Thread by @AndrewLSeidel

Let’s talk about how damn scary it is that a virulent Christian Nationalist, intimately tied to the January 6th insurrection and the Big Lie, might be Pennsylvania’s governor and in charge of its elections. A #thread on Doug Mastriano @SenMastriano
🧵 Buckle up🧵

I know about Mastriano because of my work exposing the links between Christian Nationalism and the January 6th insurrection, which can be found in the huge report on that subject released with brilliant contributions from leading experts.
bjconline.org/jan6report/

I also covered Mastriano in my testimony to the @January6thCmte. (Not publicly available yet)

Mastriano believed he was answering “God’s calling” asking him to run for Governor. He believes he’s been chosen by his god like so many of the characters in his holy book. That belief should scare the hell out of you.

The idea that Trump was chosen by that same god helped create the permission structure that led to J6:
White Christian Nationalists believe this is their country, given to them by their God, found for them on his principles, and that they were fighting for his chosen one.

Because that god chose Trump, Trump couldn't have lost the election, right? It must have been stolen! And, as I've written in The Founding Myth, when reality collides with the belief system like that violence is inevitable.
bit.ly/TFMpaperback

Violence is always implicit. When he was first elected in 2019, Mastriano humbly compared his political motivations to the biblical figure Queen Esther, who stopped the ancient Persians from massacring the Israelites.

Mastriano said that “if we get the call, we’re not going to stand away from our Esther moment.”
The story of Esther ends with sons impaled on poles, 300 executions, and 75,000 enemies slaughtered, shading his “Esther moment” with bloody violence.
bit.ly/35PmHmJ

A day before the insurrection, Mastriano noted that Republicans “were in a death match” with Democrats.
bit.ly/35PmHmJ
Mastriano threatened the journalist, Eliza Griswold, who reported this story.

Griswold rightly explains: he “embod[ies] a set of beliefs characterized as Christian nationalism, which center on the idea that God intended America to be a Christian nation, and which, when mingled with conspiracy theory and white nationalism, helped to fuel the insurrection.”

In the lead up to J6, he joined several public prayers, including to pray that “we’ll seize the power that we had given to us by the Constitution and as well by you providentially" and that "on the sixth of January that they will rise up with boldness.” rightwingwatch.org/post/trumpist-…

Mastriano believes he's a divine warrior in a spiritual battle. He spreads lies and disinformation. His PhD is questionable and many of his citations are “completely false and do not support his claims whatsoever.” bit.ly/3CMcxix

This is completely unsurprising. The entire Christian Nationalist identity is based on historical disinformation and lies perpetuated to bolster the idea, as I detail in The Founding Myth. bit.ly/TFMpaperback

Mastriano also preached on stage during the Jericho March’s “Let the Church ROAR” rally on 12/12/20, a dry run for the January 6th insurrection. The same signs, speakers, and militant messages were preached

Mastriano addressed the “God-fearing Americans, flag-waving Americans” and quoted First Corinthians. He invoked 1776, the Battle of Gettysburg, Ben Franklin, and said:

After that sermon, Mastriano talked about how George Washington was failing until he “appealed to Heaven,” again, invoking the message on the flag that was seen so widely on January 6th and in the lead-up. (For more on the flag, see the J6 report, bjconline.org/wp-content/upl… )

The “Appeal to Heaven” rhetoric and flag are an integral part of Christian Nationalism, as seen in that important report. Mastriano frequently appears in videos with the Appeal to Heaven flag behind him, including in the video in which he threatens the New Yorker journalist.

Christian Nationalism is an existential threat to the American republic. Mastriano embodies that threat—and if given power—will abuse that power and force us closer to the Christian nation that privileges conservative, white Christian men at the expense of everyone else.
~fin~

@threadreaderapp unroll for the good people please.

Adding this note about Mastriano's sign:

https://twitter.com/CaptainDadPool2/status/1526979259742437379

Note that those signs include a line from John 8, which Mastriano added to his speech at the Jericho March, mentioned and excerpted above.

I also spotted Mastriano's biblical campaign signs at the Capitol on J6. #CapitolSiegeReligion