The double-edged sword of internet virality is proving more of a curse than a blessing for Rep. James Talarico.
The Texas Democrat who is vying for John Cornyn’s US Senate seat is already considered un-kosher by the majority of Texas Christians, like me.
But to make things worse, a video has popped up on the radar which prominently displays just how the Dem Senate hopeful REALLY views the Bible.
Granted, this is a story within a story.
I really want to get right to the FIRESTORM it has created. But, alas — we should probably cover the backstory first… so we know what’s what.
There is a huge fight over whether Bible-related curriculum should — or shouldn’t — be required, or even allowed as learning material in Texas public schools.
In a sense, that fight has concluded; we’ll cover that in a moment.
And it is against that backdrop that James Talarico, who is hoping to represent the State of Texas in the United States Congress, made the comments that have caused a new wave of outrage against him.
To start with, here’s the video in question now raging like wildfire across the internet plains of Texas. (Okay, Okay — I’ll see myself out.)
Watch here:
JAMES TALARICO: Teaching children about the Bible is “deeply immoral.”
JESUS: “If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea’” pic.twitter.com/C4Dv01SRV0
— Jason Howerton (@jason_howerton) August 14, 2026
Here’s another full screen version for easier viewing:
James Talarico says Bible-based instruction is “indoctrination” and “deeply immoral.”
He voted against a bill banning gender ideology in public schools in 2025. pic.twitter.com/LkRHoPsxUh
— Corey A. DeAngelis, school choice evangelist (@DeAngelisCorey) August 14, 2026
The ‘indoctrination’ and ‘propaganda’ that Talarico is referring to in that resurfaced video has to do with updated Texas school standards.
Those standards would mandate the use of the Bible, and particular Bible stories, in all Texas public schools.
Now, there’s a little more nuance to the purpose and the curriculum than that — and we’ll get into that shortly as well.
But let’s get a roundup of the basics that Talarico is pushing against.
Just keep in mind… even in Texas, we have more than our fair share of left-leaning media, not the least of which is the Houston Chronicle and the Texas Tribune.
I use both as sources in this story, but be aware.
If you taste that old familiar unsavory anti-Christian and anti-Republican flavor from their quoted articles as we progress, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Here are some of the basics regarding those new Texas standards Talarico is pushing back against, according to this Houston Chronicle article from June:
The State Board of Education gave the final greenlight to Bible-infused school standards on Friday after months of intense debate, enshrining Christianity as part of classroom instruction for all 5.5 million students in Texas public schools.
The Republican-led board cemented a new required reading list for every grade level on Friday with a 9-5 vote and then passed a rewrite of the state’s social studies requirements for kindergarten to eighth grade. Biblical concepts and figures are embedded in both plans, which are among the most aggressive efforts to mandate the teaching of Christianity in the country.
Republicans trumpeted the new standards as a victory for Judeo-Christian values and classical ideals. Proponents say that Bible-infused provisions, including required lessons on Jesus, Abraham and Moses, are designed not to evangelize but help children develop moral compasses and appreciate American exceptionalism.
“We are bringing the Bible back into schools this week for the first time in 60 years,” SBOE member Brandon Hall, R-Aledo, said during a prayer session outside the hearing this week.
Texas is also so far the only state to mandate the reading of direct religious texts. Students will analyze around a dozen Bible passages and stories, from David and Goliath in second grade to the Book of Job in tenth grade. (Emphasis added.)
Did you notice the part about it not being a state government mandated push to evangelize students in Texas public schools?
As a Texan and a Christian dad with 5 school-age kids and more on the way, part of me doesn’t even care.
ALL of my kids have the Bible associated in some form or fashion with essentially every part of their education — no way am I letting someone else ‘train up’ or educate my kids without it. (In this social environment? Not a chance.)
We homeschool 100% in this household.
As the late, great Voddie Baucham once warned: “We cannot continue to send our children to Caesar for their education and be surprised when they come home as Romans.”
But for those who opt to send their kids to the public […government…] school system, that distinction is very key.
The difference between using the Bible for creating an accurate depth of understanding on issues pertaining to Texas and American history, as compared with an outright attempt to evangelize public school kids; there’s a big difference between those two things.
