Micah Beckwith has emerged as the newly inaugurated Lieutenant Governor of Indiana, an extremely controversial figure in both state and national politics. He will now be featured at the Cass County Republican’s Lincoln Day Dinner after calling for the deportation of Logansport’s residents. Beckwith is a pastor from the Noblesville Campus of Life Church and a self-described “Christian nationalist.” He was formerly on the Hamilton East Public Library board of directors and was instrumental in relocating nearly 2,000 books for being too vulgar, an action that resulted in national outcry.
Beckwith has positioned himself as a champion of religion in government, but his vision is not one of tolerance or acceptance of others, ideals Christianity preaches, but instead a theocratic distortion of America’s founding ideals. His vision represents a dangerous religious far-right movement that threatens America.
His rhetoric is filled with the dangerous implication that America should be governed by biblical law, an idea that flies in the face of the separation of church and state. Our Founding Fathers deliberately established a separation between church and state to prevent religious tyranny. Beckwith, however, seeks to blur this line, pushing policies that would impose his singular religious worldview on a multi-religious population.
During his campaign for Lieutenant Governor, his comments spotlighted his extremism. Beckwith repeatedly called America a “Christian nation,” an idea that is not rooted in historical fact. His brand of theocratic politics is exclusionary and a direct contradiction to the religious freedoms enshrined in the First Amendment.
A government that prioritizes one faith over others is inherently unjust and undermines the rights of Americans who are members of different faiths. Twenty-eight percent of the Indiana population is either non-Christian or unaffiliated with any religion. These are Hoosiers, and Beckwith certainly does not care for them.
Beyond his vision for a theocratic state, Beckwith’s stance on social issues reveals a deep hostility towards minorities and progress. He has expressed opposition to LGBTQ+ rights, reproductive freedoms, and public education that promotes diversity and inclusion. Indiana has the 16th largest percentage of the population identifying as LGBTQ+ and the highest in the Midwest.
Meanwhile, Beckwith has on multiple occasions attacked the LGBTQ+ community as well as their allies. During his campaign in October, Beckwith promised to fire any state employee using pronouns in email signatures, a complete disregard for individual identity. These actions only undermine workplace diversity and foster a culture of fear among state employees. His church has also opposed gay pride events while advocating for book bans targeting LGBTQ+ literature.
While Beckwith’s attacks against social issues and minority rights are a major cause for concern, his complete disregard for the Constitution and the rights of Hoosiers and Americans across the country remains on full display.
After Trump won the 2024 election in November, Beckwith publicly attacked the Indiana Daily Student, Indiana University’s student newspaper, for its coverage of Trump’s victory on X, formerly known as Twitter. He labeled their coverage as “woke” and “elitist leftist propaganda,” going as far as to threaten the newspaper and university.
“This is WOKE propaganda at its finest and why most of America looks at higher education indoctrination centers like IU as a complete joke and waste of money,” Beckwith tweeted. “This type of elitist leftist propaganda needs to stop, or we will be happy to stop it for them.”
Beckwith’s alarming rhetoric and attacks not only display a disregard for journalistic independence but also pose a direct threat to the First Amendment and the rights of free speech and the press.
This incident also showcased Beckwith’s complete lack of understanding of basic governmental structure. He attacked the IDS for referring to the United States as a democracy and has repeatedly insisted that America is somehow not a democracy but just a republic, completely misconstruing the fact that America was a republic founded on democratic ideals.
Let us not forget how Beckwith acted during the recent controversy surrounding Haitian immigrants in Logansport. In October, various conservative figures and organizations, such as the New York Post and Fox News, pushed false information regarding Logansport’s new Haitian population. The Post falsely reported that white students were being ignored by teachers due to Haitian students based on the lone testimony of one parent.
Beckwith, for his part, stoked the flames of the right, claiming that Haitians were being “dumped” into the town and that the city was overrun, going as far as to say that Logansport’s population had grown to as much as 70,000 people, all from Haitians, apparently. His claims are as ridiculous as it sounds. Yet, for his supporters, these outright lies were taken as fact. Beckwith even called for the deportation of these immigrants, the vast majority of whom are here completely legally.
A poll conducted by Magpie in October found that 79% of respondents stated there had not been any negative impact on education due to the influx of Haitian immigrants.
Yet, despite all this, despite his lies, despite his attacks on Hoosiers and legal residents of Logansport, he will be the featured guest at the Lincoln Day Dinner. Logansport should not be welcoming to such a figure, and we should not tolerate his presence in Logansport when he spreads unfounded lies about our city. Allowing him to spread his hate and bigotry should be a disgrace.
