Tennessee state representative, candidate for governor plans to ban mosques, non-Christian religions if elected
A Tennessee state representative running for governor said he would work to ban mosques and what he described as “pagan religions” — including Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism — if elected, arguing the First Amendment does not prevent states from doing so.
State Rep. Monty Fritts, 63, a Republican candidate for governor, made the remarks in a sit-down interview with four days remaining in the state’s primary early voting period.
When asked how he would practically ban mosques and non-Christian houses of worship as governor, Fritts said he views Islam differently from other religions.
“Islam is a little different story than perhaps other religions are, in that it’s not necessarily a religion; it’s a political movement,” Fritts said. “It’s that movement that, if you don’t submit, you perhaps are executed. I feel that Islam is incongruent with both our U.S. and Tennessee Constitution.”
When pressed on the First Amendment — which reads, in part, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion” — Fritts argued the amendment’s opening word limits its scope to the federal government, not the states.
Fritts, who served four years as a state representative, said he entered the governor’s race after what he described as a spiritual calling.
“I don’t know that I want [to be governor]. I feel like God has called me to run,” Fritts said. “I’d been in as a state rep for four years, was happy to get out of politics, and I just kept this feeling, this pressing urgency, that whisper, that sense of urgency for our state.”
https://www.wsmv.com/2026/07/29/tennesse...f-elected/
A Tennessee state representative running for governor said he would work to ban mosques and what he described as “pagan religions” — including Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism — if elected, arguing the First Amendment does not prevent states from doing so.
State Rep. Monty Fritts, 63, a Republican candidate for governor, made the remarks in a sit-down interview with four days remaining in the state’s primary early voting period.
When asked how he would practically ban mosques and non-Christian houses of worship as governor, Fritts said he views Islam differently from other religions.
“Islam is a little different story than perhaps other religions are, in that it’s not necessarily a religion; it’s a political movement,” Fritts said. “It’s that movement that, if you don’t submit, you perhaps are executed. I feel that Islam is incongruent with both our U.S. and Tennessee Constitution.”
When pressed on the First Amendment — which reads, in part, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion” — Fritts argued the amendment’s opening word limits its scope to the federal government, not the states.
Fritts, who served four years as a state representative, said he entered the governor’s race after what he described as a spiritual calling.
“I don’t know that I want [to be governor]. I feel like God has called me to run,” Fritts said. “I’d been in as a state rep for four years, was happy to get out of politics, and I just kept this feeling, this pressing urgency, that whisper, that sense of urgency for our state.”
https://www.wsmv.com/2026/07/29/tennesse...f-elected/
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
