Before it compared Trump to Hitler, Thursday’s edition of the PBS NewsHour made the Justice Alito flag controversy an all-encompassing scandal. First, the network’s Supreme Court expert Marcia Coyle discussed the Supreme Court’s decision to allow a Republican-drawn congressional district in South Carolina to stand but segued into the controversy over two flags being flown over two of Justice Alito’s homes – an American flag hung upside down at his residence and the “Appeal to Heaven” flag hung outside his beach home in New Jersey.
On those feeble grounds, the New York Times Jodi Kantor, who broke the story in the paper and previously appeared on the NewsHour to suggest Alito had “insurrectionist” January 6 views, since the upside-down U.S. flag and the Appeal to Heaven flag (featuring a pine tree below the phrase “An Appeal to Heaven”) were allegedly symbols of the “Stop the Steal” movement in support of Donald Trump having won the 2020 election.
On Thursday, Coyle said that when she saw the flags, “I wanted to call Justice Alito up and say, what were you thinking? Because it's just something -- it's incomprehensible.” From there, host Geoff Bennett moved onto Flag-gate Part II: “Appeal to Heaven,” with slanted report from the show’s most biased correspondent, White House correspondent Laura Barron-Lopez.
BENNETT: We're going to focus more closely now on that New York Times reporting about that Appeal to Heaven flag seen flying outside Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito's New Jersey beach home last year. The flag has origins dating to the Revolutionary War, but is now associated with Christian nationalism and efforts to overturn President Biden's 2020 election win. The flag was also carried by rioters at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021….
Barron-Lopez explained the flag dated back to the Revolutionary War but was recently popularized by pastor Dutch Sheets of the New Apostolic Reformation. She ran a clip from scholar Matthew Taylor, who said the “Appeal” flag had “become a symbol of right-wing Christian extremism, of Christian supremacy, of aggressive Christian nationalism” and support for Donald Trump. "So, as Taylor says, the flag was popularized by the New Apostolic Reformation. but it has become much bigger to represent the 2020 election lies," she added.
PBS used the flag and its “undercurrent of violence” as a gateway to talk more about “right-wing extremism,” via a bad video that the Trump team posted and later removed from social media:
BENNETT: So how does this fit into the bigger picture of right-wing extremism?
BARRON-LOPEZ: So there were two other examples of extremism from Trump and his allies this week, Geoff, that we want to highlight. And on his TRUTH Social account, Trump posted a video that referenced a -- quote -- "unified reich" if he's elected in November. Trump's campaign said that that was reposted by a staffer, it wasn't a video that campaign created and that they weren't aware of that reference in the video. But this isn't the first time, Geoff, that Trump has echoed Nazi Germany. He has repeatedly talked about migrants -- quote -- "poisoning the blood of the country" on the campaign trail, which historians point out that that is a direct reference to Adolf Hitler and his use of the terms blood poisoning….
Evidently any odd thing Trump says could conceivably herald the dawning of fascism. Barron-Lopez even cited a Yale historian, who said Trump’s claim that Biden’s FBI wanted to assassinate him (as recollected by Barron-Lopez) “is essentially a classic tactic used by fascist movements, that they want to get a monopoly on victimhood...."
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PBS NewsHour
5/23/24
7:29:30 p.m. (ET)Geoff Bennett: We're going to focus more closely now on that New York Times’ reporting about that Appeal to Heaven flag seen flying outside Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito's New Jersey beach home last year.
The flag has origins dating to the Revolutionary War, but is now associated with Christian nationalism and efforts to overturn President Biden's 2020 election win. The flag was also carried by rioters at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Our White House correspondent, Laura Barron-Lopez, has been covering this and joins us now.
So, Laura, you have reported on this flag before, but tell us more about how it's become popularized in recent years.
Laura Barron-Lopez: As you noted, Geoff, this flag dates back to the Revolutionary War.
It was used by the Colonies a lot during that war, but now it's connotation have changed. It's very different. And in recent years, it was popularized by a pastor named Dutch Sheets, a leader in what's known as the New Apostolic Reformation, and they believe that it's destiny for the U.S. to be a completely Christian nation.
