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The Gospel of Donald Trump Jr.

The former president’s son told a crowd that the teachings of Jesus have “gotten us
nothing.”

By Peter Wehner

Antranik Tavitian / The Republic / USA Today Network

DECEMBER 26, 2021, 1:29 PM ET SHARE

About the author: Peter Wehner is a contributing writer at The Atlantic and a senior
fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He writes widely on political, cultural,
religious, and national-security issues, and he is the author of The Death of Politics: How
to Heal Our Frayed Republic After Trump.

Donald Trump Jr. is both intensely unappealing and uninteresting. He combines in

his person corruption, ineptitude, and banality. He is perpetually aggrieved; obsessed
with trolling the left; a crude, one-dimensional figure who has done a remarkably
good job of keeping from public view any redeeming qualities he might have.

There’s a case to be made that he’s worth ignoring, except for this: Don Jr. has been
his father’s chief emissary to MAGA world; he’s one of the most popular figures in the
Republican Party; and he’s influential with Republicans in positions of power. He’s
also attuned to what appeals to the base of the GOP. So, from time to time, it is
worth paying attention to what he has to say.

Trump spoke at a Turning Point USA gathering on December 19. He displayed

seething, nearly pathological resentments; playground insults (he led the crowd in
“Let’s Go, Brandon” chants); tough guy/average Joe shtick; and a pulsating sense of
aggrieved victimhood and persecution, all of it coming from the elitist, extravagantly
rich son of a former president.

But there was one short section of Trump’s speech that I thought was particularly
revealing. Relatively early in the speech, he said, “If we get together, they cannot
cancel us all. Okay? They won’t. And this will be contrary to a lot of our beliefs
because—I’d love not to have to participate in cancel culture. I’d love that it didn’t
exist. But as long as it does, folks, we better be playing the same game. Okay? We’ve
been playing T-ball for half a century while they’re playing hardball and cheating.
Right? We’ve turned the other cheek, and I understand, sort of, the biblical reference
—I understand the mentality—but it’s gotten us nothing. Okay? It’s gotten us nothing
while we’ve ceded ground in every major institution in our country.”
Throughout his speech, Don Jr. painted a scenario in which Trump supporters—
Americans living in red America—are under relentless attack from a wicked and
brutal enemy. He portrayed it as an existential battle between good and evil. One side
must prevail; the other must be crushed. This in turn justifies any necessary means to
win. And the former president’s son has a message for the tens of millions of
evangelicals who form the energized base of the GOP: the scriptures are essentially a
manual for suckers. The teachings of Jesus have “gotten us nothing.” It’s worse than
that, really; the ethic of Jesus has gotten in the way of successfully prosecuting the
culture wars against the left. If the ethic of Jesus encourages sensibilities that might
cause people in politics to act a little less brutally, a bit more civilly, with a touch more
grace? Then it needs to go.

Decency is for suckers.

Translating the teachings of Jesus into public life, and figuring out how they ought to
influence the duties of the state, is a complicated matter. A decade ago, I wrote a book
with Michael Gerson, City of Man: Religion and Politics in a New Era, in which we
dealt with that issue, among others. But what we heard from Donald Trump Jr. was
something very different. He believes, as his father does, that politics should be
practiced ruthlessly, mercilessly, and vengefully. The ends justify the means. Norms
and guardrails need to be smashed. Morality and lawfulness must always be
subordinated to the pursuit of power and self-interest. That is the Trumpian ethic.

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The problem is that the Trumpian ethic hasn’t been confined to the Trump family. We
saw that not just in the enthusiastic and at times impassioned response of the Turning
Point USA crowd to Don Jr.’s speech but nearly every day in the words and actions of
Republicans in positions of power. Donald Trump and his oldest son have become
evangelists of a different kind.

Their approach hasn’t been embraced by Republicans, of course. There are GOP
governors and others in the Republican Party who embody a very different ethic, and
for the sake of their party and their country, I hope they gain influence. But it would
be naive and irresponsible to pretend that what we have seen since Donald Trump left
office is the revivification of ethical standards and demands for moral excellence
within the Republican Party.

Liz Cheney voted with President Trump more than 90 percent of the time but is now
persona non grata in the GOP because she is willing to defend the Constitution and
the rule of law and stand against a violent assault on the Capitol and an effort to
overturn a free and fair election. When Liz Cheney is more despised in the party than
the crazed Marjorie Taylor Greene, Paul Gosar, Lauren Boebert, Jim Jordan, Madison
Cawthorn, or Donald Trump Jr., you know that the GOP has lost its moral bearings.

I understand that many Americans, including some number of Republicans I know,

would rather we move on from the Trump family. But the Trump family and MAGA
world won’t let us. And they’re playing for keeps.