In Ohio, Knox County commissioner promises to invoke Christian nationalist ideology while in office

Following her first meeting this week as a city commissioner in Knox County, Ohio, a right-wing pastor turned politician named Drenda Keesee made nods to the Seven Mountain Mandate, a cornerstone of contemporary Christian nationalism. 

"This is my new office," Keesee said in a video posted to Facebook. "It's an opportunity for us to take on the Seven Mountains, to bring righteousness and God's plans for the government … So we should be involved in government.

"The Bible says, 'When the righteous rule, the people rejoice' and 'sin is a reproach to any nation or any people.'"

"I would encourage any of you that are considering running for office, it is a calling to be in government," Keesee concluded. 

The Seven Mountains principle, popularized by the pro-MAGA pastor Lance Wallnau, has been a key concept of the religious right since President-elect Donald Trump was elected for his first term in 2016. This is especially after the noted Bible Enjoyer appointed an expansive crew of evangelicals to provide him with spiritual guidance. 

“The Seven Mountains mandate is a particular form of understanding human society that says that Christian people are not called to persuade their neighbors to practice the Christian faith, to demonstrate to their fellow Americans that the Christian faith is the faith of love and truth. The Seven Mountains Mandate is … a mandate to colonize the Earth for God,” Bradley Onishi, a one-time Christian nationalist who now critiques the ideology, told NPR last year. 

“The goal is not to simply reflect the character of Christ on earth by way of living a life that upholds his glory and his teachings. The goal is to have absolute authority and power over every facet of human society.”

Keesee’s fundamentalist views and paranoid disposition are unsurprising. On her YouTube series "Drenda On Guard," the wannabe televangelist accuses Freemasons, Illuminati and the World Economic Forum of having conspired to unseat Christians from the aforementioned seven mountains of our country. In one episode, Keesse said this cabal has a "maniacal plan to take down mankind" so it can wage "a war against God."

This, of course, includes somehow manipulating children into becoming transgender. In 2023, just before he announced her candidacy for county commissioner, a clip of Keesse emerged via Media Matters for America where she claimed that young people were “being bombarded constantly with messaging that makes them question whether they’re male or female.” 

“Because just like Hitler, they know if you’re going to mold a child, you mold them at the youngest age you can before they have a developed consciousness of what is right and wrong.”