What The HECK Do Pharisees And Sadducees Have To Do With The Midterm Elections?

Most of our readers will know the New Testament well enough to remember that, aside from Rome itself, there were two major bad guy factions in scripture. The Pharisees and the Saducees.

Why am I bringing these guys up in the context of 2026 midterms? Because when we remember who those two groups were, we’ll be able to see the bait-and-switch being pulled by Democrats trying to run under a Christian banner.

Usually that involves lecturing us all about what it REALLY means to follow Jesus Christ… often involving things claims about Jesus supporting abortion, or how he would not hold illegal aliens accountable for violating the law. Or a dozen other variations on the theme.

Let’s look at the two gospel-era factions:

The Samaritans made an appearance, but that was usually in the context of Christ teaching how to extend love to the outsiders.

Pharisees and Saducees, on the other hand, were gatekeepers of cultural power in his context.

You might even notice how they can have an interesting parallel to our own red/blue political divide.

PHARISEES:
The first group, the Pharisees were always in open conflict with Jesus. Testing his theology. Challenging the ways in which they imagined the Sinless Son of God had broken their religious rules. They were the rigid shell of what had once began as a holiness movement in the time since the return from Babylonian Exile. They were determined to live the kind of righteous lives that would allow God turn away his wrath and restore the glory they saw in King David’s day.

They had a high view of Scripture, took it seriously and believed it was true. They cared about God’s promises. They believed in miracles. In angels. And importantly, as we saw with Paul, they believed in the Resurrection and eternal life.

SADDUCEES
The second group operated on a very different framework. The Sadducees were more of an institution than a religious movement. They did not accept ideas of miracles and resurrection. They were the ones who raised the hypothetical question about the woman who married seven husbands asking whose husband he was. They only accepted the first five books of scripture as authentic, either ignoring the remainder of the Old Testament writings, or treating them as uninspired but helpful documents. In Jesus’ day, they had become the religious aristocracy in Judea and it was from their families that Rome elevated High Priests. (Needless to say they were far more closely aligned with Rome than their counterparts of the Pharisees.) Importantly, they also held the majority in the court that would eventually meet some time after the Last Supper to condemn Christ to death.

Talarico has been running as a midnight-blue Democrat who has echoed every woke progressive sentiment you could possibly imagine. He’s all-in with kids being gender-transitioned. He claims the Annunciation was a case study of God’s support of Abortion. God himself is somehow gender-fluid, despite the fact that Christ is very definitely the SON of God and has not relinquished his humanity in his Resurrection.

But…

And here’s the bait-and-switch.
He’s gone to school, you see. Seminary. He’s can read the original languages. That makes him fancy. An expert.

Who are the peons to question his superior understanding of God’s word?

So when the guy he calls ‘pastor’ stands up on a Sunday morning and makes it clear that he does NOT believe Christ is risen from the dead, that he thinks its a story that might or might not have happened… he thinks that gives him an air of credibility and authenticity.

Texas U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico’s pastor (PCUSA) preaches during his Easter sermon that Jesus NEVER rose bodily from the dead and that he does NOT believe in a literal resurrection. pic.twitter.com/Z6ZH7hMJXg

— Protestia (@Protestia) September 21, 2026

Meanwhile, the Apostle Paul, whose convictions, tradition tells us, led him to a martyr’s death had this to say about Christ’s resurrection:

14 And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. 15 We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19 If in Christ we have hope[b] in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. — 1 Cor 15

(Did I forget to mention that was EASTER Sunday? Of this year? Yeah. That’s a thing that happened.)

The apostles do not confer the title ‘pastor’ on such men. They use other titles like ‘false teachers’. Jesus has called them ‘ravenous wolves’.

We’ve also got the footage of one of his clergy encouraging Talarico to lie about his true intentions so he can deceive the public into supporting him so that he can take office and put his woke agenda into place.

🚨 TALARICO’S CHURCH MINISTER MAKES A STUNNING CLAIM

Rev. Babs Miller said she believes James Talarico will “change his tune back to where he was” after the election. The comments came in undercover footage reported by The Daily Wire. #JamesTalarico #TexasPolitics #TexasSenate… pic.twitter.com/gJ1wb7fv8g

— Reverend Jordan Wells (@WellsJorda89710) September 17, 2026

And here is Talarico’s pastor talking about rewriting the Bible to ‘get rid of the stupid stuff’ he disagrees with.

🚨EXCLUSIVE: Talarico’s Spiritual Mentor Caught On Camera Touting ‘Rewritten’ Bible pic.twitter.com/TeKyAflx3b

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) September 17, 2026

So, we’re seeing an alignment between Talarico’s religious community and the secular left. We’re seeing leadership playing fast-and-loose with scriptural authority, denying even the very foundation of Christian faith itself. Hollowing out the MEANING of the institution while still leveraging the political capital it holds in the public esteem.

Any of this ringing a bell?

Sure, the political right has a tendency to lose the plot, usually getting caught up in superficial rule keeping or dispute about secondary issues.

But there was a HUGE difference in how Jesus spoke of the Pharisees and the Sadduccees.

The Pharisees were religious leaders who kept missing the point of their own convictions. He tried to help them course-correct. Even Paul called himself a ‘Pharisee’, when Pharisees and Saducees were tag-teaming to arrest him.

Because Paul and the Pharisees shared many key theological understandings, but the Pharisees just weren’t living into them as they should.

Nowhere in the gospels does it suggest that the Saducees were seen by Jesus or the apostles as any different than Herod or the Romans.  The were people interested in secular power; people with no real interest in the things of God… beyond a very cynical instinct to leverage the trappings of faith as a gateway to political power.

Sound familiar…?

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