Democrats won big in the 2026 midterms, taking control of both the House and Senate. But who helped make this historic victory possible, and what lessons should we take from it?

In this episode of "The Justice Briefing", historian Dr. Jemar Tisby examines the election results, the political power of Black voters and organizers, and the long struggle for American democracy.

YOU'LL LEARN

- Why Black voters and Black women played a critical role in the midterm victories.

- How Mississippi's Reconstruction and Redemption history reveals an American tradition of authoritarianism and voter suppression.

- Why Black Christianity deserves more recognition in conversations about faith and politics.

- What historical setbacks teach us about sustaining political movements.

- Why accountability must be a priority for the incoming Democratic Congress.

Jemar also reflects on the importance of celebrating hard-won victories while preparing for the work ahead.

Keep The Justice Briefing going. Become a paid subscriber, just $5.83/month on the annual subscription at JemarTisby.Substack.com 

Get Dr. Tisby's latest book: "Notes from an Evangelical Reject"

What does it mean when a Christian says, “Jesus is my candidate”? 

Can pastors avoid partisan endorsements while still addressing political injustice? 

And how should believers navigate imperfect electoral choices?

In this Election Day special of "The Justice Briefing", Dr. Jemar Tisby welcomes Dr. Christina Edmondson, Rev. Dr. Mika Edmondson, and public theologian Ekemini Uwan.

The conversation responds to remarks by Pastor Philip Anthony Mitchell on Cam Newton's "Funky Friday" podcast.

What You'll Learn

- Why Christina calls for greater precision, courage, and community.

- How Mika connects political responsibility to the Good Samaritan.

- Why Ekemini emphasizes social location, informed voting, and accountability.

- How the Black freedom struggle informs Christian political ethics.

- Why pastors can reject partisan endorsements while providing moral guidance.

- How prayer, worship, organizing, and listening shape Christian engagement after Election Day.

Guests, books, and podcasts

• Truth's Table — The podcast cohosted by Christina Edmondson and Ekemini Uwan, exploring theology, race, culture, gender, and public life.
• Truthful Prayers for Resisting the Chaos — Christina Edmondson and Ekemini Uwan's forthcoming devotional book, mentioned as Truthful Prayers.
• What Makes Leaders Wise — Christina's book on wisdom, leadership, and organizational health
• Christianbook.com
• The Power of Unearned Suffering — Mika Edmondson's examination of Martin Luther King Jr.'s theology of suffering.
• Koinonia Church, Nashville — The congregation pastored by Mika Edmondson.
• Sistamatic Theology — Ekemini Uwan's website for her writing, speaking, preaching, and theological work
• Notes from an Evangelical Reject — Jemar Tisby's forthcoming book

Make sure more conversations like these happen. Become a paid subscriber to Footnotes at: jemartisby.substack.com

What could the midterms change in Congress? What do early-voting numbers reveal? And what happens after Election Day?

What happens if the election results are close? What if a candidate refuses to concede? And what happens between the time polls close and the moment elected officials actually take office?

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, historian Dr. Jemar Tisby examines the November 3 elections and the processes that follow.

You'll learn:

• How a new House majority could block legislation, conduct investigations, and exercise oversight.
• Why early-voting turnout is drawing attention in North Carolina, Florida, and other states.
• Which Southern races involving Black candidates have historic significance.
• How vote counting, recounts, legal challenges, and certification work.
• What the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party's 1964 challenge teaches us about political participation and long-term change.

This episode connects the immediate stakes of the 2026 midterms to the history and institutions that shape American democracy.

The best way to support his podcast is by becoming a paid subscriber to Footnotes. It's $5.83/month investment in current events at the intersection of faith, history, and justice.

Subscribe today!

My new book is for anyone who has wondered about or walked away from a community they once called home.

Pre-order your copy of Notes from an Evangelical Reject.

Episode Chapters

00:00 — Why the midterms don't end on November 3

01:39 — What's at stake in the 2026 elections?

04:57 — What a Democratic House majority could do

07:01 — Congressional investigations and oversight

09:34 — Impeachment powers and the limits of House control

11:54 — What political participation can accomplish

12:42 — Supporting independent journalism and the forthcoming book

14:54 — Early-voting turnout and Kentucky's limited voting window

17:01 — Party breakdowns: North Carolina, Florida, and other states

21:48 — Competitive races and Black candidates in the South

25:51 — Georgia, Stacey Abrams, and the importance of long-term organizing

29:38 — Florida, Byron Donalds, and the meaning of political representation

37:26 — What happens after Election Day?

41:18 — Counting, recounts, challenges, and certification

43:18 — How to evaluate claims about election integrity

53:26 — Fannie Lou Hamer and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party

56:58 — What history teaches about political change

Why did Ryan Coogler set "Sinners" in Clarksdale, Mississippi, in 1932? What do the film's music, Christianity, vampires, and racial dynamics reveal about the Jim Crow South? And how much history is contained in scenes that last only a few seconds?

