The Freedom From Religion Foundation is scrutinizing disturbing reports of House Speaker Mike Johnson’s coordinated political activity with pastors ahead of the midterm elections.

As first reported by Right Wing Watch, Christian nationalist evangelist David Herzog revealed during a recent appearance on the “Elijah Streams” program that pastors attending the Trump administration’s “National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise & Thanksgiving” event on the National Mall were invited to a private briefing with Johnson and MAGA pastor Lorenzo Sewell. According to Herzog, Johnson urged the pastors to politically mobilize their congregations in support of the administration’s agenda and Republican midterm election efforts, stressing that churches and religious leaders were essential to advancing the movement’s goals.

Herzog described Johnson as telling pastors that churches and religious leaders would make the “difference” in determining whether the country “is going to go one way or the other” and emphasized the need for churches to “spread” the Trump administration’s message and mobilize the vote to preserve President Trump’s political power.

If his claims are accurate, this raises profound constitutional and legal concerns.

“The federal government may not use official events, public resources or political access to organize churches as partisan campaign machines,” says FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. “Herzog describes the man who is third in line to be president as essentially promising select Christian churches the fulfillment of their Christian nationalist dreams if they can deliver in the midterms.”

Also alarming are Herzog’s claims that administration officials promised pastors access to “billions of dollars” in government funding for church-run programs. Those remarks come amid a broader push by the Trump administration to steer taxpayer-funded social services through religious organizations, including recent efforts by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to recruit faith-based groups for federally funded addiction and behavioral health programs.

“Directing taxpayer money to politically aligned churches while encouraging them to function as electoral organizing hubs represents a dangerous fusion of church and state,” says FFRF Legal Director Patrick Elliott. “Americans should be deeply troubled by any effort to transform houses of worship into government-favored political actors.”

Herzog additionally framed the effort as part of a broader campaign to preserve Christian nationalist political control, warning pastors about Democrats taking power and invoking inflammatory rhetoric about Muslims and “Sharia law.” He described the administration as handing churches “the baton” to advance Trump’s agenda.

FFRF is currently evaluating the potential legal and constitutional implications of the reported activities, including possible violations involving partisan political coordination, misuse of government resources, preferential treatment of religious organizations and threats to church-state separation.

The federal government serves and should represent all Americans, not just conservative Christians. Using religion as a political weapon undermines both democracy and religious liberty.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters relating to nontheism. With more than 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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