a national organization like AU is paying attention to what's going on in Texas. I'm sure you're noticing because it's so dramatic, but tell us how you guys evaluate this escalating legal and legislative assault on Texas public education and describe for us what you see as the long-term risks of turning our public schools into Sunday schools.
Rebecca Markert:
Sure. Well, I'm going to back up just a little bit here and just start off by saying that Christian nationalists have been on the march in this country over the last number of years and nowhere is that more readily apparent than in Texas. Texas really is sort of a microcosm of what would happen if Christian nationalism became the law of the land – if Christian nationalists were in power. We are seeing it play out in Texas specifically because they have control of halls of power there. Americans United believes that families, not politicians or public school officials should decide whether and how their children are going to engage with religion. Part of this extremist goal is to indoctrinate a new generation of Americans in this lie that we are a Christian nation. And because Texas is one of our largest states and educates roughly one in 10 of the nation's public school children, it
Is an epicenter of this entire movement. And the culmination of that is this required reading list, this literary canon that was passed last week by the Texas Board of Education. As you mentioned, it is a required reading list for all public schools, grades K through 12, and it really requires children in almost every grade to read state selected Bible stories. That is something to our knowledge would be the first time that any state in our country has mandated that, that all public school students have to read a religious text. A departure from letting schools and teachers decide what should be read. This is a new trend for states to create state-approved reading lists that districts must use. And traditionally school districts have chosen what books students read as part of their curriculum themselves from a list of recommendations that might come from the state, but they're not from mandates from the state.
Kathleen Thompson:
Rebecca, Chris and I were just recently at the Texas Democratic Party Convention and just a side conversation we were having was about the Texas that we could all live in versus the Texas where we export terrible public policy like abortion and reproductive rights that kills women who want to have children and want to grow their families and measles outbreaks that start in Texas and go across the country like wildfire and this new screw worm. I mean, it's just bad public policy, bad public policy that's starting in Texas, but just like you say about the one in 10 kiddos learning from Texas representing the nation and a lot of schools are going to be buying textbooks that even though they're not in Texas, that Texas uses. So it's just really a warning call to states outside of Texas that do have a greater freedom by living across a border in a different zip code.
So I just wanted to share that that's something that's really top of mind for me and for our staff here.
Rebecca Markert:
Yeah. And I will also say that what happens in Texas does have impact on the country overall. We saw this with the case of the Ten Commandments bills. There were 30 plus bills introduced two years ago in states across the country that would mandate the posting of Ten Commandments in every public school classroom in the state. And only two states had passed that Arkansas and Texas. But then this past year we saw them pass also in Alabama and in Tennessee. This copycat legislation happens that when people see that it's working in a particular state, especially one that is a large state with a huge citizenry, that then reverberates to other states and that copycat legislation takes hold and then is replicated.
Kathleen Thompson:
Rebecca, when state leaders loudly proclaim this lie that America is a Christian nation, that Texas a Christian state, the door to hostility against religious minorities is swinging wide open. And unfortunately we're seeing a rampant rise in shockingly open and frank Islamophobia across Texas, particularly where I am in North Texas. And it was on vivid display at the recent Republican convention in Houston during which a handful of Muslim attendees were literally asked to leave the building but also the party. Would you please say what a futhering in official erosion of church state separation will fuel in this rise of targeted bigotry? And how can defenders of religious liberty better protect and advocate for Muslim neighbors and religious minorities?
Rebecca Markert:
So I think that it's fair to say that Christian nationalists in Texas are definitely showing their hypocrisy when they show these anti-Muslim views and it mirrors what we're seeing elsewhere in the country, including some anti-Muslim comments from politicians in response to the election of New York City Mayor Mamdani. We're seeing this also play out in policies, policy initiatives and things that they want to do in particular with voucher programs. They are really trying to exclude Muslim schools from participating in a private school voucher program. East Plano Islamic Center near Dallas has been mired in controversy. And we haven't weighed in on a lot of this because there's a lot of things going on at the moment
But it really does show what happens to religious minorities if a certain religious ideology is so connected to government and to those who are in the halls of power. It really denigrates minority religious belief to the detriment of all Americans and is something I think that we should all be concerned about.
