Believe Me, by John Fea

John Fea, who teaches American history at Messiah College, is disgusted with his evangelical brothers and sisters.  Well, at least with the 81% of them who voted for Trump.  In Believe Me: The Evangelical Road to Donald Trump, Fea explores the historical and theological reasons that evangelicals backed Trump.

He accuses American evangelicals of operating out of fear: xenophobia and racism were, to Fea, key factors.  He disparages the evangelical leaders who support Trump, particularly "The Court Evangelicals," pastors who are close to his administration.  And he impugns the thinking of anyone who thinks Trump was the best choice for America in 2016.

Once Trump began looking like the Republican choice, there was one thing and one thing only that got him elected: he was not Hillary.  Fea makes passing reference to this fact.  He writes, "It is impossible to understand why 81 percent of white American evangelicals turned to Donald Trump in November 2016 without grasping their strong antipathy toward Hilary Clinton."  After decades of seeing her in public life, many Americans could not stomach the thought of her in the Oval Office (again).

Fea takes great pains to take easy shots at Trump and his many moral failings, which are obvious and indisputable.  But he would have the reader think that the other choice in 2016 was a moral giant.  Besides her policy positions and actions, which many conservatives and Republicans find reprehensible, what about her enabling her husband's rape and harassment of multiple women?  What about her thinking herself above the law regarding a private server and her destruction of devices and data during that investigation?  What about her using her family foundation to curry political favor?

We Americans were faced with a binary choice between two candidates with a wide array of moral and ethical failures.  For anyone who supported a conservative Republican agenda, Trump was the obvious choice.  A year and a half into his presidency, that has been affirmed over and over.  On one issue Fea himself acknowledges that "it may not be too much of an exaggeration to say that the future of Liberty University . . . may have been in jeopardy had Hillary Clinton won the presidency in 2016.  With the Trump victory, Christian colleges are breathing a bit easier these days."  On many issues, conservatives and many Christians can breathe easier with Trump in the White House.

I'm sure Fea is a great guy and a wonderful teacher, but as a white evangelical who voted for Trump, I tired of his telling me that I am racist, xenophobic, irrationally fearful, unjustly nostalgic, hypocritical and unchristian to have voted for Trump.


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!