April 27, 2011: Fox News Guest: Obama’s ‘Refusal’ to Acknowledge Easter Evidence He Is ‘Muslim’

Fox News’s morning talk show Fox and Friends hosts the Reverend Robert Jeffress, who repeatedly suggests that President Obama is a “secret Muslim” (see October 1, 2007, December 19, 2007, Before October 27, 2008, January 11, 2008, Around March 19, 2008, April 18, 2008, and April 26, 2011). Jeffress, the senior pastor of Dallas’s First Baptist Church, tells interviewer Steve Doocy: “Steve, let’s look at what’s really going on here. On the one hand, we have a president who never met a Muslim holiday he didn’t like, or at least wasn’t willing to issue a proclamation for; and on the other hand, here he is refusing to acknowledge publically the most important event in Christian faith, the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” Jeffress is referring to Obama’s supposed refusal to acknowledge Easter. “And yet the White House is wondering, why do 20 percent of Americans believe the president is a Muslim? Well, as my kids would say, ‘Duh.’ You know, I mean, it’s actions like these that really make people wonder what it is the president really believes.… I really think, Steve, there’s only one of two explanations. Either he has advisers who are telling him that it’s politically expedient to ignore Christianity and elevate other world religions like Islam. And if that’s the case, Republicans need to pray that those advisers stay in place through the 2012 election cycle. The only other explanation is that there’s something deep within the president himself that will not allow him to issue these public proclamations about Christianity, when he on Easter will issue a proclamation about Earth Day, or he will recognize Muslim holidays. I think either explanation is deeply troubling for Christians.” [Media Matters, 4/26/2011; Media Matters, 4/27/2011] On the same day, pundits at Fox News and the Washington Times attack Obama’s April 24 attendance of Easter services at Washington’s Shiloh Baptist Church, claiming his choice to attend that church is evidence that he is a “black nationalist” (see April 27, 2011).