“One of the few openly Christian politicians in the United States who acts like a Christian.” 

That’s how conservative New York Times columnist David French recently characterized James Talarico and the Texas Democrat’s “faith-forward” campaign for the U.S. Senate. It should come as no surprise that Talarico walks the Christian walk: He’s currently on leave from his training for the ministry at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary (APTS). 

However, given the MAGA Christian response to the young politician-seminarian, you might think it was the Antichrist running for the Senate. He’s been called “demonic,” a “fake Christian,” and “blasphemous,” with “very, very radical and extreme views.” One Newsmax host accused him of using “fake passages from the Bible, tortured and misrepresented.” Talarico has drawn fire for characterizing God as “nonbinary,” though he later explained he meant God is “beyond gender” (a common theological notion). U.S. Representative Ronny Jackson, an Amarillo Republican, said the statement showed Talarico is “a full-on RADICAL LEFTIST!!”

Such over-the-top rhetoric is a sad fact of life in this age of post-truth hyperbole. But the ferocity of anti-Talarico invective reveals a deep and very public clash between two distinct ways of being Christian. 

While MAGA Christians insist that the Bible dictates their anti-abortion, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-immigrant Christian nationalism, the Mainline Protestant tradition—of which Talarico’s Presbyterian Church (USA) is a part—has a very different understanding of what it means to follow Jesus, one that leads to a politics precisely opposite from that of MAGA Christians. 

Within this Mainline tradition, Talarico is quite orthodox. His campaign, then, and the shrill attacks it provokes from right-wing Christians, is a vivid reminder of just how varied Christianity is. And paradoxically, Talarico’s unabashedly biblical politics also underscore the imperative of defending our nation’s venerable, but now vulnerable, tradition of church-state separation.

So strongly does Talarico’s campaign foreground his Christian faith that The New Yorker claims his platform is basically the New Testament. 

That’s a bit of an overstatement. Talarico is running on a standard progressive Democratic platform. He advocates “paid family leave, affordable child care, [and] the right of every American to marry who they love.” He envisions an America “where every person and every family—regardless of religion, race, gender, sexual orientation, or any other difference between us—can truly be free and live up to their full potential.” This could easily be the platform of a Kamala Harris or an Elizabeth Warren.

Naturally, this is anathema to conservative Republicans and their evangelical Protestant allies. But what seems to particularly irk MAGA Christians is that, unlike most Democratic politicians, Talarico explicitly grounds his progressive agenda in the same Bible that MAGA Christians claim as their own. 

Talarico often says he learned from his Baptist preacher grandfather that Christians “follow a barefoot rabbi who gave us two commandments: Love God and love neighbor—because there is no love of God without love of neighbor.” That’s a reference to Matthew 22:36-40, one of Talarico’s go-to, and definitely non-“fake,” scripture passages. And as Talarico told Stephen Colbert, it has radical implications: We are to love our neighbor “regardless of race or gender or sexual orientation or immigration status or religious affiliation.” 

Another of Talarico’s go-to Gospel passages, Matthew 25:35-40, directly links love for Jesus with care for the hungry, the stranger, and the imprisoned. For many evangelicals, this passage refers mainly to a future end-times Tribulation. For Talarico, by contrast, it is manifestly current and intensely political. Here’s how he deploys it in the Colbert appearance:

“For 50 years, the religious right … convinced a lot of our fellow Christians that the most important issues were abortion and gay marriage … two issues that Jesus never talked about. Jesus in Matthew 25 tells us exactly how you and I and every one of our fellow believers [are] going to be judged and how we’re going to be saved: by feeding the hungry, by healing the sick, by welcoming the stranger.”

Accordingly, Talarico calls for “a politics of love—a love for this state, a love for this country, and a love for all of our neighbors. A love that can heal what’s broken in America.”

