Donald Trump on the campaign trail has largely embraced the actions and perpetrators of the Capitol attack on January 6, 2021. Trump’s kickoff rally in Waco, Texas featured the former president harmonizing with the J6ers — and this week Trump made news by hugging Micki Larson-Olson, a QAnon supporter who has called for the execution of former Vice President Mike Pence on the grounds of treason.
Even notably ideological Republicans like Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan have stepped back from this sort of Tucker Carlson-level January 6 revisionism. But Trump, along with MAGA adherents like Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor-Greene, have insisted that the J6ers are devout patriots, and like all patriots — in their view — they are being persecuted for their patriotism.
The devotion to Trump and his alternative narrative among the most extreme MAGA faithful is so strong that it has been described as a cult. Commenting on quotes from Larson-Olson, former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer called it exactly that.
It’s a cult. https://t.co/RbhELlajLN
— Steven Pifer (@steven_pifer) April 29, 2023
Pifer’s was one among hundreds of comments addressing the cult status of Trump’s supporters.
For those who believe Trump leads a cult, Larson-Olson startled with this comment in particular: “If I were to imagine what it would be like to hug Jesus Christ — not that I’m saying President Trump is Jesus Christ — but, just, you know, if I was to imagine what it would be like to hug Jesus Christ, that’s what it felt like for me. It was so personal and intimate.”
The comparison has seen various people rush into the fray to list the differences, as they see them, between Trump and Jesus, itself an example of how far Trump has taken his cult of personality candidacy.
One commentator who felt compelled to debunk the comparison wrote: “Jesus was a young physically fit carpenter and preacher. Trump is a bloated version of a failed real estate magnate & bigoted blowhard. I imagine one feels nothing like the other.”
Jesus was a young physically fit carpenter and preacher.
— Kevin Kresse (@kevinkresse) April 28, 2023
Trump is a bloated version of a failed real estate magnate & bigoted blowhard.
I imagine one feels nothing like the other.
Others find the religious comparison appalling and wonder if church support of Trump should endanger their tax exempt status.
Seriously 10 years ago if you told me that all the Evangelicals would embrace a thrice married, serial liar and adulteress, bankrupted ex talk show host as JC, I would ask what you had been drinking.
— South Side Darth Maul (@HP_DarthMaul) April 28, 2023
But this is the fact now.
Tax the church.
The Trump-Jesus comparisons made news in March when the former President was arraigned. Some on the snark side did vouch for the Trump-Jesus similarities back then, after Rep. Greene and others said Trump’s arrest was like Christ’s arrest.
The only thing Donald Trump has in common w/Jesus is that they both hung out with hookers and they both used ghostwriters.#TrumpIndictment https://t.co/pc8H8f2sQx
— John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) March 18, 2023
But the Trump-Jesus comparisons in March were primarily part of objecting to prosecutorial procedure and did not, like the recent hugging spectacle, address Trump’s alleged “chosen-one” aura.
