Harris camp hires activist reverend who claims Christianity has been ‘hijacked’ by White supremacy

The Harris-Walz campaign has hired liberal activist the Rev. Jennifer Butler to be its new head of faith outreach, with Butler confirming the appointment on social media and in an interview with Religion News Service. 

Butler is a longtime liberal activist who argued in 2022 that White supremacists have “hijacked” the Christian faith, and has said that faith calls us to “resist.” She is the founder of the nonprofit Faith in Public Life, which claims to advance the “moral imperative for a just, inclusive and equitable country.” She now runs a campaign seeking to root out White nationalism within the Christian faith. 

“I bring a broad set of relationships that I think can help, very quickly, pull a broad coalition together,” Butler told Religion News Service (RNS) on Wednesday. “I also recognize that we’re at a pivotal moment in American democracy where faith voices for justice are needed now more than ever… The Harris-Walz campaign is a really unique opportunity to shift the debate, to engage all of those who are concerned about what a Trump presidency would mean, the work of this campaign and what it can do to transform America.”

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Butler’s official title will be national faith engagement director, according to RNS. Fox News Digital reached out to the Harris campaign for more details on what Butler’s new role will specifically entail but did not receive a response. Additionally, no announcement appears on the campaign’s website, or its official X account, as of Thursday morning.   

In 2022, Butler wrote an editorial posted to the website of a progressive, non-denominational Christian movement. “More Christians must step up,” she wrote at the time. “We must do more than just watch the January 6th hearings aghast. We cannot allow our faith to continue to be hijacked by white supremacists covered in religious language. For the sake of our faith and our democracy, we must denounce Christian nationalism and reclaim a faith that values and affirms the human dignity of all people. Including our own.”

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Meanwhile, the following month, she reiterated her comments during an interview on MSNBC. During the interview, Butler proclaimed that Christianity “has long been used to justify the oppression of others” and she insisted it was happening again amid the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. “That is not my faith,” Butler continued. “As Christians, particularly as White Christians in this country… we need as Christians to speak more loudly about what our faith – that our faith calls us to resist the pharaohs, the Egyptian kings, the Roman Caesars of our day.”

Butler added that she is working to “reclaim [Christianity] for justice and for compassion,” and also charged Republicans with using religious liberty as a “weapon” to pass discriminatory bills against people who identify as LGBTQ. The activist reverend was arrested in 2017 for nonviolently protesting Republican efforts to repeal provisions of the Affordable Care Act, including attempts to override abortion regulations on grounds that it violated religious liberty.