How little regard toward our Constitution and founding documents do Democrats have?
We’re at the point where a man billed as one of the top constitutional lawyers on the left side of the aisle doesn’t seem to know about them to the same extent a 16-year-old does.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat who helped lead the second impeachment against Donald Trump, managed to go viral in the bad sense for his questioning of Marco Hunter-Lopez, a Texas student testifying before a House Judiciary subcommittee on the Constitution and limited government.
Hunter-Lopez was there for a hearing on Wednesday titled “Sharia-Free America: Why Political Islam & Sharia Law are Incompatible with the U.S. Constitution: Part II.”
If you missed part one, don’t worry: The sequel surpasses it, from what I’ve seen.
Hunter-Lopez is a 16-year-old student from the Dallas suburb of Wylie, Texas, who tried to found a Republican Student Club but was denied because his club was “political in nature.” He eventually got it approved, but according to his written testimony, he and others “faced hostile scrutiny” from administrators.
However, he said that other groups did not face similar scrutiny. From his testimony:
On February 2nd, I was leaving a meeting and was walking to the cafeteria for lunch and I saw a large booth labeled “Islam” set up during lunch. Four adult women from the organization “Why Islam” were there. I was confused and did not want to give it attention, but after discussing it with my friends, we decided to approach the booth. I had a discussion with the women — one in particular who they kept referring me to because she knew most of the theological questions. As we tried to understand their goal, I looked over and saw multiple pamphlets spread out, one of which was explicitly titled “Understanding Shariah.” This was very concerning to me and other students. They were also making Qurans available that include a “Shahada Card” on the last page instructing students how to convert: “To become a Muslim, one needs to make the following declaration: ‘I bear witness that there is no god worthy of worship except God, and I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of God.’” This occurred openly during lunch, with administrators present who did nothing to intervene.
Both Sharia law and Muslim separatism in the Dallas-Forth Worth area have been major issues over the past few years, which is a problem when considering that many of these individuals think their beliefs are thoroughly incompatible with American values.
But, of course, Raskin saw no problem at all, trying to turn his questioning of a 16-year-old relaying his experiences in our public schools into a dazzling display of his knowledge of our founding documents, saying that “the Constitution of the United States does not establish a religion and forbids establishing a religion” in the middle of one of Hunter-Lopez’s remarks.
“Are you aware that it doesn’t mention God?” Raskin, a member of the Congressional Freethought Caucus, continued.
Hunter-Lopez then noted that the Declaration of Independence mentions it four times.
“Is the Declaration of Independence law?” Raskin responded.
Well, this kind of depends on who you ask, considering that a document officially severing ties with the United Kingdom did effect a rather large change in governance, one might note, in these American colonies. But I digress, because that’s not what we were here for.
Raskin had intended this as a setup to say that “Thomas Jefferson was denounced as an infidel, who wrote the Declaration of Independence,” and claiming that he and James Madison “were emphatic about separating church and state.”
“America proclaimed the separation of church and state,” Raskin said, “what Thomas Jefferson described in his famous letter to the Danbury Baptists as a ‘wall of separation.’”
Ruh-roh! “That was a letter, not a law,” Hunter-Lopez said.
That’s right: The pretext of this argument — that the Declaration of Independence, being a very specific public letter stating specific public things that included the Creator and God-given rights — was based in large part on one of the great myths of the left, that there is a “separation of church and state” baked into the Constitution. It’s neither there nor in the Declaration of Independence, but instead in a private letter to the Danbury Baptists, authored by one of the more secular founding fathers.
And it was also written to reassure the Connecticut congregation that the wall was there for its protection, not the protection of the government from Christian values:
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.
Jefferson followed this up by saying he would “reciprocate your kind prayers,” that infidel.
Anyhow, Raskin was reduced to talking over a 16-year-old who said that America should “acknowledge our Christian heritage.”
“Everybody can acknowledge their own heritage,” Raskin said. “Do you agree with that?”
“American heritage,” Hunter-Lopez replied. “Not just any heritage.”
“Oh, you don’t think you’re allowed to acknowledge your Christian heritage, or your Jewish heritage, or your Muslim heritage?” said Raskin, now reduced to strawman arguments.
“I’m saying you members of Congress need to acknowledge American heritage,” Hunter-Lopez replied.
🚨 OMG. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D) just got HUMILIATED by 16-year-old patriot Marco Hunter-Lopez, despite Raskin CONSTANTLY cutting him off during the Sharia Law hearing
RASKIN: Jefferson described in the letter to Danbury Baptist—
LOPEZ: That’s a letter, not a law.
RASKIN: So your… pic.twitter.com/Kzmc6CwElj
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) May 13, 2026
Precisely. The fact that Thomas Jefferson could be, on occasion, more secular than his peers does not mean that America was and is not based in Christian principles for a Christian population that shares Christian values generally, even if they do not acknowledge them specifically in their own life.
This shouldn’t be difficult, particularly in the arena of two-tiered religious law being preached in our public schools — something we should all agree the founders would find abhorrent.
And yet, we need a 16-year-old to explain this to a man touted as one of the foremost legal minds on the elected left. Your 2026 Democrats, America.
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