MLK Day, Postliberalism, and the Assault on Civil Rights One Year Into Trump's 2nd Term

Straight White American Jesus

Axis Mundi Media: Bradley Onishi + Daniel Miller

News, Politics

4.7 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 20 January 2026

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

MLK Day, Postliberalism, and the Assault on Civil Rights On Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2026, Brad Onishi reflects on the legacy of civil rights in a moment when those rights are under unprecedented threat, one year into Donald Trump’s second term. From Trump’s humiliating and dangerous letter asserting U.S. control over Greenland to the escalation of ICE abuses in Minnesota, this episode argues that the core idea of civil rights—inalienable human dignity promised to all—has entered a period of open attack. Drawing on King’s own words, Brad frames civil rights not as radical demands, but as a fight for what the United States has always claimed to promise: equality under the law, due process, and freedom regardless of race, religion, immigration status, or identity. Brad then introduces the real engine behind this moment: postliberalism. Joined by theologian and political theorist Dr. David Congdon, the episode unpacks how postliberal movements—rooted in both Christian theology and Silicon Valley technocracy—reject liberal democracy, individual rights, and pluralism in favor of hierarchy, authoritarian power, and state-enforced moral order. From JD Vance to Catholic integralists to tech elites dreaming of CEO-rule, these movements converge in their hostility to democracy and civil rights. This conversation situates Trump’s second term as the first sustained experiment in federal postliberal rule, explaining how backlash to the Civil Rights Movement itself helped fuel today’s authoritarian turn—and why understanding postliberalism is essential to grasping what is happening to American democracy right now. David Congdon, Who is a True Christian? https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/who-is-a-true-christian/2DA88468C8824BD55EBE9AE94CFCDF73 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	AXIS Moondy
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0:45.3	Welcome to Straight Right American Jesus.
0:47.3	I'm Brad Onishi and great to be with you on this Monday.
0:51.3	It is Martin Luther King Junior Day, January 19, 2026. And I want to talk about something
0:57.0	that pertains to, I think, the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. and civil rights in general.
1:02.8	It also pertains to the fact that we are now just about one year into Trump's second term,
1:10.0	and things only seem to get worse, hour by hour,
1:15.1	minute by minute. Some of you have probably seen already that Trump released a letter to Denmark
1:21.9	explaining why the United States should have control of Greenland.
1:30.2	It's a tremendously embarrassing letter.
1:35.1	I mean, in a decade of embarrassing moments from Trump,
1:37.8	as somebody who's been in office and running for president,
1:41.5	this, it could take the cake.
1:43.0	I'll read some of it to you. Considering your country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped eight wars plus, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of peace. Although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America. The world is not secure unless we have complete and total control of Greenland.
2:03.7	That's just part of it. It kind of continues like that. So, yeah, things are not getting better.
2:10.2	And it strikes me that today on Martin King Jr. Day, that the idea of civil rights is under complete threat.
	...

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