In this special Sinners Movie Teach-In, historian Dr. Jemar Tisby joins award-winning creator Garrison Hayes to explore the overlooked history and cultural influences behind Ryan Coogler's acclaimed film.

Jemar spent years teaching and living in the Mississippi Delta, not far from Clarksdale, and has devoted his career to studying race, religion, and justice in American history. 

Together, Jemar and Garrison examine the film's historical setting, its religious symbolism, the music of the Delta, and the economic structures that shaped Black life long after emancipation.

**Spoiler warning:** This conversation discusses major plot developments and scenes throughout the film.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Welcome and introduction to the Sinners Movie Teach-In  

05:18 First impressions of Sinners and its Clarksdale setting  

10:18 Chinese immigrants and racial boundaries in the Delta  

13:23 Introducing the Sinners Movie Syllabus  

16:10 The Mississippi Delta: slavery, cotton, and generational poverty  

22:38 Fannie Lou Hamer, education, and Black religious thought  

28:34 Christianity, Hoodoo, and African spiritual traditions  

33:40 The blues, Robert Johnson, and the juke joint  

36:43 The vampires and competing visions of unity  

41:08 Convict leasing and the prison labor system  

46:37 Sharecropping, plantation money, and debt  

51:47 Ryan Coogler's ownership deal and economic power  

57:41 Chinese–Black solidarity and survival under Jim Crow  

61:35 The Choctaw and Indigenous knowledge  

65:59 Irish identity, colonialism, and the construction of whiteness  

68:28 How to use the Sinners Movie Syllabus

ABOUT THE HOSTS

Dr. Jemar Tisby is a historian, author, filmmaker, and racial justice advocate whose work explores the intersection of faith, history, and justice.

Garrison Hayes is an award-winning communicator and creator whose work explores history, race, culture, and contemporary issues.

Free Educational Resource: The Sinners Movie Syllabus

Jemar Tisby and historian Keisha N. Blain created the #SinnersMovieSyllabus, a free guide to the history and culture that informed the film.

The syllabus includes books, films, music, and educational materials about the Jim Crow South, Black Christianity, the blues, migration, racial violence, and Black horror.

Read the syllabus HERE

For more discussions about faith, history, and justice, subscribe to Footnotes:

How do you tell a compelling story about racism, injustice, or social change without making your audience feel like they're listening to a sermon? What separates a story that moves people from one that overwhelms them with its message? And how do you build a creative career telling these stories when there isn't an obvious path forward?

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, historian, author, and filmmaker Dr. Jemar Tisby sits down with award-winning writer and director Nick Brooks, director of the new narrative short film What Will We Tell Them.

Brooks is the author of Promise Boys, Up in Smoke, and the Ethan Fairmont trilogy. His creative career has taken him from teaching and writing children's books to filmmaking, music, and video game writing.

Their conversation explores the craft of storytelling, the relationship between social justice and art, the importance of representation, and the persistence required to create opportunities.

In This Episode, You'll Learn

• Why justice-centered stories can become preachy.
• How to build a story around characters.
• Brooks's three ingredients for a strong story.
• Why trusting your audience matters.
• How lived experience shapes creative work.
• How to pursue opportunities before you feel fully qualified.
• How to move from inspiration to a finished film.
• What went into making What Will We Tell Them.

About Nick Brooks

Nick Brooks is an award-winning author, director, and musician whose work spans young adult and middle-grade fiction, film, and music. His writing explores the lives of young people navigating institutions, expectations, and systems of inequality.

Learn more about Nick: thenickbrooks.com

What Will We Tell Them

Learn more about the film "What Will We Tell Them" by subscribing for updates at: jemartisby.substack.com

Chapters

00:00 — Welcome and *What Will We Tell Them* screening announcement  

01:45 — Meet Nick Brooks: author, filmmaker, and creative artist  

04:47 — Telling stories about justice without preaching  

08:30 — Hook, heart, and theme: how Brooks develops stories  

11:19 — The influence of hip-hop, books, and Black storytelling  

14:47 — How to nurture social awareness in young people  

18:20 — Howard University, mentorship, and discovering education  

24:09 — Writing children's books and finding a creative purpose  

29:15 — Creating opportunities and getting a literary agent  

33:56 — Taking risks, handling rejection, and writing for GTA VI  

38:15 — How children's books opened doors to a new career  

41:11 — *Fruitvale Station*, Ryan Coogler, and becoming a filmmaker  

45:30 — Learning filmmaking by getting onto film sets  

48:13 — Mistakes to avoid when telling stories about injustice  

50:44 — The story behind *What Will We Tell Them*  

54:21 — Filmmaking challenges, preparation, and adapting on set  

57:29 — Private screening details and ways to support the film

Stay Connected

Subscribe to "Footnotes" for historically grounded analysis, commentary about faith and justice, and updates on new films and educational projects: jemartisby.substack.com

Instagram: @JemarTisby 

What do you do when the church, workplace, organization, or community you once called home no longer reflects your values?