And that brings us to a more nuanced explanation of the updated standards and the curriculum, as detailed by one Mary Elizabeth Castle, as reported by Fox News:
Texas state representative and Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico’s campaign responded after a resurfaced video of his comments on the Bible and education sparked outrage.
“It was a new state curriculum that would teach Christian Bible stories as historical fact, as the only truth to our youngest students, and, I mean, kindergarten, first graders,” he said.
He further warned that the alleged effort to “push propaganda, to push indoctrination on those youngest students is deeply immoral and should trouble all of us.”
“The claim made by Representative Talarico is misleading,” Mary Elizabeth Castle, director of government relations for Texas Values, told Fox News Digital.
“The curriculum he was referring to in the video from 2025 is the Bluebonnet curriculum, which was an English language arts curriculum adopted in the winter of 2024 that helped students understand the copious amounts of Bible references made in historical speeches and common stories like Dr. Martin Luther King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech.
“The references to the Bible in the Bluebonnet curriculum help students understand the thousands of everyday idioms that people use every day that have some context to Scripture,” she continued.
“The purpose of the biblical references was to improve reading scores and reading comprehension among students. The majority of Texas parents and stakeholders testified in favor of the curriculum, which passed at the State Board of Education. A very small number of people would agree with Mr. Talarico’s sentiment, and a number of school districts have purchased this curriculum.” (Emphasis added.)
Indeed — that detailed understanding of the changes puts Rep. Talarico’s claims on very shaky ground.
Dare I say, untruthful ground? (I do dare, by the way.)
Not to mention, even the ACLU agreed in a court of law that the Bible could be taught in public schools, as reported in that same Fox News article:
Hiram Sasser, First Liberty’s executive general counsel, told Fox News Digital, “Courts across the nation have determined that the Bible has had profound influence on Western culture and is an important piece of literature and history. No education is complete without understanding the Bible and its influence, as even the ACLU recognizes.
“What is crazy is that Talarico is to the left of the ACLU, which agreed in a court settlement with us that the Bible may be taught in Texas schools.”
“Democrats have a funny way of defining ‘indoctrination.’ When they do it, it’s ‘inclusion.’ When it opposes their ideology, it’s considered government-imposed cruelty,” Tim Graham, the executive editor of Media Research Center’s NewsBusters, told Fox News Digital.
“Talarico has clearly and repeatedly identified himself as a pusher of leftist gender ideology, which stands in dramatic contradiction to biblical teaching. So, it’s not shocking he doesn’t want anybody discussing the Bible in the classroom.”
And that brings us to the present, with Talarico taking heat for his anti-Christian comments.
Just yesterday, Fox News ran a story that included his comments about the Bible in Texas schools, as well as his well-documented (anti-Biblical, anti-Christian, ungodly) progressive ideology.
The Fox News host indicated that Talarico was AVOIDING their calls to come on and answer questions about his own statements.
Ken Paxton, seeking to prevent the long hoped for progressive takeover of Texas by winning Cornyn’s seat himself, indicated Talarico is attempting to conceal his true radicalism.
Check out that clip from this weekend, here:
Talarico is a Democrat Socialist, and his votes prove it.
He supports transing children.
He calls election integrity concerns “phantoms.”
He says teaching Bible stories and the Ten Commandments in schools is “indoctrination” and “Christian bullying.” pic.twitter.com/3ckwUmlAIM
— Attorney General Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) August 16, 2026
Then again, Talarico might also be in hiding.
Did you catch the part from the central video in question in which he scoffs — not only that the Bible would be taught — but that it would be taught “as fact”, even to younger students?
He surely isn’t looking forward to an appearance on adversarial national television if he has to answer the questions now being hurled at him on social media in response to that:
But yet we can teach them pronouns and different sexual orientation and drag queen story hour and you see that is OK yeah we got your number
— Kim 🇺🇸🇮🇱🇮🇪🏴 (@NPdayz) August 14, 2026
And this next response hit the same chords as the previous one.
