The rank hypocrisy of NeverTrump

Hypocrisy has a skewed understanding in modern context. The term has been boiled down to the phrase “do as I say, not as I do.” However, this definition dilutes the most important ingredient of what makes someone a hypocrite. Admitted moral failings do not make one a hypocrite. Fraud does. In ancient Greece, hypocrites were theatre actors. They were playing a role. Their job was to convince their audience that they are a role different than themselves.

We have seen an abundant examples of lockdown petty tyrants defying their own orders. What is clear about the Democrat Party is that they do not believe that COVID is a threat. They know masks do not work, that mitigation strategies were unnecessary and ineffective. But they had a role to play. And thus, when they were not in character, they flagrantly violated the rules they imposed on others. They are hypocrites not because they failed to live by their own standards, but because they never believed them in the first place. 

The NeverTrump movement is no different. And I refer not to the 2016 movement where even I opposed Trump because I believed he was a RINO. I refer instead to the movement that rode under that banner beyond 2016 and through 2020. There are three prominent examples that I speak of in this article.

Beginning with the Lincoln Project we will see the most egregious examples. The founder of the Lincoln Project, John Weaver recently admitted to being a low level homosexual political version of Harvey Weinstein. He also used this scandal to bill himself as a victim for being a homosexual. Prior to this scandal it was revealed that John Weaver was the Russian asset the Lincoln Project oft accused Trump of being.

The Lincoln Project billed itself as a group of morally uncompromised Republicans that wanted to return the GOP to the days of Mitt Romney and John McCain. But it turns out, one of their major players is a homosexual adulterer, a sin which to them pales in comparison to mean tweets. For the Lincoln Project, the problem was never Trump’s character, it was always about money and opposing right-of-center policy.

David French is where we see a more Christianized example of a NeverTrumper than the overtly left-of-center McCain/Kasich staffer that was Weaver. David French consistently articulates that Christians who support Trump are compromising the gospel to “Christian Nationalism.” But David French already is vocal in his support of those who seek to undermine the gospel. Just in 2021, David French has promoted the words of numerous woke Evangelicals, including but not limited to: Beth Moore, Russell Moore, Phil Vischer, Jemar Tisby, and Anthony Bradley. He made a point early on in 2020 to endorse a woke podcast. It is not hard to conclude that someone who makes a habit out of promoting false teachers is projecting his own compromised Christianity onto others. David French is a hypocrite, and that’s why you get arguments out of him like “drag queen story hour is the price of freedom.“

The last example to talk about is Erick Erickson. Like French, Erickson brands himself a Christian whilst opposing Trump. The arguments are near the same as French’s, but Erickson is less compromised. However, he is an adamant supporter of Russell Moore and a white knight for Beth Moore as well. Erick Erickson is a theological jellyfish.

And that is the issue with the prominent NeverTrump members. They claim that their theological conservatism is their moral guidance for opposing Trump, as French and Erickson do, but actively support Woke Evangelicals subverting the gospel in the church.