However blasphemous Talarico’s “politics of love” may seem to MAGA Christians, he’s quite orthodox within the Mainline Protestant family. Texas Impact’s Bee Moorhead—a Presbyterian Church (USA) elder who has taught Talarico at seminary—considers his politics and biblical appeals “extremely consistent” with their shared denomination’s teachings. Rev. Dr. Josh Robinson, pastor at Austin’s Hope Presbyterian Church, also finds Talarico’s “theological grounding, in most meaningful respects, consistent with PC(USA) teaching.” The denomination, Robinson adds, is “a big tent,” embracing “serious theological diversity, from confessional conservatives to progressive activists. … Talarico is on the progressive end of that tent, but he is inside it.”

Claiming more than 1 million members in the United States, Talarico’s denomination is part of the Reformed tradition of Protestantism. Basic Presbyterian beliefs echo those that most evangelicals affirm: God rules over creation; all persons are sinners; and Christians must live “in accordance with God’s moral law.” Like evangelicals, Presbyterians also believe in Christ’s Second Coming and a final judgment, and they deem the Bible “the infallible word of God.” 

Yet, when applying that divine word to social and political issues, the Presbyterian Church (USA) departs radically from MAGA Christians. According to the denomination’s website, Reformed theology calls the faithful to “respond to God’s call to work for a society that seeks justice.” Another document spells out the denomination’s commitment: “Our social witness stance … encourages church members and leaders to go to places of suffering and need to alleviate poverty, stop violence, protect the planet from climate change, and seek justice for immigrants, the LGBTQIA+ community, and people of color.”

For these Presbyterians, like Talarico, Jesus’ call in Matthew 25 to serve “the least of these” requires a commitment to “dismantling structural racism, and eradicating systemic poverty.” 

Robinson said that Talarico’s use of Matthew 25 “maps directly onto one of our denomination’s central, biblical commitments.” Rev. Dr. Duane Bidwell, pastor of Claremont Presbyterian Church in California and a former faculty member at Claremont School of Theology, agreed: “When Talarico emphasizes dignity, compassion, fair economic policies, and moral responsibility, he’s drawing straight from the teachings of Jesus, and he fits right in with the PC(USA)’s social witness tradition.”

When Talarico declares, “The closest thing we have to the Kingdom of Heaven is a multiracial, multicultural democracy,” he echoes leading theological voices in his denomination. For instance, here’s the late Letty M. Russell, longtime Presbyterian professor at Yale Divinity: “[I]n Christ, difference is a given. God intends for many voices, cultures, and languages and presses the church to be part of every nation and culture, growing and learning from the differences of people in its midst.”

Not all members of Talarico’s denomination are as socially and politically liberal as their denomination’s official teachings. Members are fairly evenly divided between Republicans (47 percent) and Democrats (48 percent), and between those who think the growing immigrant population is a change for the better (36 percent) or for the worse (38 percent). Robinson noted that “more theologically conservative members … would take genuine issue” with Talarico’s framing of God as non-binary, especially those “who have been taught to picture God through the default masculine lens.” 

Nevertheless, denomination members appear to align more closely with Talarico on other issues: Seven out of 10 believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases, strongly favor same-sex marriage, and believe homosexuality should be accepted. “Talarico’s stances aren’t revolutionary,” Bidwell said. “He’s saying things that have been in the mainstream of PC(USA) life and theological education for 30 or 40 years.”

The broader Mainline Protestant family also includes the United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church, the Disciples of Christ, and the Episcopal Church (my own denomination). In Texas, and nationwide, this religious grouping accounts for about 10 percent of adults—significant, but well behind evangelicals (27 percent in Texas) and Catholics (22 percent).

More liberal theologically and politically than their evangelical neighbors, Mainline Protestants generally share Talarico’s concern for those who suffer injustice, marginalization, and discrimination. Last year, Episcopalian bishop Marian Edgar Budde took a characteristically Mainline stand when she called on President Trump to “have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now,” including LGBTQ+ persons and undocumented immigrants at risk of deportation. In response, Trump labeled her “a radical left hard-line Trump hater”—shades of the MAGA Christian invective against Talarico.