Chris Mosser:
It definitely makes sense that the scapegoating of a religious minority would go hand in hand with the attempted ascendancy to official control of a broader religious movement like we're seeing with Christian nationalism. So the two things definitely go hand in hand and you're really kind of fighting the same thing when you're fighting that idea in general. We've talked a bunch with one of our allies in Dallas, the Reverend Mara Richards Bim, who is the Justice and Advocacy Fellow at Royal Lane Baptist Church in Dallas about her own personal work and also as a member of the clergy. She's done great work in opposing the 10 Commandments thing in the public schools and really against Christian nationalism in general. She's really doing great work. I'm curious if Americans United has found any other either individual or organized clergy efforts to fight this trend back, Christians against Christian nationalism.
Are you guys seeing that happening anywhere?
Rebecca Markert:
Yeah, actually Reverend Bim has been a wonderful plaintiff for our coalition lawsuit against the 10 Commandments law in the state of Texas. And we actually have three lawsuits in the state of Texas, the state law madating the decalogue be put up in public schools. Those cases brought together a group of multi-faith families, including clergy members from various denominations. And that is something that we have seen happen again and again as we are challenging these impositions of religious ideology by the government. We're seeing it in Texas, we're seeing it in Oklahoma, we're seeing it in Tennessee when they are overreaching and trying to move the needle closer to imposing one narrow belief on us all. We have a lot of religious leaders, even Christians and other minority faith leaders coming forward and saying, "This is not the America that we believe in and this is not how we safeguard religious freedom in this country." And so that is something that happens time and again. And in the last couple of years, I've seen so many people come out of the woodwork to fight back.
Kathleen Thompson:
So glad to hear it.
Chris Mosser:
As we're having this conversation and as this topic is becoming so important and so scary, just so happens that we're coming up on the 250th anniversary of our country this weekend coming up on July the 4th. I want to go there, but I also want to mention something that in my view, sometimes political points can be gotten across to the mainstream audience when there's a mainstream pop culture sort of reference that can be used. And in this case, it's hard not to think of The Handmaid's Tale and The Cautionary Tale, not only from the recent TV programs that have been on, but also the book that's been around for a long time. Margaret Atwood, notably, when she was the first to win the Arthur C. Clark Science Fiction Award for The Handmaid's Tale when it first came out back in the day. And famously upon her acceptance of that award said, "Hey, this award's nice and all, but this isn't really a science fiction book.
This a warning of what could possibly happen in the country." And fast-forward just a handful of decades and here we all are. Rebecca, would you guys say that there are parts of that story or parts of that show that might be instructive for people who aren't paying very close attention to this but might've watched that show to understand that there are definitely parallels with our real life right now in America?
Rebecca Markert:
I mean, I think that might be one of the reasons why it's hard for some of us to watch that show because it feels so very real right now. It really
sort of indicates what would happen if we don't fight back and we don't stand up against what's happening in our country. And I do think that there are parallels and it is very apparent that part of the Christian nationalism strategy is to subjugate women and to make sure that their rights are less than others. That is a huge part. We saw that in Project 2025 too. In order for them to exert their power, they do have to suppress the power of other people. And marginalized communities are the ones who are the target, unfortunately. And I think that it's an instructive show, obviously a bit fictionalized, but I think as we are continuing down this path and we see what's happening in the courts and we see what's happening in the executive branch and we see how these larger policy goals at the federal level are playing out also at the state level, I think we're starting to see just how dangerous of a time we are living in and why it's so important for the dissenting voices to stand up and fight back.
Chris Mosser:
It's interesting that you say that, and I hadn't even drawn this part into our conversation today, but at the same time that the Texas Republican Convention was happening in Houston, there was a turning point event that happened in San Antonio that was geared specifically for women during which a lot of the messaging was it's time for women to give up your right to vote and return to the household and subjugate yourself to your husband. And these things were being said very blatantly and right out loud in a very well-decorated stage, and it was just kind of shocking. And so that's also part of this broader disparate sort of symptoms that we see in a variety of different places in the political sphere right now. So outside of the Handmaid's Tale, Rebecca, give us some tips on how to talk to people about this. People who may not have really clued in that this is happening.
There are a lot of people who might see this as sort of abstract sort of political stuff that they may not really see as urgent or really want to concern themselves with necessarily. How can progressive people effectively talk with folks who are sympathetic to this Christian language, Christians themselves and may not quite understand why it wouldn't be a good idea to make everyone comply with the basics of what they believe? How do we get that message across just to our friends and family?
