Good afternoon, Press Pass readers. Before we jump in, I wanted to let you know that voting is open for the Webby Awards, and my Bulwark colleague Will Saletan has been nominated in the best limited series podcast category for The Corruption of Lindsey Graham. Do me a favor and go vote for him. You can do so through April 18. Today, we’re looking at what’s in the pews in the church of MAGA: “patriotic” editions of the Bible being sold with the Trump name and branding. But it turns out Donald the father and Donald the son have endorsed different Bibles, which could create some early-modern-style religious factionalism in the House of Trump. The United States’ history of politically tinged Bibles is long; Trump Senior is not even the first president to have a Bible hit the shelves, but he is the first to charge money for it. Also, a group of lawmakers on Capitol Hill wants to rename Washington-Dulles after someone as ineffective as the airport itself. All that and more, below.
Two Bibles, both alike in dignityDifferent members of the Trump family have “endorsed” competing editions of the Bible that present the American founding documents alongside scripture itself to market the Good Book to Christian nationalists. “Is this Bible formally endorsed by President Trump?” So runs the call-and-response-like text of the first FAQ on the website for the God Bless the USA Bible, an edition of scripture “inspired” by country music singer Lee Greenwood’s 1984 hit, “God Bless the USA.” (My colleague Bill Kristol waxed nostalgic about that song in today’s Morning Shots newsletter, remembering it as a mainstay at Reagan and Bush rallies he attended as a White House staffer.) Greenwood’s Bible edition has taken a winding path to publication, losing its original Christian publisher following an outcry among authors and then having its release scheduled to coincide with the twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. (I don’t know, either.) The product has now been relaunched with the Trump name, the Trump seal of approval, and even a suite of promotional Trump photos and a hype video from the former president. The God Bless the USA Bible has obtained the Trump branding package through CIC Ventures, the same folks licensing the most famous name in America for such products as Trump sneakers and Trump cologne. Trump touts the God Bless the USA Bible as the only Bible he endorses, which is a fairly unusual way to market scripture.¹ But it turns out his son Donald Trump Jr. has endorsed a competing patriotic Bible with similar but not identical features. Don Jr. has put his support behind the We the People Bible, a more rugged-looking volume you could imagine being tossed into the back of an F-150 SuperCab. Like the Bible his father is backing, the Don Jr.–endorsed book uses the King James translation of the biblical text and prints it alongside the Constitution, Declaration of Independence, Pledge of Allegiance, and Bill of Rights. (The only content it seems to lack from his father’s edition is a copy of the chorus to Greenwood’s hit song.) Don Jr.’s retails for $89.99 while his dad’s is $59.99. The We the People Bible also has bundle options to help you maximize your faith and patriotism. The “Liberty bundle” ($144.99) includes a bookmark, a U.S. flag pin, a challenge coin, and a t-shirt. Upgrading to the “Faith bundle” ($169.99) adds three polished rocks inscribed with the words “FAITH,” “HOPE,” and “LOVE.” Selling Bibles was a natural next step for a candidate who spends part of Easter weekend entertaining comparisons between his own legal travails and Christ’s crucifixion, and whose confidants claim he is “an instrument of divine providence.” But Trump is not the first modern president to be associated with a Bible: The American Bible Society released the “Eisenhower Memorial Edition” of the New Testament in response to an outpouring of donations to the society from the former president’s admirers following his passing.² And the Trumps are hardly the first American politicos associated with customized Bibles. While the Trump Bibles are clearly meant to provide little more than an on-brand opportunity for a quick cash infusion, they are linked to an interesting history of politically controversial Bibles in American public life. The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth is a redaction of the Gospels that Thomas Jefferson created by taking a blade to the pages of three Bibles to remove the supernatural and miraculous elements, leaving in place primarily the teachings of Jesus. The third president didn’t publicize his cut-up life of Christ, and it wasn’t published until 1904, long after the third president’s death. But at that point, it was printed by the Government Printing Office and distributed to all newly elected lawmakers, a tradition that continued until the 1950s. Jefferson’s skeptical edit expresses a point of view on the Christian religion that was popular then among elites at the time, such as Jefferson’s friend and ally during the Revolution, Joseph Priestley, the scientist who helped found Unitarianism in England before being hounded out of the country for his radical views and taking refuge in America.³ Jefferson’s cut-and-paste project was unknown to the public during his lifetime. It only gained fame after a curious Iowa congressman hunted down the original, which the Smithsonian had bought, and pushed his colleagues in Congress to pass legislation ordering its printing. Peter Manseau, a curator and historian of religion at the Smithsonian, tells the fascinating tale of the book and the backlash:
