On Nigerian social media videos showing Trump promising to bring the Bible back to America, opposing homosexuality and false claim of a Biden/Kamala government funded sex-affirming surgery for children are being used to portray Trump as devout Christian and savior of the faith. Health care coverage in the U.S. is provided by the private health insurance companies. Even Obama care is provided via the private market who decides what treatment it covers.
This notion that Trump is Bible-reading, scripture union (SU) Christ-loving savior of the faith is one of the mythologies that has been propagated and accepted as gospel truth by many especially in Nigeria. By the fruit ye shall know them. No one knows which church Trump attends nor his pastor. Trump is not a Christian by any standard and there are no fruit of the spirit in his life.
Yes, many U.S. evangelicals have adopted him as their reincarnated saviour of the faith due mainly to the overturning of Roe by the Supreme Court appointees who were hand picked for him by the conservation think tank. However, during the campaign when abortion became toxic Trump actually tried to walk back his claim as the one who overturned Roe. He supported Florida Amendment 4 claiming that the six weeks abortion ban was too strict before he walked it back.
After decades of cultural resistance to homosexuality, public opinion has shifted towards more support for homosexuality as more scientific data has emerged supporting the biological foundation for most homosexuality. Homosexuality has been recorded for centuries in every culture across the globe dating back to biblical time. What has changed is societal attitude towards it, causing more gays to come out of the closet. This, of course, is still very upsetting on many especially in traditional societies like Nigeria.
A recent survey by Gallup shows that 69% of Americans now support same sex marriage which is a seismic shift from just a decade ago.
However, among the core evangelicals, opposition to homosexuality and abortion is cast in stone. Trump has exploited that opposition as the cornerstone of his three presidential bids to court the evangelicals and it has worked like magic.
The Trump campaign spent over $30 million on videos like this one that falsely and effectively define Kamala Harris who, as an elected official from liberal California, has a long record of supporting abortion and gay rights.
The realignment of the traditional strong Hispanic support away from the Democrat toward Trump who took over 40% of their votes is a reflection of both their concern about inflation but moreso, their traditional value which still strongly opposes Gay rights and abortion. I saw that shift here in Miami which was once a deep blue Democratic base which has now turned Ruby Red as Hispanics have become the vast majority, a major demographic shift due to immigration. Trump spent over 30 million dollars pushing the sex affirming video ad naseum during the campaign.
By the way I know several Nigerians here in the U.S. who also voted for Trump on the same issue of opposition to Gay right and abortion.
Without understanding the nuance of the context, one can easily misread the situation. The reality is that this election result and the massive loss by Kamala has a lot to do with misogyny, racism and xenophobia. Americans were just not ready for a woman president especially one like Kamala who has a complicated immigrant Indian and Jamaican parent more so as wars are going on both in Europe and the Middle East. The image of Trump as a strong man is very appealing to many especially Hispanics many came from countries where strong men were venerated.
There were also many blacks who did not think Kamala was black enough. Janet Jackson actually voiced that opinion. Trump increased his black votes while Kamala was way below where Obama was in his presidential bids. This was a case of Kamala running a truncated presidential run (107 days) during the perfect storm when the economy, inflation, cultural sentiments were all against the Democrats. Here is the link to the pew research opinion survey data on attitude towards same sex marriage. https://www.pewresearch.org/religious-landscape-study/database/
Adewale Alonge, PhD, Founder & President, Africa Diaspora Partnership for Empowerment and Development. www.adped.org
