Allie Beth Stuckey and Megan Basham are Freaking Out

Two of the most influential figures in the Christian MAGA-sphere, Megan Basham and Allie Beth Stuckey, appear to be in panic mode.

Stuckey is the host of Blaze Media’s Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey and a frequent speaker in conservative churches. She grew up in Prestonwood Baptist Church, a Dallas megachurch that has helped shape conservative evangelical Christianity for the past 40 years.

Basham is a reporter for The Daily Wire but is best known for sparring with progressives on X.

For those uninitiated in Stuckey’s and Basham’s schtick, a quick glance at a post on X from Stuckey on Jan. 24—the day ICE agents killed Alex Pretti in Minneapolis—could be misleading. She wrote, “I don’t yet know everything about today’s tragic events, but I know enough not to believe the same people who have lied about everything else.”

The post came at the end of a day that saw Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem step in front of cameras to claim Pretti had assaulted officers and was a “domestic terrorist.” These remarks were made after multiple videos from the incident failed to substantiate Noem’s claims. Noem had previously applied the “domestic terrorist” label to Renee Good just minutes after Good was shot in the face.

A casual observer, then, can be forgiven for assuming Stuckey’s post was about the firehose of lies the Trump administration directs at the U.S. public on a minute-by-minute basis. But look deeper, and a more foreboding anxiety emerges in her words: fear of the Sisyphean task of continuing to carry Donald Trump’s water that lies ahead of her.

PR War

The source of that anxiety can be found in a post she made earlier in the day, just hours after Pretti’s killing: “Dems are winning the media war in Minneapolis. Republicans have played decent defense, but we need more stories and images showing the professionalism and compassion of ICE and border patrol, as well as stories/images of the victims of illegal alien violence.”

In the days since, Stuckey has shared images of children killed by undocumented immigrants, along with a photo of an ICE agent cradling a child in what appears to be a river rescue operation.

On Sunday, Basham shared an image from Dr. Anthony Youn, a self-described “holistic plastic surgeon” with more than one million Instagram followers. Youn encouraged his audience, “Don’t believe the lying politicians. Believe your own eyes. Watch the horrific video from all angles and make your own conclusion. There is enough video evidence that anyone who watched objectively can see what happened.”

Basham reposted the image and wrote that Stuckey is “absolutely right, the PR war needs to be fought over on Instagram were [sic] there are many women who could be persuaded, but are being fed bad information.”

These are just a few of the dozens of similar posts from Stuckey and Basham since Saturday morning. In many ways, these women have revealed in plain sight what generations of evangelical men have been doing in back rooms for decades: framing narratives to gain and retain power over persuadable followers. The strategy—whether employed by Jerry Falwell, Ralph Reed, Rush Limbaugh, or now Stuckey and Basham—is to convince their audience that they alone are telling the truth, while everyone else is spreading propaganda.

Audience Retention

Stuckey and Basham have also expressed concern in recent weeks about James Talarico, the U.S. Senate candidate from Texas who is a devout Christian and seminary graduate. Why would they care about a campaign that even the most optimistic Democrats consider a long shot?

I suspect it is because Talarico knows the Bible, is passionate about following Jesus, and still arrives at vastly different conclusions about the world than they do. He also speaks in a respectful, measured tone—one that reflects the clear-eyed objectivity they claim to possess and know their audience finds persuasive.

Stuckey revealed what she thinks of her audience in another post on X: “It’s tough for me to see Christian women with such poor theological training that they believe a government enforcing completely just immigration law via deportation is denigrating image bearers.”

A reply to Stuckey’s post from Hallie Skansi read: “Allie Beth thinks the only reason any woman would come to a different conclusion than her is because we’re dumb or don’t have the caliber of theological training that she (supposedly) has. Idk, Allie, maybe I just have eyes and have read the Bible!”

Apparently, some of the Bible study moms who make up Basham’s and Stuckey’s primary audience don’t like seeing peaceful protesters shot or preschool children’s lives upended by ICE terror. And, like most good moms, they know when they are being lied to.

That is not good news for Stuckey and Basham.