On July 17, 2024, J.D. Vance gave a speech at Republican National Convention officially accepting the Vice Presidential nomination. In the address, which to many viewers might’ve sounded like standard-issue false-patriotism from a party known for hyperbole, Vance actually tossed red meat to Christian Nationalists.
“America is not just an idea,” Vance said. “It is a group of people with a shared history and a common future. It is, in short, a nation.”
To many of America’s rabid theocrats yearning for a “white utopia”, phrases like “shared history,” “white heritage” and “culture” are confirming nods to the underlying mission. From Mother Jones’ Kiera Butler:
“The words ‘shared history’ lit up a far-right evangelical corner of social media. ‘America is a particular place with a particular people,’ Joel Webbon, a Texas pastor and podcaster, wrote on X. ‘This is one of the most important political questions facing America right now,’ posted former Trump administration official William Wolfe. ‘Answer it wrong, we will go the way of Europe, where the native-born populations are being utterly displaced by third world migrants and Muslims. Answer it right, and we can renew America once more.’ Vance was embracing one of their most cherished beliefs: America should belong to Christians, and, more specifically, white ones.”
Butler goes on to add that many “boomers” who’ve pushed “Christianization” of America for decades are out, to be replaced by fresh-faced, doe-eyed, earnest/youthful newbies—Vance among them. “For this group of evangelical leaders, Vance, a 40-year-old former Marine who waxes rapturous about masculinity and women’s revered role as mothers, was the perfect tribune to spread their gospel of patriarchal Christian nationalism.
“A group of young pastors hope to spearhead a Christian nationalist glow-up as they eagerly await a ‘Christian prince’ to rule America. These often bearded thirty- and forty-somethings have suits that actually fit. They are extremely online, constantly posting on myriad platforms, broadcasting their YouTube shows from man-caves, and convening an endless stream of conferences for like-minded followers. Let’s call them, as one scholar I spoke with did, the TheoBros.”
No longer underground, the subversize, anti-democratic, authoritarian movement also centers around “purity culture,” as some pundits and observers have noted. Vance’s catering to TheoBros aligns with his co-founding Rockbridge Network, a coterie of rich, vocal Very Online Christian Nationalists.
