From “The Bible According to Christian Nationalists: Exploiting Scripture for Political Power” by Brian Kaylor
At the time, Missouri sent six Republicans and two Democrats to the House of Representatives. Following the 2020 census, state lawmakers started the constitutionally required process of adjusting the lines to make sure the eight districts in the state had roughly the same number of people living in them. While Republican leaders in the state legislature wanted to keep the basic 6-2 map, some more conservative lawmakers sought a 7-1 split. Republicans wanting to keep a 6-2 scenario warned that 7-1 could be tossed as unconstitutional, thus creating the risk that judges might instead draw a 5-3 map. After all, Donald Trump beat Joe Biden in 2020 by 57 percent to 41 percent, which is closest to a 5-3 split. Missouri’s districts were already gerrymandered, but Seitz and others decided it was a biblical quest to gerrymander them even more. Ironically, to create a 7-1 map, they needed to target the seat of Democratic U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a United Methodist minister. All in the name of God.
“This is ‘such a time as this.’ I believe God called us here to serve with your blessing,” Republican state Rep. Sarah Walsh declared during the prayer rally. Her comment borrowed a popular line from the Book of Esther, where Mordecai told Queen Esther she needed to confront the king to prevent an effort to kill all of the Jews in the land. As Mordecai urged her to save her people, he said it was possible she might have been put in that place “for such a time as this.” While Mordecai hedged on whether Esther was in that position for that time, Walsh declared definitely that they were in that place for that time. She believed God wanted them to win this gerrymandering fight – even though God is never actually mentioned in the Book of Esther (nor is gerrymandering). Undeterred, Walsh argued a 7-2 map would pass “by the grace of god and the overwhelming support of Trump-supporting Missouri.” This would, she added, help them win the fight against “radical, America-hating, God-hating socialists in Washington D.C.,” who “want to make government our god.” Spoiler alert: the 7-1 map failed, which is why America is a godless socialist nation now.