Why Trump wants a task force to investigate 'anti-Christian bias'

SALT LAKE CITY — As he eyes a return to the White House, former President Donald Trump is laying out his pitch to Christian voters. His campaign launched a "Believers for Trump" initiative, while he has vowed to "aggressively defend" religious liberty.

Buried in the Republican Party's new platform, Trump extends another promise: to protect U.S. Christians from anti-Christian persecution.

Near the bottom of the 5,000-word document, a short section on religious liberty proposes a "new Federal Task Force on Fighting Anti-Christian Bias," focused on "investigating all forms of illegal discrimination, harassment, and persecution against Christians in America."

The platform includes no further details, and for the first several months of his campaign, Trump mentioned the idea only in passing: in a February appearance at the National Religious Broadcasters meeting, and in a December campaign speech in Iowa.

As the Nov. 5 election approaches, Trump has begun to resurface the idea. During a recent appearance at Turning Point USA's Believers' Summit, Trump called for the creation of the task force, reading the platform's verbiage word for word. He's paired the promise with attacks on his electoral opponents, saying the Biden-Harris administration weaponized the federal government to "target religious believers."

"The reason Biden, Harris and their thugs are so desperate to stop us," Trump said at the Believers' Summit, "is that they know we are the only ones who can stop them."

As concerns about discrimination against minority religious groups, including Jews and Muslims, is growing, the idea of an initiative to investigate anti-Christian bias is garnering mixed reviews.

Do Christians face 'persecution' in the US?

The creation of a federal task force to investigate religious or ethnic discrimination is not a novel concept. In recent years, the Biden-Harris administration has launched national strategies to combat Islamophobia and antisemitism.

Where Trump's proposed task force would be unique, though, is its focus: instead of investigating discrimination against a religious or ethnic minority group, the task force would focus on Christians.

Nearly two-thirds of U.S. adults identify as Christian, and though the share of religiously unaffiliated Americans is growing, Christians still make up — by far — the largest religious group in the U.S.

That doesn't mean that Christians haven't faced instances of discrimination, said Dr. Michael A. Helfnad, the Brenden Mann Foundation Chair in Law and Religion at Pepperdine Caruso School of Law.

"We certainly have seen confirmed instances of the failure to adequately protect the religiously Christians in the United States," Helfand said. "The highest court in the country has itself found such occasions."

Helfand pointed to several Supreme Court cases dealing with religious liberty — including Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and Fulton v. Philadelphia — in which the court ruled Christians' beliefs were not respected.

But it is difficult to measure whether these are one-off instances of anti-Christian bias, or part of a larger wave of anti-Christian discrimination. What is clear is the U.S. has seen a spike in reported antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents over the past year.

"We have not heard or seen the same kind of spike of anti-Christian hate crimes," Helfand said. "But maybe what you need is somebody to study it, to see what's going on. And a task force is a good thing to do that."

Dr. Gary Doxey, associate director for the International Center for Law and Religion Studies at Brigham Young University, suggests that a federal effort to investigate anti-religious discrimination include other faith groups beyond Christians.

"We ought to get some perspective from history," Doxey said. "We also ought to remember that that perspective suggests that Christians aren't the only victims. In fact, many of the more egregious cases include non-Christians as the victims."

It's "very plausible" that today's hyper-politicized environment has seen "an increase in hostility toward Christians," Doxey added. "But I would suspect that the task force would be more viable if it didn't just simply focus on Christians."

'He defends people of faith'

Whether or not a Christian discrimination task force is feasible or necessary, it makes for a strong pitch to Trump's base — many of whom view themselves as victims of anti-religious discrimination.

White evangelical Christians, the most pro-Trump religious bloc in 2020, widely view themselves as being discriminated against. According to a 2023 survey conducted by the Survey Center on American Life, 60% of white evangelicals say they face "a lot" of discrimination in the U.S.

Trump's appeal to these voters does not occur in a vacuum. A pair of Deseret News/HarrisX surveys conducted in late 2023 found that Republicans view Trump as a "person of faith" — not because of his perceived religious devotion, but because they view him as a defender of religious people.

A September 2023 poll found that Republicans were more likely to say Trump was a person of faith than any other politician, including former Vice President Mike Pence; Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah; and President Joe Biden.

When a second Deseret News/HarrisX survey in November 2023 asked the same question, an even larger share of Republican voters — 64% — said Trump was a person of faith.

In explaining why they believe this, respondents were less likely to say Trump performs religious acts or lives a religious lifestyle. Only 26% of respondents said they believe he is "actively involved in religious and faith communities," and a minority of Republicans — 43% — said he "has a strong moral compass."

But they nonetheless view Trump as a "person of faith" because he "defends people of faith in the U.S." (67%); he "supports policies that focus on families" (60%); and he "cares about people like me" (54%).

Related topics