While Jefferson’s Bible is notable for what it cuts out, more recent editions of scripture have sought new angles on the oldest market for a single book in the world by adding things in. Recent examples of patriotic editions of scripture comparable to the Trump Bibles include The Founder’s Bible, which is described in promotional copy as controversial evangelical author David Barton’s “most significant life’s work.” First published in 2012, Barton’s Bible also gathers the founding documents alongside scripture. The NKJV American Patriot’s Bible, meanwhile, is a study Bible that was edited by pastor and Christian broadcaster Richard Lee and first published in 2009. While it doesn’t contain the same political documents as other patriotic Bibles, it does include articles and margin notes that relate scriptural themes to American history. To borrow from another religious tradition, you could call it a sort of nationalistic midrash. So the Trump-endorsed Bibles that mix scripture with secular government documents don’t represent a break with recent practice: Bibles marketed to patriotic believers have been sold in Christian bookstores for years. Assembling an edition that more tightly interweaves love of God and love of country is an easy way to make a new commercial appeal to the large part of the Republican base that fuses a down-home Protestantism (you’ll find no Apocrypha in any of these patriotic bibles, naturally) with a comparably narrow patriotism. And when you’re on the hook for millions of dollars in legal bills, making such a risky, direct attempt to capitalize on your followers’ deepest fears and hopes might start to seem like a sensible course of action. The Wright Wing BrothersA group of Republican lawmakers have introduced a bill to rename Washington Dulles International Airport after their favorite one-term president, Donald J. Trump. According to Fox News:
Yet another chapter in the history of the House GOP’s Trump? When will this book end? But I have to think a shrewd opponent of the former president—a mole in the party—could be at work here. Only someone looking to besmirch Trump in an election year might think to name such a terrible and inefficient airport after him. Dulles regularly takes top spots on lists of America’s worst airports. Its facilities feel like they haven’t changed since the 1970s. (Various properties using the Trump name have received similar reviews.) Given how tight the remaining House calendar is, I don’t envision this bill getting much further than its initial referral to the Transportation Committee. That’s probably as far as it was meant to go, anyway: Bills like this are usually intended only to generate a brisk morning’s worth of press clippings. Fox happily obliged, and the bill’s supporters have probably received the notice of the former president for their show of loyalty. If members of Congress want to rebrand a decent airport to honor a great American, I would recommend renaming San Diego International Airport after Tony Hawk. He’s a native and lifelong resident of the San Diego area and has a cultural legacy exceeding that of almost every U.S. president, and I’m sure he’d appreciate the show of loyalty from our lawmakers, too. Mulkey’s “fashion” choicesI wanted to share an interesting piece by the New York Times’s fashion critic, Vanessa Friedman, on the outlandish and peculiar outfit choices of Louisiana State University Women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey.
Mulkey’s team was unsuccessful in last night’s game against Iowa, but Friedman’s piece is still worth the read. 1 I’d be curious to hear Trump discuss the merits of the more than four-centuries-old King James translation that Greenwood’s Bible uses. While debates over translations of scripture have always run hot (has anyone ever asked Trump if he’s a KJV-only guy?), Greenwood’s use of it for his Bible might ultimately come down to the fact that the KJV is in the public domain in the United States. 2 Thanks to editor and historian of American religion Daniel Silliman for tipping off The Bulwark to the existence of this Ike Bible. 3 The Invention of Air by Steven Johnson is a great book on Priestley’s discoveries in the field of botany. Among other things, he’s known not only for co-inventing carbonation but also for the discovery of oxygen. (Before Priestley, nobody could breathe.) 4 The language in the proposed law seems to copy fairly closely the text of the act passed in 1998 to rename Washington National Airport after Ronald Reagan. You’re a free subscriber to Bulwark+. For unfettered access to all our newsletters and ad-free and member-only podcasts, become a paying subscriber. Did you know? You can update your newsletter preferences as often as you like. To update the list of newsletter or alerts you received from The Bulwark, click here.
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Donald Isn’t the Only Trump Shilling Bibles
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