How do you know when it's time to stop fighting for a seat at someone else's table?

And if you decide to leave, how do you figure out what comes next?

Maybe you've spent years trying to make an institution better, only to discover that there's a limit to how much change its leaders will tolerate.

Maybe your presence is welcomed, but your perspective isn't.

Or maybe you have a vision for something different, but you're not sure you have the resources, experience, or courage to build it.

This episode of The Justice Briefing will help you think through your next move.

Dr. Jemar Tisby shares lessons from his journey out of white evangelical institutions and into building Tisby Media, an independent organization dedicated to truth-telling at the intersection of faith, history, and justice.

Drawing on his personal experiences with racial exclusion, institutional resistance, and entrepreneurship, Jemar offers three practical principles for turning dissatisfaction into constructive action.

You'll discover how to move beyond simply knowing what you want to leave behind and start identifying what you want to create.

And you'll learn why building your own table might not be what you actually need.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• How to recognize when an institution has made space for you without giving you meaningful power
• Why righteous anger can be a powerful starting point for creating positive change
• How to identify the deeper motivation that will sustain you when building something new gets difficult
• The three factors that can help you discover a mission uniquely suited to your gifts and convictions
• The surprising difference between building your own table and building your own chair

You'll also hear about Jemar's forthcoming book, Notes from an Evangelical Reject, and get updates on projects from Tisby Media, including the upcoming short film What Will We Tell Them?

If you're tired of shrinking yourself to fit someone else's vision—or you have a dream of creating something better but don't know where to begin—this episode will help you see the possibilities in front of you and take your next step with greater clarity.

Mentioned in this episode

Notes from an Evangelical Reject — Jemar's forthcoming book, available for preorder. Publication date: January 19, 2027.

How to Resist White Christian Nationalism — A self-paced course featuring practical action steps.

Jesus Was a Migrant — Watch the trailer and learn about community screenings at https://jesuswasamigrant.com.

What Will We Tell Them? — A new narrative short film from Tisby Studios.

Book Launch Team — Join Jemar's launch team for exclusive resources, updates, and opportunities to help spread the word about Notes from an Evangelical Reject. Join HERE.

Footnotes — Subscribe for historical insights and analysis at the intersection of race, religion, and politics. JemarTisby.Substack.com

Episode chapters

00:00 – How to Build Your Own Table

02:27 – Why So Many People Are Questioning Their Institutions

07:48 – Jemar's Journey Through White Evangelicalism

12:58 – When You're Given a Seat but Not a Voice

17:19 – Principle 1: Identify Your Internal Driver

19:59 – How Righteous Anger Can Fuel Constructive Change

21:24 – The Vision That Pulls You Forward

22:28 – Principle 2: Create a Clear Mission

24:09 – Discovering Your Gifts and Learning to Trust Yourself

27:33 – Finding Joy and Passion in Your Work

29:29 – Identifying the Need Only You Can Address

31:09 – Principle 3: Decide What You're Actually Building

31:43 – The Difference Between Building a Table and Building a Chair

36:21 – How Jemar Built Tisby Media

40:03 – The Justice Briefing, Teaching, and the Justice Institute

42:40 – Tisby Studios and the Power of Film

44:10 – What Will We Tell Them? and the Legacy We're Creating

46:16 – Notes from an Evangelical Reject and the Book Launch Team

54:02 – Upcoming Projects and New Developments

58:04 – Why We Need New and Truer Institutions

Follow Jemar Tisby

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@JTisby

About The Justice Briefing

The Justice Briefing is your weekly guide to current events at the intersection of faith, history, and justice.

#TheJusticeBriefing #JemarTisby #EvangelicalReject

In a rare guest interview, Dr. Jemar Tisby sits down with Dr. Matthew D. Taylor, author of the new book Defying Tyrants: Following Jesus in a World of Christian Antichrists.

They discuss Christian supremacy, Christendom, and imperialism. Going deeper, they explore how Jesus displayed and taught about power, and why the tyrants who claim his name avoid those teachings with surgical precision.

They also talk about the cost of this work. Dr. Taylor lost his job for writing this book.

You'll come away with a theological case for defying tyrants and a picture of what that looks like in the church, in politics, and in everyday life.

Get Defying Tyrants wherever you get your books.

Topics Addressed

• Pete Hegseth's speech and the new Office of Religious Affairs
• Constantine's conversion and the merging of church and empire
• Christian supremacy as the ideology beneath Christian nationalism
• Why "antichrists" in 1 and 2 John refers to Christians who harm others in Jesus' name
• The parable of the wheat and the tares
• The cost of speaking out against authoritarianism

Support conversations like this one by becoming a paid subscriber at JemarTisby.Substack.com.