Apart from rare occasions like the Trump-Budde controversy, Mainline Protestants get precious little coverage in the mainstream media compared to the other major Christian tendencies. And like all Christian groups, they have seen a steady decline in membership in recent decades. So, for many Mainline Protestants I’ve talked to, Talarico’s campaign is as welcome and refreshing as the first raindrops after a long drought.

Talarico in San Antonio on March 1 (AP Photo/Brenda Bazán, File)

Despite positive polling, Talarico still faces an uphill slog to win stubbornly red Texas. Yet however he fares in November, his campaign serves as a timely reminder that there are many ways of following that “barefoot rabbi”—indeed, many ways of being religious, as witnessed by the proliferation of mosques, synagogues, and Hindu and Buddhist temples across the Lone Star State. People of faith, including people of the same faith, disagree profoundly over moral, cultural, and political issues. The “religious vote” is far from monolithic.

And this highlights a basic problem with Christian nationalism, long dominant in Texas politics and seeing an unprecedented ascendency in the second Trump administration. When partisans of that ideology call for the United States to be an explicitly “Christian nation” governed by Bible-based laws, they beg a central but all-important question: Whose version of Christian, and whose interpretation of the Bible? 

Somewhat paradoxically, by running on his faith and thereby drawing vitriol from MAGA Christians, Talarico also reminds us of the wisdom of church-state separation—that venerable constitutional principle which Talarico himself has called “sacred.” (Here again, as Robinson noted, Talarico is orthodox within the Presbyterian tradition: “Presbyterians,” Robinson said, “have a long and serious commitment to [the church-state] boundary, not because faith is private but because coerced religion is a distortion of it.”) As Talarico told Colbert, this separation harmonizes with Jesus’ command to love one’s neighbors, including one’s non-Christian neighbors: “Forcing our religion down their throats is not love.” 

With so wide a variety of viewpoints—even within the same faith community—it’s dangerous for any one to have too much power. While people’s religious commitments inevitably shape their political choices, as Talarico’s Presbyterianism clearly shapes his, no single faith community should have a political monopoly.

When I asked Moorhead how she positions Talarico within the U.S. Presbyterian community as a whole, she replied, “Hopefully he represents the future of the church.” 

Whether he’ll be Texas’ future senator remains to be seen. But his “faith-forward” campaign reminds us of our state’s religious diversity—and of our shared imperative to guard against religious tyranny.

The post ‘Fake’ Christian? Or Faithful? appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Editor’s Note: This article is co-published with ProPublica as part of an initiative to report on state and federal efforts to restrict local control.

No state has taken over as many local public school districts as Texas. Just since 2020, the state education agency has installed its own hand-picked leaders in eight districts. Four of those came this spring. At least another 10 are at risk of takeover, including, as of last week, the Austin Independent School District (ISD). 

And to lead some of these districts, Texas is turning to a cadre of officials with ties to Mike Miles, the man the education agency chose in 2023 to oversee the Houston school district, the state’s largest. Miles is also a close ally of Mike Morath, Texas’ powerful education commissioner.

Already, at least two of these new district leaders have started to adopt policies similar to the contentious reforms Miles has pursued in Houston. He has touted improved test scores under his charge. Houston ISD had no F-rated campuses and fewer D-rated campuses in the state’s latest ratings compared with previous years. But Miles has also sparked widespread protests in response to the district’s rigid adherence to scripted lessons and repetitive testing, the firing of principals and teachers, mass school closures, and the conversion of schools into charters.  

Miles did not respond to requests for comment from the Texas Observer. Houston ISD officials, in a statement to the Observer, said the district did not achieve better ratings by maintaining the status quo but “made difficult decisions” to improve academic performance, noting the majority of its campuses are now rated A or B. 

