(RNS) — On a Saturday morning in 2009, Amanda Tyler was in a grocery store parking lot in Austin, Texas, setting up for Democratic Congressman Lloyd Doggett’s “neighborhood office hours,” when a large crowd of conservative protesters swarmed the congressman and his staff, waving “Don’t Tread on Me” flags and holding signs with Rep. Doggett’s face, drawn with devil horns, printed on tombstones and written with messages like “No Socialized Healthcare.”
Tyler, who was Doggett’s district director at the time, recalls this moment as the most intimidating of her career. The same protesters, she said, stalked the congressman for months afterward, attending different events, brandishing assault rifles and shouting about evil.
“It gave me a very close-up experience with the political tactics that could be used and how violent they could be,” Tyler said. “They had distorted the congressman’s face to look like a demon — so dehumanizing — and used symbols that felt like spiritual warfare.”
The event in Texas was a turning point for Tyler, who would a decade later launch the initiative “Christians Against Christian Nationalism” in 2019, and in 2021, become the executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, where she advocates for religious liberty and the separation of church and state.
The chaos and hostility of that Saturday morning in Texas, Tyler says, served as a prelude to the political intimidation tactics seen on Jan. 6, 2021.
“Christian nationalism was not the sol …