Resources Referenced

• Matthew D. Taylor, Defying Tyrants: Following Jesus in a World of Christian Antichrists (Broadleaf, 2026)
• Matthew D. Taylor, The Violent Take It by Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy (2024)
• Matthew D. Taylor's Reckonings (Substack)
• Scripture: Mark 10:42-45; 1 John 2:18-19; Matthew 13:24-30

Get the course. Gain the confidence: How to Resist White Christian Nationalism

White Christian nationalism is the greatest threat to democracy and the witness of the church in the United States today. 

Most people who follow this work already know that. So why don't we have more confidence to confront it? 

In this back-to-basics episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby names five obstacles to confidence: 

1. leaving out the "white," 

2. calling every conservative Christian a Christian nationalist, 

3. leading with facts alone, 

4. stopping at 'it isn't really Christian," 

5. mistaking understanding for resistance. 

Along the way, he brings the receipts, from PRRI's newest data showing that nearly two-thirds of Americans resist Christian nationalism to Gorski and Perry's "deep story" of a Christian America that was supposedly stolen and must be taken back.

The episode builds toward a revelation Dr. Tisby had live on the show: what people need most to resist white Christian nationalism is confidence. The truth is on our side. 

To move from understanding to action, Dr. Tisby introduces his new self-paced course, How to Resist White Christian Nationalism.

Topics Addressed

• How the plantation's paternalistic hierarchy mirrors the white Christian nationalist vision
• Tokenism: why people of color in the movement are useful but never central, and why tokens get spent
• New PRRI data: nearly two-thirds of Americans resist Christian nationalism, with Arkansas and Mississippi the least resistant states
• The "deep story" of white Christian nationalism and why we must meet a bad story with a truer story
• The third commandment, the no true Scotsman fallacy, and the responsibility of Christians to resist
• The ARC of Racial Justice and the gap between understanding and action

Resources Referenced

1. How to Resist White Christian Nationalism (self-paced course), Dr. Jemar Tisby

2. PRRI, New Report Analyzes the Two-Thirds of Americans Who Resist Christian Nationalism (September 24, 2026)

3. Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross: White Christian Nationalism and the Threat to American Democracy (Oxford University Press, 2022)

4. Dr. Jemar Tisby, The Color of Compromise (2019)

5. Dr. Jemar Tisby, How to Fight Racism (2021), source of the ARC of Racial Justice

6. Scripture: Exodus 20:7; Isaiah 6:8

Support the Show

Fewer than 5% of subscribers make this truth-telling at the intersection of faith, history, and justice possible. For $7 a month, or $5.83 a month on the annual plan (less than a gallon of gas in LA), you can help keep The Justice Briefing going. Become a paid subscriber at JemarTisby.Substack.com.

Stay informed. Stay faithful. Stay in the fight.

For decades, the religious right told Christians that abortion was the one issue that outweighed every other. 

Yet ICE recorded at least 18 miscarriages in its custody from January through September 2025, then lost count, and the movement's loudest voices have barely said a word.

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Tisby asks why an unborn child's life should matter less because their mother is an immigrant, and how race shaped the religious right from the start.

In 1971, the Southern Baptist Convention backed laws allowing abortion in cases including rape, incest, and likely harm to a mother's emotional health, then reaffirmed that stance after Roe v. Wade. 

Historian Randall Balmer argues in Bad Faith that what first mobilized conservative Christians politically was the IRS denying tax exemptions to racially discriminatory Christian schools like Bob Jones University.

So was it ever about life in the womb, or was it about power?

Support the podcast:

Is this kind of information worthwhile? That's the only question you need to answer. If yes, become a paid subscriber at JemarTisby.Substack.com 

For $5.83 a month on an annual subscription, you fund the research behind every episode, along with Tisby Media's new course and films.

This episode of The Justice Briefing is different. Instead of starting with a current event and working backward to the history, Dr. Jemar Tisby does what he loves most: he tells stories.

Diving back into primary source research for his new Substack series, History Rhymes: Democracy and Voting Rights Edition, left him feeling like a grad student again, brimming with material he could not wait to share. So he devoted a full episode to three of those stories.

The first is about the Congress that refused to seat more than sixty former Confederates in December 1865, overrode a president more than a dozen times, and wrote insurrection into the official record.

The second is about the 1868 Charleston constitutional convention, the only one in American history with a Black majority, where recently emancipated men wrote the most democratic document South Carolina had ever seen and included the children of the people who had enslaved them.

The third is about Amos T. Akerman, a former Confederate and enslaver who became attorney general and prosecuted the first Ku Klux Klan out of existence for forty years.

Taken together, the three stories make one argument: Congress has the power, it lacks the will, and history has the receipts.