The school districts whose new leaders have connections to Miles should prepare for “upheaval and chaos,” warned an elected Houston school board member. 

“If anything doesn’t align with improving test scores, it will be taken away,” said Maria Benzon, who was elected in November to the Houston ISD board but is not permitted to serve under the ongoing state takeover. Under Miles, for example, Houston ISD eliminated librarian positions and turned some libraries into what Benzon called “detention centers,” because they are being used, in part, for students with behavioral issues. Morath, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) commissioner, has said the centers are used for more than just punishment. 

Mike Miles in September 2023 in Houston (Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle via AP)

Texas law allows the TEA to take control of districts with multiple failing school ratings or governance issues and to replace their superintendents and elected boards. 

The recent takeovers include Beaumont, Lake Worth, and Connally independent school districts, whose new superintendents worked under Miles when he was superintendent in Dallas ISD; two of them also worked for him in Houston. In Fort Worth ISD, one of the state’s largest districts, the new state-appointed superintendent chose as his second-in-command Daniel Soliz, another person who worked under Miles in Houston ISD. Soliz did not respond to requests for comment for this story. 

At least two of the state’s new superintendent appointees—Sandi Massey, who now helms Beaumont ISD in southeast Texas, and Ena Meyers, TEA’s appointee for Lake Worth ISD, a small district near Fort Worth—also worked for the controversial Colorado-based charter network Third Future Schools, which Miles led prior to becoming superintendent in Houston. In April, the Observer revealed that Miles had an ongoing $120,000 annual consulting contract with the charter network, an arrangement that likely violated a new statewide ban on public school administrators’ moonlighting. After questions from the news organization, Miles canceled the contract. The district said Miles “remains fully focused on leading Houston ISD and delivering results for students.”

Third Future’s charter network is expanding around the state as districts turn campuses over to the nonprofit’s Texas subsidiary, often as a means to delay possible state takeover. The organization did not respond to the Observer’s request for comment.

School district takeovers often involve layoffs, school closures, and an increase in charter schools, as has happened in Houston, said Domingo Morel, an associate professor of political science and public service at New York University, who found Texas has had more district takeovers than any other state since 1989. 

What’s unique to Texas, Morel said, is that the low bar required to take control has led to more takeovers. Since 2015, five consecutive failing state ratings at just one school can trigger a takeover, as occurred in Houston, which has 273 campuses. 

Texas has also made it harder for districts to appeal these seizures. The Legislature passed a law in 2021 that barred districts from using public funds to challenge the education commissioner’s “final and unappealable” decision to take them over. The threshold that defines a failing school was also lowered. Then, in 2025, the state passed another law restricting districts from using public funds to sue the state when challenging its accountability ratings. 

The state “is the player, the referee, the coach, the scorekeeper,” when it comes to rating schools and deciding when to seize control, said Steven Nelson, an associate professor of education policy and leadership at the University of Nevada who’s been studying school takeovers for more than a decade. He said he suspects the TEA-appointed leaders connected to Miles will also focus on standardized testing, which will result in “a narrow curriculum when all is said and done.” 

The acceleration of takeovers, and the state’s increasingly stringent rating system, comes just as Texas rolls out a school voucher program that will, in most cases, award parents $10,000 in state funds to send their children to private schools. State accountability standards do not apply to private schools, where students don’t have to take the standardized tests required in Texas public schools. 

TEA spokesperson Jake Kobersky said the agency does not expect the four school districts that have recently been taken over to adopt the same reforms that Miles implemented in Houston. “During an intervention, state law requires the agency to appoint a new superintendent and a board of managers. All other staffing and operational decisions are made locally by the district,” Kobersky said. 

But last August, Morath told lawmakers other districts “should be copying the changes that we see in Houston.”

Massey, the new superintendent in Beaumont, has also cited the changes in Houston ISD as a blueprint.

