In a new episode of TeleSUR’s “The Empire Files,” host Abby Martin and Truthdig columnist Chris Hedges analyze the Christian right and its impact on American politics.

Hedges has a wealth of experience writing about the Christian right movement and its relationship to fascism, and he draws on this knowledge to explain the growing threat of "Christianized fascism."

“The Christian right, like the alt-right, is endowed with all sorts of conspiracy theories, coupled with magical thinking, coupled with an utter disdain for historical fact,” Hedges says. “I think the Christian right are as bigoted as the alt-right.”

He argues that while President Trump’s “personal life makes a mockery of the very values” the Christian right claims to hold sacred, the Trump administration can be expected to further the ideals of political evangelists.

If this “Christianized fascism” continues to gain momentum, what would that look like? Hedges explains:

It’s going to be the fusion of the American flag with the Christian cross and the Pledge of Allegiance. We’ve already seen it. It’s going to be assaults on women [and] women’s rights. It’s going to be assaults against the educational system, where we’re teaching creationism and magical thinking. It’s going to be attacks against “those forces of secular humanism that are destroying the country.” It’s going to be a sanctification of law and order and imperial adventurism into kind of a crusade. And I think that as society unravels, they will stoke this demonization of “the other”: Muslims, undocumented workers, African Americans are on the list, feminists.

Martin and Hedges also delve into the history of political evangelists and examine religious populist movements in other countries. Watch the full interview below:

—Posted by Emma Niles