Topics Addressed

• Why the first iteration of the Ku Klux Klan disbanded in the mid-1870s and did not reconstitute until 1915
• The 1868 South Carolina constitutional convention: 76 Black delegates out of 124, and the only Black-majority state legislature in U.S. history
• What Black delegates actually wrote into the state constitution, including free public schools, protected suffrage, women's property rights, and a permanent ban on secession
• The three Enforcement Acts, and why the Ku Klux Klan Act finally worked by naming the state itself as the defendant

Resources Referenced

• Here's What Congress Did When Members Had a Spine
• When Black People Wrote the Constitution
• When the Department of Justice Prosecuted the Ku Klux Klan Out of Existence
• The Spirit of Justice by Jemar Tisby: bit.ly/spiritofjustice
• A Way Forward: Hope in Uncertain Times, Nashville, August 28-30, with Rep. Justin Pearson, Shane Claiborne, and others. Free, but registration is required: Register here

Support This Work

History Rhymes: Democracy and Voting Rights Edition runs weekly through the 2026 midterms, roughly twelve installments in all. The episodes are free. The articles are free. The research is not.

If this is the kind of work you want more of, become a paid subscriber at JemarTisby.Substack.com. It is $5.83 a month on the annual plan. Less than six dollars for history from a PhD historian who spent years learning the tools of the discipline to bring it to you.

Stay informed. Stay faithful. Stay in the fight.

On the 61st anniversary of the Voting Rights Act, Dr. Jemar Tisby closes a full history of the law by turning to the fight over it right now.

What took blood and marches to win in 1965 has been taken apart in the thirteen years since 2013, from Shelby County to Louisiana v. Callais, and almost nobody marched.

Dr. Tisby refuses to end there. He points to the faith leaders already mobilizing to protect the ballot before the November midterms, from William Barber's 100 days of action to the poll chaplains and peacekeepers being trained in local churches, and he names the moment for what it is: the civil rights movement of our generation.

The episode also launches History Rhymes: Democracy and Voting Edition, Dr. Tisby's three-month series tracing the struggle over the vote from Reconstruction to today.

In This Episode

• Why 2026 is the civil rights movement of our generation, and how the April march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge echoed 1965
• How the Voting Rights Act was taken apart in thirteen years, from Shelby County to Louisiana v. Callais
• Faith leaders mobilizing before the midterms, including William Barber's 100 days of action
• Poll chaplains and peacekeepers: protecting voters, protecting ballots, and protecting the system itself
• The launch of History Rhymes: Democracy and Voting Edition on Footnotes
• The closing charge: register, check your registration, and take somebody with you

Resources Referenced

• The Washington Informer, "Faith leaders start 100-day countdown to Nov. 3 election," featuring Rev. Dr. William Barber and Rev. Tony Lee of Community of Hope AME Church: https://www.washingtoninformer.com/faith-leaders-midterm-vote/
• Black Church PAC and its Freedom Summer events: https://www.blackchurchpac.org/
• All Roads Lead South Coalition, organizers of the 2026 march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge
• History Rhymes: Democracy and Voting Edition, Dr. Tisby's new Footnotes series: https://JemarTisby.Substack.com

Support The Justice Briefing

The Justice Briefing runs on readers and listeners, not advertisers. If it helps you make sense of this moment, the best way to support it is to subscribe to Footnotes at JemarTisby.Substack.com. The annual plan comes to $5.83 a month, it keeps this work independent, and it puts every installment of History Rhymes: Democracy and Voting Edition in your inbox from now through the midterms.

The DNC's Rules and Bylaws Committee just voted to have South Carolina lead off the 2028 Democratic presidential primaries, and Dr. Jemar Tisby explains why that decision matters more than the news cycle will let on.

He walks through what a primary actually does, why the order of states determines momentum, money, and makes the case that this is a win for the party.

In this episode:

• What a primary actually is, and why it is not a direct vote for the nominee
• Why the order of states determines momentum, media coverage, donor confidence, and who drops out
• The South Carolina versus Nevada split and the case Latino leaders made for Nevada
• The progressive objection to a Southern first primary and what it assumes about Black Southern voters
• Six things candidates should do over the next 18 months to earn Black votes

Resources referenced:

• Previous episode: "What Every Social Movement Must Do"
• Dr. Tisby's YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/@JTisby

Support the show:

There are no ads on The Justice Briefing and no sponsors. Paid subscribers are the ones who make this work possible. If the breakdown of the 2028 primary calendar was useful to you weeks before it becomes a headline, become a paid subscriber at JemarTisby.Substack.com.

On the Fourth of July, the White House released a 160-page report accusing the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History of "ideological capture."

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby reads the report's own words, walks through the two congressional hearings it triggered, and makes the historian's case that the charge is a confession.

