The USDA secretary is a dangerous religious zealot like Pete Hegseth

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins isn’t as dramatic with religious theatrics as some of her colleagues in Donald Trump’s Cabinet, like Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, but that shouldn’t fool anyone. A recent lawsuit from staff members alleges that Rollins has been “promoting her own preferred brand of Christian beliefs and theology to the captive audience of employees,” largely through proselytizing emails sent to the whole staff at the USDA, which make them “fear the negative consequences of not sharing the Secretary’s religion.” The details in the lawsuit reveal that the former Cotton Bowl Queen is just as committed a Christian nationalist as the more belligerent Hegseth.

That might seem like a bold claim at first blush. Hegseth has drawn attention for his aggressive, even violent rhetoric that treats Christianity as a war-mongering faith focused more on punishing non-believers than the more Jesus-like aspirations of love and charity. The defense secretary is so devoted to reimagining Jesus as a vengeful prophet that he got caught giving a sermon-like speech in which he appeared to pass off dialogue from Quentin Tarantino’s 1994 film “Pulp Fiction” as Bible verses. In contrast, the emails Rollins sent her staff leaned sentimental, reminiscent of religious tracts being handed out by smiling elderly evangelicals proselytizing to heathens on the street.

“Christ Is Risen” reads the headline on one email included in the lawsuit, which was decorated with a watercolor illustration of an open cave decorated with flowers. “God has granted each of us victory and new life. And where there is life — risen life—there is hope,” it reads in part. As Hemant Mehta of the Friendly Atheist detailed, Rollins blasts similar material out on her official USDA social media accounts, such as an image of a cross made of flowers declaring, “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!”

Considering how much misery the administration has inflicted since the president returned to office in January 2025, it’s tempting to dismiss the evangelical puffery of Rollins as annoying but harmless — especially compared to the more violent rhetoric of Hegseth. That’s certainly the tactic embraced by right-wing media, which portrayed Rollins as a sweet Christian lady being picked on for an innocent “Easter wish” by oversensitive infidels. “‘He Is Risen’ Message Sparks Meltdown Against Top Trump Official,” read a typical friendly headline from the Daily Wire.

But the plaintiffs are right that Rollins is a bully — and that her actions are about making people who have different beliefs feel “alienated, marginalized, and unwelcome.” Anyone who has spent significant time around the Christian right knows that behind the tight smiles and cheer often lies a deep well of hostility toward anyone who is different. Rollins and her allies illustrated this phenomenon perfectly in their response to the lawsuit.

“While we do not comment on pending litigation, we will keep the plaintiffs in our prayers during this process,” the USDA spokeperson wrote in the official agency response to the lawsuit. Rollins, similarly, tweeted an article about the lawsuit with the statement, “It’s just another opportunity to remind everyone: He is Risen.”

One doesn’t even have to know that “I’ll pray for you” is Christian conservative code for a stronger phrase. The hostility in these responses is in full view. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit repeatedly express concerns that their boss, Rollins, want them to feel “unwelcome” and like they are “going to hell” because they don’t share her beliefs. By declaring an intent to pray for them and doubling down on the proselytization, the USDA spokesperson and Rollins are confirming that yes, the intent here is to cast judgment on everyone who doesn’t share their beliefs.

Passive-aggression is often the preferred method of attempts at conversion for many conservative Christian women, because it reads as more feminine than the overt aggression of their male counterparts. Independent journalist Madeline Peltz got a full view of this covering the recent Rededicate 250 event on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., where multiple female attendees feigned niceness but then muttered insults at Peltz, who is Jewish, or tried to convert her with guilt-tripping tactics.

In a lot of ways, this superficial gentility is more coercive than the bellowed threats of punishment, either on earth or in hell, that come from the “dude-ier” side of the Christian right. The recipient of the proselytizing might find it difficult to defend herself. Any attempt at pushback will be spun as a curmudgeonly overreaction to someone just trying to share her faith. But, as the plaintiffs argue, there is nothing sweet or kind about the emails Rollins sent out. The communications are obviously written to shame anyone who doesn’t share in the evangelical views of Rollins.

“Today we celebrate the greatest story ever told, the foundation of our faith, and the abiding hope of all mankind,” read the opening sentence of the Easter email. Sending out a religious message from the boss to staff of a federal agency should already be viewed as a violation of their religious freedom. But the heavy-handed use of “our,” “we” and “all” sends the message that, if you don’t agree with Rollins, you don’t fully count as a person, much less as a valued employee at USDA. Many of the individual plaintiffs and members of the union making the complaint on their behalf aren’t Christian at all. Others are LGBTQ. Some see emails like this and conclude their boss could be hostile to them, leaving them fearful of losing promotion opportunities or worse.

Rollins’ proselytizing in the federal workplace signals that conservative Christians are the only legitimate Americans and that everyone else should be treated as second class. She belongs to the same administration that just helped host Rededicate 250, which promoted false claims that the U.S. was intended by the Founders to be a Christian nation. Because “Christian nation” sounds abstract, this myth doesn’t ring the alarm bells that it should with too many voters.

But Rollins shows what it means in practice: marginalizing, shaming and potentially even discriminating against people simply because they aren’t right-wing evangelicals. What started off as a few annoying emails became a pattern of escalation, which suggests she was testing the waters to see how far she could go. No wonder employees are worried about their job security. Hopefully, the employees who filed suit against her win — and scare other Christian nationalists in government to back off their war on everyone whose only “sin” was being different.