Blatant corruption starts with small compromises of integrity

Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. —Ephesians 5:11

On July 11, U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham died. Discourse after his death focused on how Senator Graham had been a clear-minded, firm opponent of Donald Trump in 2016 but was a reliable Trump supporter by 2025.

The behavior exhibited by former Trump critics such as Graham, Vice President JD Vance, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio appears to many as a classic instance of placing expediency and career advancement over integrity. You can read many other people’s opinions of their evolution into Trump supporters, so I will do something different. I will try to shed light on how politicians start down the path of justifying corruption.

If your primary focus is on getting reelected, then you will do what is necessary to get reelected—even things that are not honorable

I was press secretary for a congressional campaign in 1990. After my candidate, Rick Santorum, won the election, he went to Washington for new member orientation. He commented afterwards, “The first thing they told us was that you can’t get anything done here unless you get reelected. No wonder members of Congress are constantly thinking about their next election.”

If your primary focus is on getting reelected, then you will do what is necessary to get reelected—even things that are not honorable.

Many years later, a nonprofit organization on which I served as a board member was unhappy with one of our legislators. We thought he supported our goals, but then he voted against us. I was assigned to contact the legislator and ask what had happened.

 Of course, compromise is necessary in politics, but that’s a different kind of compromise

The legislator told me, “I was planning to vote for your bill. When I went forward to cast my vote, the chairman of one of my committees was standing there. He said, ‘If you want any money for your district out of my committee, you need to vote against this bill.’ So I changed my vote.”

Stories like this one happen every day. Legislators compromise their integrity because they think there is no other way to achieve their goals.

Of course, compromise is necessary in politics, but that’s a different kind of compromise. It is one thing to enunciate one’s principles clearly and then agree to support legislation that only partially aligns with those principles. That’s what William Wilberforce did when fighting the slave trade in Britain. Everyone knew he wanted to abolish slavery completely, but he knew that politics involves negotiating compromises with competing interests and that a partial success was better than nothing.

That kind of negotiated compromise is not the same as casting a vote contrary to what one believes.

Once party leaders know one of their legislators is vulnerable to pressure, they will use it repeatedly and there will never be a good time to resist

I wish my legislator had told his committee chairman, “I will be loyal to you whenever I can, but I cannot cast a vote that I could not explain honestly to my constituents. If you feel the need to punish me for that, I am sorry.”

Once party leaders know one of their legislators is vulnerable to pressure, they will use it repeatedly and there will never be a good time to resist.

That is how formerly honorable people have become sycophants of Donald Trump. They started by accepting the idea that supporting a popular but dishonorable, untrustworthy narcissist who appeared to share their values was better than ceding power to the other party. Because nearly everyone in the Republican party has consented to this deal, they have been powerless to resist in any meaningful way as Trump slid from reasonable governing in 2017–2020 (mostly thanks to the members of his administration who restrained his worst impulses) to denying an election that didn’t go his way, supporting a violent attack on the Capitol, and then assembling a collection of power-hungry loyalists who would make his second presidential administration more akin to authoritarianism than to representative democracy.

 Christians in many countries have to determine how they can avoid becoming targets of their government without losing their integrity

The same process is happening every day, all around the world. Christians in many countries have to determine how they can avoid becoming targets of their government without losing their integrity. Some see opportunities for financial gain if they will just look the other way regarding—or, even worse, play along with—government corruption. We cannot be purists, as no government is perfect. But neither should we endorse or participate in actions to which we would be embarrassed to admit.

Rick Santorum wasn’t perfect either, but he had a simple rule that kept him honest. He said that if you would be ashamed to have something you did reported on the front page of the local newspaper, you probably shouldn’t do it.

Bruce Barron, author or coauthor of seven books on religion and politics and a former US congressional aide, was editor of the World Evangelical Alliance’s theology journal from 2018 to 2024. Subscribe to his blog at brucebarron.substack.com.