White, evangelical, and ... progressive

In this sense too, the white evangelicals I spoke with were unique in their stances. For most white evangelicals, the top issues as of 2016 were national security and government corruption. But among those who had moved away from the larger evangelical community, many attributed this departure to Trump’s attitudes and policies toward immigrants or his handling of the protests that rocked the world following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020.

“I’ve been shifting left on race issues over the last few years, but obviously what our country went through last year with George Floyd was horrific,” said the chief financial officer who wanted to remain anonymous. “Now that I live in a major metropolitan area … and have more friends of all different colors and backgrounds, I just think it’s egregious the ways in which the Republican Party and evangelicals seem to ignore and dismiss issues of race from the public discourse. That is unequivocally something that Jesus would have been bothered by.”

At this point, though, none of the white evangelicals I interviewed expressed concerns that they were abandoning their religion by siding with the Democratic Party. In fact, many said they saw their politics and religious identity as going hand-in-hand. “All of my beliefs come down to my conviction that Jesus laid down his life for humankind, so his followers are called to lay down their lives,” Bird said. “In other words, to sacrifice our own needs, wants and comfort for the sake of others.”