‘Global LAUGHING STOCK’: Nicolle STINGS Hegseth for reciting FAKE BIBLE VERSE at prayer service

America's Secretary of Defense is today a global laughingstock after quoting a fake Bible verse. It did not take the press here and around the world very long to figure out that Pete Hegseth was not exactly quoting the Bible at a Pentagon prayer service. It wasn't the Gospel of Matthew or Mark or Luke or John. While Hegseth suggested that it was a twist on an actual Bible verse. What it really was, what it actually was, was a take from the gospel of Quentin Tarantino.

Blessed is he who in the name of camaraderie and duty shepherd the lost through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children.

Blessed is he who in the name of charity and goodwill shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper

and the finder of lost children.

I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to capture and destroy my brother.

I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers.

And you will know my call sign is Sandy 1 when I lay my vengeance upon thee.

And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.

Amazing right? Now, it's so bad that the Pentagon is admitting it today. The spokesperson for the Pentagon saying it was a, quote, custom prayer, obviously inspired by the dialogue in Pulp Fiction. And that spokesperson insists that it was still a reflection of a real Bible verse, Ezekiel 2517.

But even that last point isn't exactly right. The LA Times points out that, quote, the infamous Ezekiel 2517 speech from Pulp Fiction is almost entirely a screenwriter's creation. Only the final refrain is loosely inspired by the actual biblical verse." Now the global reaction to Pete Hegse's remarks was swift. California's governor got in on it as well. Gavin Newsom posted this take on the famous Pulp Fiction movie poster with the words, Pete Fiction,

I just make up stuff because I'm war secretary. No surprise, late night talk show host had a field day. Here is Stephen Colbert.

Despite all this, I want Hegseth to succeed. He's the Secretary of Defense. If he succeeds, that means America succeeds. So please, join me in prayer. God, I'm talking to you, you talking to me? Are you talking to me?

War is like a box of chocolates.

I am tired of these mother****** sins on my mother****** soul! But Hegseth's embarrassing debacle has already been seen all around the world. People around the world are laughing at him and us. Al Jazeera covered it. Pan European outlet Euronews covered it. They wrote this, quote, last year we suggested proved that the Trump administration may be culturally illiterate.

Now Pete Hegseth has added another stone to that dubious edifice. You could argue that something like this would be a career killer in a normal administration, in a normal presidency, but in that normal parallel reality,

in a normal administration, placing sensitive classified information on a group chat with a reporter would have already gotten Hegseth fired a year ago. So what makes this frankly deeply humiliating moment for Pete Hegseth all the more significant is that Pete Hegseth is using religion as a cudgel and he invokes the Bible all the time to

justify the armed interventions that the Trump administration is engaged in all around the world. New York Times reported last month that, quote, more than any top American military leader in recent history, Hegseth has framed

U.S. military operations in the Mideast, Africa, and Latin America as bigger than politics or foreign policy. Often he, Pete Hegseth, has imbued these actions with a Christian moral underpinning that suggests they are divinely sanctioned. Or, I guess if we're talking about Pete Hegseth,

we mean sanctioned by Jules from Pulp Fiction. What Pete Hegseth, quoting of a fake Bible verse says about Donald Trump and his administration and its thirst for war is where we start today with Nthea Butler. She is the chair of the Religious Studies Department

at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of the book, White Evangelical Racism. With me at the table for the hour, Paul Rykoff. He is the host of the Independent Americans Podcast and the founder and CEO of Independent Veterans of America. Also joining us, the host of Politics Nation,

the president of the National Action Network, the Reverend Al Sharpton is here. Rev, I start with you. I didn't think that they could reveal themselves any more than they have over the last 10 days in this fight

with the Pope. But this feels next level to me.

It is next level. And I think that the real challenge here is not for those of us that have continued to raise their contradictions all the way to their gaffes, is the real challenge is the Christian right or the Christian nationalists that have supported them to allow in one week this president to attack the pope, to say things that was completely unsavory in terms of religious terms, and now your Secretary of War, Secretary of Defense, He calls himself Secretary of War, who talks openly all the time about his family and him were in church,

and he's a religious man and all of this, to openly show the hypocrisy and disingenuous way he's saying that, when he can quote with passion a Bible verse that is not a Bible verse, but is really Samuel L. Jackson playing a role. So if anything is more exposing than this week, from Mr. Trump, the president, dealing with the pope, all the way to this churchgoing guy that doesn't know the difference between pope fiction and the Book of St. Matthew or wherever else he

wants to misquote, I think that it is incumbent upon the Christian right or the so-called Christian nationalists to call them out. I don't expect nothing from Trump or Hegseth, but those that are supporting them saying they're holding up Christian standards, now we'll see if you're really holding up Christian

standards. Now we'll see if you're really holding up Christian standards.