His argument is simple: there is no such thing as objective history. Facts are objective, but facts do not interpret themselves, and interpretation is the work of the craft. When the right demands "straightforward" scholarship, what they really want is a story that agrees with them.

This is not about erasing the founders. It is about expanding the narrative to tell the whole truth. History does not repeat itself, Dr. Tisby reminds us, but it rhymes.

In This Episode

• Why "objective" history is a myth, and why interpretation is the historian's job
• The fundamentalist "plain reading of Scripture," and what it shares with the demand for "straightforward" history
• Narratives of declension and their link to "Make America Great Again"
• Inside the two congressional hearings, and which committee actually holds jurisdiction over the Smithsonian
• The witnesses behind the report: the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025, and Hillsdale College
• PragerU, the 1776 curriculum, and this White House's record on history
• The Lost Cause, the UDC textbook committee, and the Dunning School
• Du Bois and Carter G. Woodson on expanding the narrative, plus the ARC of Racial Justice as practical next steps

Resources Referenced

• Saving America's Story, the White House report on the National Museum of American History
• W.E.B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America (1935), and its chapter "The Propaganda of History"
• Carter G. Woodson, The Mis-Education of the Negro (1933)
• Dr. Tisby's article on the Dunning School, at JemarTisby.Substack.com
• Jesus Was a Migrant, the first film from Tisby Studios, at jesuswasamigrant.com

Support the Show

The Justice Briefing is independent and listener-supported. Dr. Tisby is not attached to any institution on a full-time basis, which means this history reaches you because readers and listeners make it possible. If this episode gave you the background the headlines skip, support the work at JemarTisby.Substack.com. An annual membership comes out to just $5.83 a month, and it keeps the weekly articles and podcast coming.

What is the one thing every social movement must do before anything else? In this episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby argues that it is not fundraising, filing for nonprofit status, or even getting out the vote. It's something much more foundational.

Drawing on his training as a historian of race, religion, and social movements, Dr. Tisby traces the pattern across four eras of American history. In every case, the injustice that moved people to act was violent, visible, and visceral.

Dr. Tisby then turns to the present. ICE keeps killing people, and he makes the case that under this administration, immigration is the tip of the spear: the most public, most violent, most visceral campaign of them all.

In This Episode

• Why every social movement must find the injustice that evokes the most moral outrage and press on it until progress comes
• The "violent, visible, visceral" test for what actually mobilizes people to act
• How abolitionists, Ida B. Wells, civil rights activists, and the Black Panther Party each pressed on their era's defining injustice
• The recent ICE killings of Lorenzo Salgado Araújo in Houston and Johan Sebastián Durán in Maine
• The 2,000-arrests-per-day quota, masked agents, unmarked vehicles, and the lack of accountability fueling reckless violence
• Why immigration is the tip of the spear for this administration, and why attacks on voting rights struggle to spark the same outrage
• The story behind Tisby Studios' first film, Jesus Was a Migrant, and why it is distributed through group screenings
• Concrete action steps: booking a screening, abolishing ICE, taking off the masks, demanding accountability, and emphasizing the ethics of the kingdom

Resources Referenced

• Martin Luther King Jr., Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?, on nonviolent coercion and the healthy tension that forces a society to confront its prejudice
• The Black Panther Party's Ten-Point Program
• The Color of Compromise by Dr. Jemar Tisby, and its closing chapter, "The Fierce Urgency of Now," which introduces the ARC of Racial Justice
• Jesus Was a Migrant (JesusWasAMigrant.com)
• Last week's episode, "What Mainstream Media Keep Getting Wrong about Douglas Wilson"

Support the Podcast

The best way to support The Justice Briefing is to become a paid subscriber at JemarTisby.Substack.com. Fewer than 5% of subscribers are paid; the $70 annual plan comes out to about $5.83 a month, and it keeps this podcast, and this kind of history, coming every week.

The Justice Briefing | Show Notes

What Mainstream Media Keep Getting Wrong About Douglas Wilson

NPR just gave Douglas Wilson another splashy, in-depth interview, and Dr. Jemar Tisby has a problem with it.

Not that the media covers Wilson: the pastor from Moscow, Idaho has a direct line to power through his disciple Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense, and that is newsworthy.

The problem is how they cover him.

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Tisby makes the case that respectful, on-location, one-on-one coverage does exactly what Wilson wants.

From there, Dr. Tisby walks through who Wilson is and what he actually believes, from his rejection of the Nineteenth Amendment to his vision of a theocratic America, then names a better way to cover him.

The real question is not what Wilson believes. It is who gets to speak for Christians, and which version of God and country will prevail.