Kathleen Thompson:
And I just want to jump in to say this is a great time because families are going to be gathering for that Independence Day barbecue and picnic. So there are going to be a lot of people who aren't normally together. So we couldn't have time this interview better.
Rebecca Markert:
Well, I think it's such a great question and it's one that I'm asked often. And I like to give a little anecdote just about my personal history. I grew up in a Catholic family in Wisconsin. And when we were gathering for Thanksgiving, Christmas, all of the events, including the 4th of July, religion and politics were never off the table. Those were topics that we regularly discussed. And as I grew up and became more engaged and went to college and came back, it was one of the reasons I liked coming home and gathering with my family because I knew we were going to be talking about things that are happening right now. What do we think about this particular policy? What do we think about this particular candidate? And things like that. Because I grew up in that environment where you were allowed to talk about it and allowed to talk about these subjects that are divisive and that can be emotionally charged, we really learned how to listen to each other.
And I think that's the crux of the question. It's not necessarily how do we talk to each other about these things? How do we convey these ideas? It's how do we listen to each other? Because once we start having these conversations and really listening to hear rather than listening to respond, we start to hear where people are coming from and then we're able to then talk about what drives them, what motivates them. And when we do that, then we're able to reframe our argument and our strategies and really redirect the conversation to get them to see our point of view. It's not easy, certainly. And especially now when it feels like things are so polarizing. But I do think it's one of those moments that really needed that we have open discussion. We allow people to be intellectually curious about the other side and we should be that way too.
And I think once we start having these conversations and we start listening to each other, we're really going to find that we have a lot more in common than we differ. And that's how we're going to get into a better spot.
Kathleen Thompson:
Rebecca, we've just come out of last weekend's Texas Democratic Convention, which I mentioned earlier, which really contrasted greatly with that of the Republican parties and its diversity, equity and inclusion to borrow a phrase. Nobody was kicked out over their religious identity or their cultural identity, but there are still some internal conflicts over religion and we don't expect for you to be able to solve that very difficult problem for us. But would you share your perspective of religion dividing progressives in a way that preserves unity in a moment where unity is paramount? Because like you're saying, it's going to take all of us, people of multiple faiths, people of no faith to work together arm in arm to stop the terrible public policies that come out of a government that's run by Christian nationalists.
Rebecca Markert:
Religion can be a very divisive issue. It's one that is really emotionally charged. And I'll back up and say that Americans United is a 501(c)(3) organization. We are a nonprofit organization and are required to be nonpartisan. So we don't take positions on political candidates for office or anything like that. But religion, like I said, can be a very divisive issue. It is emotionally charged. It goes to the heart and really mind of what people believe and what they think and who they are. And that's really why the separation of church and state is so important because it is so deeply personal and isn't something that should be imposed on others. When we're living in a pluralistic democracy, everyone must be free to live and believe so long as they don't harm others. And the government then can't favor or disfavor anyone's beliefs. And I think it's important for us to build these diverse coalitions and to build an environment where we can all speak and hear each other.
Like I said before, I think if we were to do that, we'd find that we all have more in common. And many of the groups that you just mentioned, people of faith, people of no faith, all agree that Christian nationalists are trying to roll back all of our civil rights, the ones that we care about, not just church state separation, but all of the other civil rights. And this is a threat that we really need to take seriously and we are going to be more powerful if we fight together.
Kathleen Thompson:
Amen to that.
Chris Mosser:
As we begin to close here, I want to go back to the idea that as they say at UT Austin, what starts here changes the world in terms of things that come out of Texas change the world sometimes for the better, sometimes for not. My hope is that progressive people in other places who are facing a similar problem will learn from what we're trying to do here in Texas and be able to stand up to this really serious problem. Rebecca Markert, vice president and legal director at Americans United. We appreciate your input very, very much and happy 4th of July to you and everybody at AU.
Rebecca Markert:
Thank you so much. This has been a great discussion and happy 4th of July to you.
Kathleen Thompson:
Our pleasure. Thank you.
Chris Mosser:
Awesome. Progress Texas amplifies progressive values, leaders, and actions. While campaigns come and go, we're the permanent home for progressive media and action in the Lone Star State. Radio listeners, if you missed any of our show today, you're in luck because it's going to run again this weekend on KPFT Radio 90.1 FM HD2 Channel every Sunday morning at 11AM. More information on the radio station at kpft.org and more info on us at Progress Texas can be found at progresstexas.org, and you can find out more about AmericansUnited at au.org.