It's a good point because Pete Hegseth was opposed by Democrats and Republicans. Pete Hegseth was investigated for accusations of rape. Pete Hegseth went on Megyn Kelly's show and talked about being an alcoholic but promising not to drink if he was the country's Secretary of Defense. Pete Hegseth has revealed himself over and over and over again. And it turns out he is ignorant about a thing

he's using as a political cudgel against the press day in and day out, against people he perceives to be Donald Trump's enemies. And it's all fake.

I think that's the really important part. He's always been radical, reckless, extreme, sloppy, but he's also always been fake. And I think that's what's really starting to come out right now. I mean, Samuel L. Jackson was playing a part.

Pete Hegseth is playing a part. And he's always been what I call the acting secretary of culture war, right? He's a culture warrior. That's what he's been built to do. That's what he's been doing since he got there. And he's been trying to play the role of a secretary of defense. And he continues to fumble. He continues to falter.

I think there's a really bigger important point here. Our enemies are celebrating because he looks weak. He looks vulnerable. He looks ridiculous. He looks stupid. And he looks compromised.

Right? has our enemies celebrate. This is not a formidable Secretary of Defense. This is a Secretary of Defense who's driving us into more extreme politics, who's dividing our military. You know, 20% doesn't follow Jesus. And they've always wanted to make the military the MAGA army, Trump's army. But now it also looks like the army of Jesus,

which when you're launching our military into the Middle East, which has been divided by religion for generations, that's the worst possible foot forward we could put into the Middle East when we're trying to establish trust, we're trying to sign treaties,

and we're trying to build alliances. Ultimately, the most important thing here is that his fakeness and his recklessness and his radicalness is endangering our troops. Folks around the world are worried that they think they're troops of Jesus

or they think they're troops of Hegseth instead of being loyal to our Constitution. That's deeply dangerous. And, Sia, I was a little embarrassed to have you here and ask you to opine on Donald Trump's war against the pope. I'm a little embarrassed every time I say Donald Trump's war against the pope, but he's made it one. This is, as I said to the Rep, this is next-level embarrassing, that this is something we have to cover. And the reason I decided to lead with it today is because if you look at the foreign coverage

of this, it is in every part of the globe. And I don't know if that's because it comes in the same sort of week that Trump and Vance have been at war against the pope, but I mentioned a few of them. I mean, it is on the home page of Al Jazeera. It is all over AP Europe and other European wire services. It has saturated the entertainment press here and around the world.

It is a story that has spun around the globe faster than any story about Donald Trump that I've covered since the start of the war with Iran.

Yes. And let me say a couple of things about this, Nicole, because, you know, I was kind of hoping about Donald Trump that I've covered since the start of the war with Iran?

Yes. And let me say a couple of things about this, Nicole, because, you know, I was kind of hoping you'd have on Samuel L. Jackson today, since we couldn't get him on.

When you were free, we rescinded our invite.

Thank you. Well, let me say it like this. I mean, first of all, Pete Hegseth's pastor, Doug Wilson, should be ashamed because basically he's not being a good pastor to this man. Because if you have a good pastor, you would know some scripture. He doesn't know any. And that's the problem.

He is playing a part. And the part is really bad. Like I'm hoping that an understudy will come very soon because he doesn't know scripture. He doesn't know his Bible. It's most of us who are in the religious studies world and anybody who studies biblical scriptures

is laughing at him this week, along with the rest of the world, because we know that's not real scripture. I kept looking at people in the audience thinking, surely they know that this is a joke, right? Surely they know that this is made up,

because not even someone who's going to go and fight for the country and find someone who is lost, you're trying to get back a lost soldier, is going to be saying something like that in their call sign. He made this whole thing up. I'm pretty sure of it. I hope that's the case, because I would be embarrassed if there's a military person who

actually said that prayer besides him. That's number one. Number two, this whole thing with the pope this week has been very interesting, because it's like Trump can't get it out of his head, and neither can J.D. Vance. And for both of them, this is bad. They are losing, according to PRI, Public Research International, all of these people who are supposedly Catholics, who basically voted for Trump and Vance at the beginning,

but now are like, maybe we made a mistake. And so I think they are headed for a real pain come November because of this, you know, these actions against the Pope. But third, and I think this is the story that's being missed this week.

And I want to say more about this if we could, is to think about this as a myth-making exercise. We talk about this a lot in religious studies. Trump, Hegseth, Vance are making a myth about religion right now. And that myth is this, we know what Christianity is. And that myth is this, we know what Christianity is.

God is on our side.