Exposing the Left’s Heretical Messiah

"The broader picture is clear: Talarico cannot deliver what Democrats want. To the Left, he is too tied to faith. To the Right, he uses faith to advance ungodly ends."

From Crisis

By John Mac Ghlionn

James Talarico: a new secular preacher for the left, or a liberalizing Pied Piper for the right?

Democrats are in dire straits—a circus without a ringmaster, juggling chainsaws blindfolded. Their party has no clear leader, no consistent message, and no vision that unites both its restless base and its fractured coalition. Could James Talarico, a young Texas lawmaker with a preacher’s cadence and a teacher’s patience, be the answer to their prayers—or whatever secular substitute they still cling to? 

No. His rise is less a solution than a symptom. He is too devout for the Left, too deceptive for the Right, and ultimately caught in a catch-22 of his own making.

On the surface, he seems to offer what Democrats lack: youth, charisma, and the rare courage to speak of God in public. That alone explains why so many, desperate for direction, rush to his rallies and pour money into his campaign. But charisma can cover cracks. And in Talarico’s case, it conceals a dangerous contradiction. He speaks the language of the Bible, but he wields it in service of ideas that run against the very faith he professes. His politics are progressive, his theology a tool.

For years, the Left has chased figures like Zohran Mamdani, radicals who promise to tear down institutions, topple traditions, and move fast, even if things break. Talarico is not that. He is earnest, pastoral, quoting Scripture with a smile. Yet to many secular Democrats, that is precisely the problem. A party that prides itself on rejecting religion cannot long tolerate a man who constantly invokes it. Already, some of his own supporters squirm at his repeated references to God. Some mock him for it. Others turn away. This is not a party longing for revival but one lusting for revolution. And revolutions do not wait for shepherds.

For the Right, he is no refuge either. Talarico cloaks himself in Christian values, but not in defense of biblical truths. Instead, he uses faith to bless policies that undermine the very foundations of Christian teaching—on family, on life, on gender. He is not a Christian voice within the Democratic Party but a progressive voice that masks politics with piety. That is why conservatives should see through the façade. His language may sound familiar, but his ends are alien.

Consider his favorite refrain about “flipping tables.” He borrows it from Christ cleansing the temple, a moment of righteous anger directed at corruption. But when Talarico speaks of it, the target is not sin or sacrilege but rather his political opponents. He takes the story of Christ’s zeal for holiness and bends it into justification for partisan crusades. In doing so, he empties Scripture of its true meaning and fills it with the rhetoric of the Left.

This is the Buttigieg effect in sharper form. Pete Buttigieg tried to sprinkle sermons into sound bites, quoting the Bible as if it were merely a progressive pamphlet. Talarico takes the same path but does it more convincingly because, unlike Buttigieg, he seems to believe it. That sincerity is why he draws crowds. But sincerity in error is still error.

The broader picture is clear: Talarico cannot deliver what Democrats want. To the Left, he is too tied to faith. To the Right, he uses faith to advance ungodly ends. He cannot bridge the divide because the divide is not political but spiritual. The Democratic Party has long abandoned the Christian foundations that once undergirded its leaders. No single preacher-politician will bring those back, least of all one who reinterprets Scripture to sanctify social liberalism.

His backers point to his viral clips, his Rogan appearance, his ability to make some conservatives look foolish with polite quips. But politics is not a performance, and viral moments do not win enduring trust. What matters is substance. And on substance, he fails. He may carry a Bible, but he carries it into battle for the same causes the secular Left has championed for decades.

Democrats are desperate. They are wandering the wilderness, grasping at figures who can inspire them. But Talarico is not their Moses but a mirage. He may promise meaning, but he cannot deliver it. He may speak of love, but his policies undermine the truths that make love lasting. He may speak of God, but the god he invokes is one remade in man’s image: progressive, permissive, political.

The lesson is simple. Do not confuse style for salvation. Do not mistake Scripture quoted in stump speeches for faith lived out in truth. And do not let political hunger blind you to deeper realities. Talarico is caught in a bind: too religious for his own side, too radical for those who still believe in real religion. That tension cannot hold. It will tear him apart long before he can stitch his party together.

America’s crisis is not a shortage of spiritual slogans but a shortage of spiritual substance. Talarico, for all his eloquence, does not fill that void. He is not the answer. He is a distraction. And those who care about the health of faith and the future of this country must see him for what he truly is.