Pete and the Preacher Man

This is your TPM evening briefing.

Josh Kovensky

and

Emine Yücel

Aug 11, 2025

(Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

I’m subbing in for the incomparable Nicole Lafond today and tomorrow as she takes a well-deserved break.

For now, the pastor Doug Wilson is having his moment.

Wilson is a radical Idaho pastor who, as I’ve written, wants to try to make America Christian again by establishing a theocracy. In some ways, it’s funny: Wilson is out of central casting as an Idaho pastor with big ideas. He’s built a small religious empire run out of Moscow, Idaho: in addition to running his own church (and founding his own protestant denomination), Wilson has a blog, podcast, publishing house, college, and more.

It’s a moderate amount of influence that might not be particularly exceptional for a regional religious movement were it not for one thing: Wilson can count members of the Trump administration — most prominently, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth — as devotees of his work, and as members of churches belonging to his denomination. As I first reported in May, Hegseth and Wilson met for the first time this year.

Wilson has taken things a step further this year. In July, his Moscow congregation — Christ Church — opened a branch in D.C., blocks away from the Capitol building. Pete Hegseth attended its first service, which I also documented for TPM.

For Wilson, Hegseth represents a unique chance to spread his extreme ideology. Some at his church oppose female suffrage; his denomination is against women in combat, homosexuality, abortion, and pushes for an extremely traditional interpretation of family structure.

All this earned Wilson the attention of CNN, which, in an interview with the man, landed the unbelievably memorable quote, “women are the kind of people that people come out of.”

In my interactions with members of the movement, I’ve been struck by how open Wilson, pastors, and churchgoers in the denomination are about their fringe beliefs. Hegseth himself appears to be no exception. He reposted the full CNN segment last week, including a section featuring pastors opposing female suffrage:

— Josh Kovensky

Truth and Reconciliation 2.0

After months of grueling negotiations and intraparty fighting for the “big beautiful bill,” some Senate Republicans are indicating they are in no rush to craft another reconciliation package.

“You have to have a reason to do it,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) said, according to Politico. “It’s not easy to do, so you have to have a purpose for doing it in the first place.”

Many senators were on board with the first one as they wanted to get some major legislative wins for President Donald Trump’s second term in office — one of them being making Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent and preventing a tax hike.

“Without the pressure, I don’t see how you get it done,” said one Republican senator who spoke to Politico under the condition of anonymity. “I don’t think I see what the pressure is here.”

Meanwhile, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and House Republicans are pushing for a second megabill. The biggest push seems to be coming from the so-called deficit hawks who say they want to use another reconciliation bill to cut spending further.

An anonymous White House official told Politico another reconciliation bill is under consideration. But Senate Armed Services and Budget Committees Chairs’ — Sens. Roger Wicker (R-MS) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) — recently said they have not received guidance from the White House on legislative priorities for another megabill.

— Emine Yücel

Big Offensive

President Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin are set to meet in Alaska on Friday for a summit discussing the war in Ukraine. The particulars of what they’re even set to discuss remain somewhat unclear. That’s in part because of a supposed “misunderstanding” involving Steve Witkoff, the lack of a Ukrainian representative at the summit, and, as of this writing, a Russian military offensive that threatens the entire premise.

Russian commentators have taken this as an opportunity to reflect on Alaska’s past. It was a colony of Tsarist Russia sold to the U.S. in 1867; some Russians believe the U.S. stole it.

The point here isn’t so much to highlight some nonsensical Russian plan to retrieve Alaska (though such fantasies exist), but to point out the extent to which the fact of even having a meeting with the U.S. President on American soil is itself seen as a victory over there, regardless of outcome.

— Josh Kovensky