And I spoke to Matthew Taylor, an expert on Christian nationalism and a Protestant pastor with Institute — a Protestant scholar — excuse me — with the Institute of Islamic Christian and Jewish Studies. And he described the modern symbolism of that flag.
Matthew Taylor, Institute of Islamic Christian and Jewish Studies: I would say it has become a symbol of right-wing Christian extremism, of Christian supremacy, of aggressive Christian nationalism, especially built around ideas of spiritual warfare and fighting against the demons that they believe have taken over the United States.
So it attaches itself to all these different things, and it especially connotes support for Donald Trump. And, today, to fly the flag is, in many ways, to reference January 6, to point back to this other moment where people believed that they were appealing to heaven to see an election overturned.
Laura Barron-Lopez: So, as Taylor says, the flag was popularized by the New Apostolic Reformation, but it has become much bigger to represent the 2020 election lies.
Geoff Bennett: Well, tell me more about this movement and how it's grown.
Laura Barron-Lopez: So leaders in the New Apostolic Reformation, like Dutch Sheets, who I mentioned, who helped popularize the flag, are strong supporters of Donald Trump.
They were some of the first Christian leaders to rally around him in 2016. And this movement, specifically, just to expand on that, Geoff, believes in Christian supremacy, believes that Christianity should be the official religion of the United States, ending any separation of church and state, and trying to enact their vision of a Christian society.
And as the popularity of that New Apostolic Reformation has grown, so has Trump's popularity amongst Christians and evangelicals. And these Christian nationalists have essentially worked since 2015, Matthew Taylor said, to get more Republican lawmakers and government officials to fly this flag.
And as we reported earlier this year, House Speaker Mike Johnson has this Appeal to Heaven flag, has — has put it outside of his Capitol Hill office. And Johnson's office told us at the time that they did not see any affiliation with January 6 in him putting this flag outside of their office.
They denied that wholeheartedly and said that the speaker simply liked the historical — the history of the flag going back to the Revolutionary area. But key context here, Geoff, is that there's always been an undercurrent of violence attributed to this flag, whether it's the Revolutionary War history, but more commonly now, which is that this movement that has really popularized it believes in spiritual warfare.
Geoff Bennett: Well, unpack the context around this inverted American flag that, according to The New York Times, was seen flying outside Justice Alito's Virginia home shortly after the election.
Laura Barron-Lopez: That flag, which was an upside-down American flag, was also a flag that was carried by rioters on January 6.
And that flag was flown outside Alito's Virginia home 11 days after the insurrection, three days before President Biden's inauguration. And it flew for multiple days out there, according to The New York Times.
And I spoke to Jodi Kantor for "PBS News Weekend" a few days ago, and she said that Alito hasn't answered some key questions, whether it's about he doesn't believe in the peaceful transfer of power, if he is or isn't aware of the connotations around that upside-down flag.
Geoff Bennett: So how does this fit into the bigger picture of right-wing extremism?
Laura Barron-Lopez: So there were two other examples of extremism from Trump and his allies this week, Geoff, that we want to highlight.
And on his TRUTH Social account, Trump posted a video that referenced a — quote — "unified reich" if he's elected in November. Trump's campaign said that that was reposted by a staffer, it wasn't a video that campaign created and that they weren't aware of that reference in the video.
But this isn't the first time, Geoff, that Trump has echoed Nazi Germany. He has repeatedly talked about migrants — quote — "poisoning the blood of the country" on the campaign trail, which historians point out that that is a direct reference to Adolf Hitler and his use of the terms blood poisoning.
And then Trump took to TRUTH Social also this week, claiming that the Justice Department authorized the use of deadly force against him during their search of Mar-a-Lago, claiming that Biden's FBI wanted to assassinate him.
And so I spoke to a Yale historian, Timothy Snyder, who said, when you look at this in the big scale of things, Geoff, that ultimately Trump's comments about Biden trying to — his FBI trying to assassinate him is essentially a classic tactic used by fascist movements, that they want to get a monopoly on victimhood, so that way they can justify any actions they take, whether it's overturning an election or using violence against their enemy.