In This Episode

• Why NPR, CNN, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times keep making the trip to Moscow, Idaho
• The one line where Wilson admits a "respectful hearing" is the win he is after
• Wilson's theology explained: reformed fundamentalism, postmillennialism, biblical patriarchy, classical Christian education, and dominionism
• His views on repealing the Nineteenth Amendment and "household voting"
• How the Gospel Coalition, Desiring God, and other evangelical platforms gave Wilson legitimacy years before the mainstream media did
• Why the coverage centers Wilson, on his own turf, with no counter-voice in the frame
• The lack of racial analysis in most coverage of Wilson and Christian dominionism
• A better model: pass the mic to the scholars, pastors, and survivors who resist him

Resources Referenced

Scholars and books that offer a counter-narrative

• Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation
• Beth Allison Barr, The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth
• Sheila Wray Gregoire, She Deserves Better: Raising Girls to Resist Toxic Teachings on Sex, Self, and Speaking Up
• Tia Levings, A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy
• Sarah Stankorb, Disobedient Women: How a Small Group of Faithful Women Exposed Abuse, Brought Down Powerful Pastors, and Ignited an Evangelical Reckoning
• Anthea Butler, White Evangelical Racism
• Obery Hendricks, The Politics of Jesus
• Bryan Massingale, Racial Justice and the Catholic Church

Survivors speaking out

• Sons of Patriarchy (sonsofpatriarchy.com), hosted by Sarah Bader and Peter Bell

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The best way to materially support The Justice Briefing is to subscribe to Footnotes at JemarTisby.Substack.com, the #4 ranked publication in the history category. Your subscription is what keeps this work independent and coming to you every week.

As the United States marks its 250th anniversary, white Christian nationalists are telling their version of the story: that America was founded as a Christian nation.

In part two of his America 250 series on The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby argues that there is a better, more truthful story to tell if we know how to tell it, and that telling it requires something most churches have never named: a theology of history.

Dr. Tisby is a historian and a believer, and he makes the case that those two things belong together, and that Christians should be passionate about truth and history.

Topics Addressed

• Anniversaries as arguments about the past, and how they shape who we were, who we are, and who we must become
• What white Christian nationalists actually mean by "Christian nation": theocracy, a covenant like ancient Israel, Christian privilege, and a religious test for being a "real" American
• The restoration narrative of fear and grievance, and why regression differs from progression
• The biblical case for a theology of history: the Bible as a history book, and God's repeated command to remember
• The dangers of forgetting, and why memory is a guardrail against idolatry and injustice
• History and identity: how the power to tell the story is the power to shape identity
• The church's abdication of teaching history, and the "potato chips" problem of getting your history from social media
• Applying the ARC of Racial Justice (Awareness, Relationships, Commitment) to doing history well

Resources Referenced

• Part one of the series: "Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?" on The Justice Briefing
• "James Baldwin Was Right About Patriotism," drawn from the autobiographical note in Notes of a Native Son
• "The Trick Inside Frederick Douglass's Fourth of July Speech"
• "How Gerald R. Ford Celebrated Black History During America's 200th Anniversary"
• The Spirit of Justice and How to Fight Racism by Dr. Jemar Tisby
• Primary sources: the U.S. Constitution and First Amendment, the Treaty of Tripoli, the Danbury Baptist letter, and the Declaration of Independence
• Scripture: Deuteronomy 8, Psalm 77:11, Luke 22:19
• "Echoes of Injustice: From Manzanar to Mass Deportation," a mini documentary on the YouTube channel (YouTube.com/@JTisby)
• Christians Against Christian Nationalism, by the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty
• Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) at prri.org

Support This Work

Everything I do here is available for free, but I would really like your help. This kind of truth-telling at the intersection of faith, history, and justice is possible because of the people who choose to support it. Subscribe at JemarTisby.Substack.com: $5.83 a month on the annual plan, and help make this work possible.

Stay informed. Stay faithful. Stay in the fight.

How should we think about the Fourth of July, a day dedicated to celebrating independence and freedom, in light of the unfreedom of race-based chattel slavery?

What do we do about the fact that of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence 41 of them held slaves?

Do those noble words of the Declaration stating that “all men are created equal” apply to anyone other than wealthy white men?

Frederick Douglass, the formerly enslaved 19th century abolitionist, has something to say.

We take his speech, “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July” as our primary text for exploring the tension between liberty and bondage in U.S. history.

Listen and share!

Right now, curricula across this country are being rewritten to erase exactly the tension Douglass named in 1852. Subscribe and make sure this history does not get edited out from under you. JemarTisby.Substack.com

As the country marks 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, one claim is everywhere: the United States was founded as a Christian nation.

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby refuses the flat yes or no and insists on the first move any honest answer requires, which is to define the terms.

If "Christian nation" means a country shaped by Christians and their ethics? Does it mean a government with an official, state-sanctioned church?

History has the receipts,

Dr. Tisby walks through the primary sources, from Article VI and the First Amendment to the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom and the Treaty of Tripoli, and he traces the longer backstory of Henry VIII and the colonists who fled state religion.