If they’re old enough to learn all about the progressive nonsense, how are they too young to be exposed to the Bible:
The kid’s brains aren’t developed enough to learn moral lessons from the bible but they can decide what gender they’ll be for the rest of their lives, huh, James? 🙄
— Rude Earle (@RudeEarle) August 14, 2026
And this next response keyed in on one of the most insightful bits of warning we need to keep in mind about trojan-horse ‘Christians’ like Talarico:
When communists cant defeat the church, they infilitrate the church. Its what commies do.
— Brett (@Texan__Pride) August 14, 2026
Hasn’t that always been the pattern?
Socialists, Communists, NAZI’s — they all used that pattern.
They all, at some point in the plan, tried to infiltrate the church and USE it, rather than fight against it outright.
I vote this next response should be the first question posed to Talarico if he ever has the guts to appear on camera with a reporter who will ask him the real questions between now and November:
Ask him if he feels believes telling students quotes from Marx and Gramsci also qualifies as “propaganda and indoctrination”.
— Chris McKeever 🇺🇸🇮🇱 (@TheRealMcKeever) August 13, 2026
I think the X user who posted this next response has Talarico’s number:
This is probably more his speed. pic.twitter.com/NJLU97SVKZ
— Cobrajet (@Cobrajet525925) August 14, 2026
Then of course, we could just go purely Biblical on the situation, like this person:
That millstone isn’t going to feel good!
— Susan Huffman (@SusanHuffm71959) August 14, 2026
Ouch — but you can’t argue with the Biblical accuracy!
However, I actually disagree with this last comment:
This guy’s never cracked a Bible in his life.
— Cobrajet (@Cobrajet525925) August 14, 2026
Oh, yes he has.
Enough so that he can twist and manipulate those Truths to the point that they become unrecognizable as the Word of God.
And instead, they become the word of Christian Humanism.
The good news is that a ton of Texas Christians have easily seen through Rep. James Talarico’s lackluster attempt at camouflaging his true intentions.
The bad news… is that the voting population in Texas has suffered at the hands of years of progressive anti-Christian brainwashing just like in every other part of the country.
Even with his obvious hatred for Biblical Christianity and our constitutional form of Republican representative government, Talarico’s defeat is by no means written in stone, according to this from the Texas Tribune:
In Texas — where two-thirds of the adult population identifies as Christian and 45% say religion is “very important” in their life — the candidates are asking voters to choose between two dramatically different views of Christianity. Paxton’s version insists conservative Christian values — such as protecting the unborn and preserving the nation’s Judeo-Christian heritage — must prevail. Talarico’s Christianity celebrates pluralism, affirms LGBTQ+ individuals and believes God transcends all partisan divisions.
Talarico’s views, Paxton said on Patrick’s podcast, are “antithetical to historical Christian views” and “adopted from liberal theology that do not reflect what Scripture says.”
The U.S. was “founded on the rock of Biblical Truth,” he wrote, vowing to fight “far-left attempts to push our country into the sinking sand.”
Talarico attends Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary and is training to become a pastor in the Presbyterian Church (USA), the nation’s largest Presbyterian denomination. He is currently on leave from his degree program.
A recent Fox News poll found 78% of white evangelicals would choose Paxton over Talarico. Support for Paxton drops to 57% for “regular worship attenders.” The same poll found 51% of registered voters in Texas preferred Talarico, as did 63% of moderates. (Emphasis added.)
As I said, this is a story within a story.
Maybe you aren’t anti-Christianity, and maybe you’re even a Christian, but you still think the Bible doesn’t have any place at all in public schools.
Personally, I don’t think public schools have a place in America; at least not in the form they are in now! (Different story for a different time.)
But that deeper story is the one in which voters in Texas, particularly Christian voters, will now be faced with the possibility of choosing a man who claims the name of Christ.
But who denies — or in some cases cunningly twists — almost every Biblical doctrine derived from the words Jesus spoke, which God preserved within the pages of Biblical scripture.
This isn’t happening in Michigan, Massachusetts, Maryland, or some stronghold of progressive ideology.
This is happening in Texas.
That means the fight isn’t over, folks. And far from it, by my count.
This is a Guest Post from our friends over at WLTReport. View the original article here.