“The model that we are implementing here is a very similar model to Houston. And why? Because of the success that Houston has had,” Massey said at a May 21 board meeting, referring to her time working with Miles at Houston ISD, where he selected her to be chief of schools. 

Under Massey, the newly appointed board of managers voted at their first meeting to temporarily suspend a number of policies related to governance and hiring practices, including employees’ rights to present grievances to the board and principals’ ability to approve new hires without district permission. Board of managers member Jeff Wheeler said at the meeting, “We are requesting that they be suspended until the board can move, can more fully evaluate our local policies.”

The board has taken other steps that mirror what happened in Houston after the takeover there: On May 14, the district announced it was cutting 34 positions that support student mental health, and on May 21, it announced a high school would close. 

Massey did not respond to the Observer’s requests for comment about whether she’s following the Houston playbook. Jackie Simien, a spokesperson for Beaumont ISD said, “Massey has worked alongside successful educational leaders with demonstrated results in improving systems, instruction, and student performance.”

Mike Morath in 2018 (Ricardo Brazziell/Austin American-Statesman via AP)

Benzon, the elected Houston ISD board member, said Miles is sidelining parent and teacher voices in her district, and they are leaving in droves as a result. “They are trying to escape the New Education System and Miles’ bad policies,” Benzon added, referring to a program Miles transplanted from his former charter school network that is characterized by scripted lessons and repetitive testing. The Houston Chronicle reported the district “is losing students at an accelerated pace” under the takeover, spurring the district to shutter 12 schools ahead of the next school year. 

In its statement to the Observer, Houston ISD cited a survey of families reporting a “favorable perception” of the district and said it retained many exemplary teachers.

Nelson and Morel said they believe the ultimate objective of any takeover is to disenfranchise local communities. Black and Hispanic students make up the majority of the population at all four of the districts now headed by Miles’ associates.

“It all begins at the school board level to then completely disempower the community,” Morel said.

On April 23, Houston ISD moved to fire a veteran teacher and president of the Houston Education Association teachers union after she protested requirements to comply with Miles’ New Education System. 

Meyers, the new Lake Worth superintendent who at the time was Houston ISD’s deputy chief of strategic initiatives, testified in favor of the teacher’s termination. 

“We do not allow our staff to make decisions about curriculum in a New Education System school or in Houston ISD,” Meyers said, according to a transcript of the hearing. “If they are not following expectations, we would not allow them to stay in HISD as an employee.” 

Since taking over in Lake Worth, Meyers and the board of managers have temporarily suspended board policies related to governance procedures, hiring, and employee assignments and schedules, similar to what Massey and her board did in Beaumont. 

In response to the Observer’s inquiries about replicating Houston ISD’s reforms in her new role, Meyers wrote in an email that “Lake Worth ISD is very different from Houston ISD. We are a district of five schools serving a much smaller community, so our approach must reflect the unique needs of our students, staff, and families.” 

Her email continued, “I believe educators should learn from successful practices wherever they exist.”

As in Beaumont and Lake Worth, the takeover in Fort Worth ISD has been characterized by swift changes. After less than a month under the new leadership, the 68,000-student district has suspended local board governance and hiring policies and has cut dozens of staff positions, including those supporting English-language learners. 

Parent-organizer Zach Leonard said a new instructional model Fort Worth ISD is rolling out in 19 schools, called “Elevate,” is essentially the same as what Miles has done in Houston, an assertion that Fort Worth district spokesperson Tierney Tinnin refuted. 

Leonard, who is organizing with other families to oppose the takeover, noted “scripted slide-by-slide lessons, rigid timed instruction, and ‘demonstrations of learning’ reduced to data points” as similarities between the programs.

“This isn’t education reform,” Leonard said, referring to Miles’ model of learning being transported to Fort Worth. “It’s a franchise being handed to our children without a vote.” 

Do you have a tip related to a state takeover of a Texas school or district? Share it with Josephine Lee at lee@texasobserver.org. 

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