In This Episode

• Why "define your terms" is the first move in answering the Christian nation question
• The sense in which the claim is true and the sense in which it is false
• History has the receipts: Article VI, the First Amendment, the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, and the Treaty of Tripoli
• Henry VIII, the Act of Supremacy, and why colonists fled state religion
• The difference between the separation of church and state and the separation of faith and politics
• The Enlightenment roots of the Declaration
• What white Christian nationalists actually mean, and why the slogan works as a permission structure for power

Resources Referenced

• The Christian Past That Wasn't: Debunking the Christian Nationalist Myths That Hijack History by Warren Throckmorton
• The Spirit of Justice: True Stories of Faith, Race, and Resistance by Jemar Tisby
• The Color of Compromise (book and video study) by Jemar Tisby
• Rededicate 250, National Mall, May 17, 2026
• Primary sources: Article VI of the U.S. Constitution; the First Amendment; the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom (1786); the Treaty of Tripoli (1797); the Act of Supremacy (1534); John Locke, Second Treatise on Civil Government

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Support The Justice Briefing by subscribing at JemarTisby.Substack.com, where Dr. Tisby brings the receipts every week so you can answer questions like this one from an informed perspective.

This week on The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby breaks down why Juneteenth and America 250 are not the same kind of anniversary, even though they fall just weeks apart this summer.

Dr. Tisby argues that America 250 asks the nation to celebrate how great it has been, while Juneteenth asks a harder, more honest question: how free are we, really?

Using a ten-point comparison chart, he walks through what each holiday marks, whose freedom it centers, and what's at risk of being lost or co-opted in 2026.

Dr. Tisby also explains why this year carries extra weight.

With a White House actively promoting a whitewashed version of history through initiatives like Freedom 250 and PragerU's Freedom Trucks, he makes the case that you cannot responsibly celebrate the country's anniversary while erasing the centuries of bondage that came before emancipation.

In This Episode

• The origin of Juneteenth and the text of General Order No. 3
• Why the Emancipation Proclamation didn't actually free enslaved people
• How U.S. slavery was uniquely race-based, matrilineal, and perpetual
• The White House's "Freedom 250" rebrand and PragerU's Freedom Trucks
• A 10-point T-chart comparing Juneteenth and America 250
• What it looks like for white and Black Americans to commemorate Juneteenth differently

Books Referenced

• How to Fight Racism by Jemar Tisby
• I Am the Spirit of Justice by Jemar Tisby (picture book)
• Stories of the Spirit of Justice by Jemar Tisby (middle grade and up)

Support the Show

If this episode helped you think more clearly about faith, history, and justice, the best way to support it is to subscribe at JemarTisby.Substack.com. Paid subscriptions fund the research, the production, and the in-person interviews that make episodes like this possible.

In this episode of The Justice Briefing, Dr. Jemar Tisby breaks down the Southern Baptist Convention's recent vote to amend its constitution—by a 77 percent margin—banning women from preaching to assembled congregations.

Dr. Tisby draws on his own history with the SBC to offer an insider's analysis of what the Truth and Unity Amendment actually says, why Al Mohler pushed for it, and what the election of new SBC president Willy Rice signals about the denomination's continued rightward turn.

But Dr. Tisby goes deeper than the headlines.

Tracing the SBC's origins back to 1844 and the case of James Reeve—an enslaver whose deliberate nomination as a missionary candidate was the spark that led to the denomination's founding—Dr. Tisby makes the case that the SBC's patriarchy and its racism are not two separate problems that happen to coexist.

They share a common theological architecture: the divine sanctioning of hierarchy, the use of Scripture to compel submission, and the punishment of those who resist.

From the household codes that justified chattel slavery to the amendment that just passed, the logic is the same, and understanding that connection, Dr. Tisby argues, is essential to understanding what faithful resistance must look like today.

In This Episode...

• The Truth and Unity Amendment, what it says, and why Al Mohler pushed for it even though the restriction on women pastors was already denominational policy
• The case of James Reeve—the 1844 missionary nomination that was a deliberate pro-slavery provocation and led directly to the founding of the SBC
• How the biblical defense of racial hierarchy and the biblical defense of gender hierarchy draw from the same New Testament household codes
• The “purity of white womanhood” trope—how white women were simultaneously subordinated to white men and weaponized against Black people
• Saddleback Church, Beth Moore, and the enforcement mechanisms the SBC already had in place before this amendment
• The parallel between the SBC’s centralizing of authority and unitary executive theory in the Trump administration
• The election of Willie Rice as SBC president and what it signals about the denomination’s further rightward turn
• Why you cannot address patriarchy in the SBC without also addressing its racism and why the denomination is case in point

I believe women are called and qualified to preach and pastor. And I name the links between racism and patriarchy. If that’s the kind of insight you value, become a paid subscriber. JemarTisby.Substack.com

Host a screening of Jesus Was a Migrant: jesuswasamigrant.com