You don’t need to know scripture to get the Christian nationalist message in a recent Border Patrol recruitment video. It begins with a shot of an open Bible and a voiceover quoting Isaiah 6:8, saying, “I heard the voice of the Lord saying… and I said, ‘Here am I. Send me.’”

“God doesn’t ask for the most polished, or the most powerful,” the voiceover continues. “He asks for the willing … and ready to move where he leads. It’s a choice to face the unknown and to trust that God will equip you along the way.”

You probably get the point.

U.S. taxpayer dollars are being spent on this deliberate attempt to marry church and state. Just as bad, if not worse, is the ideology of cruelty it is promoting.

For those of you, like me, who are unfamiliar with the full verse, Jenn Budd, a former Border Patrol agent turned immigrant rights activist, explained in her Substack that God “warns Isaiah what will be expected of him and the men who follow him. They will have to do horrible and violent things and must harden their hearts, look past what they see, ignore what they hear. They must be strong to rid the world of these evil doers.”

According to Budd, many Border Patrol agents and recruits attend churches promoting this kind of extremist ideology and will hear this not-so-quiet dog whistle loud and clear.

Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino and many of his agents “believe they are preparing the United States for God,” Budd wrote. “They believe they must be brutal and cruel - close their eyes and ears to the violence they bring. They must remove and even kill all those they deem as invaders, subhumans and non-Christians.”

You don’t really think they will stop with immigrants, do you?