MSNBC anchor Katy Tur managed to do the impossible Monday afternoon: turn a direct paraphrase of the Declaration of Independence into a scandal.
During a segment on the “Rededicate 250” celebration on the National Mall — one of several patriotic events tied to America’s upcoming 250th birthday in 2026 — Tur breathlessly suggested House Speaker Mike Johnson had crossed some dangerous theological line by saying Americans’ rights come from “our Creator.”
Tur asked The Atlantic writer McKay Coppins whether Johnson was effectively placing God “over the Declaration of Independence” after the Louisiana Republican declared: “Our rights do not derive from government. They come from you, our Creator, and Heavenly Father.”
There was just one tiny problem with the MSNBC freakout: that idea is practically lifted from the Declaration itself. You know — the document that famously states Americans are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.”
Minor detail.
To his credit, Coppins appeared mildly baffled by the premise of Tur’s question. Rather than join the outrage parade, he pointed out the concept isn’t remotely radical. “The idea that we have certain inalienable rights that come from God can be read in a fairly benign way,” Coppins explained, adding that America’s system was designed to recognize innate human rights, not invent them out of thin air.
That’s not exactly some fringe interpretation. It’s the philosophical backbone of the American founding, rooted in natural rights theory championed by thinkers like John Locke and echoed by Thomas Jefferson in 1776. But on modern cable news, apparently even quoting the Founders too accurately can trigger a constitutional crisis.
Coppins did pivot to familiar media anxieties about “Christian nationalism,” warning that rhetoric framing politics as a battle between good and evil “can lead to some pretty dangerous places if it’s not kept in check.” Still, he never backed Tur’s underlying suggestion that Johnson had somehow invented a theocratic reinterpretation of America.
Because he hadn’t. Tur, however, doubled down anyway.
“In the context of this rally, and with Mike Johnson, and the movement toward Christian nationalism being more embedded in this culture, it’s not as benign,” she insisted, arguing the rhetoric excluded other faiths. That might come as news to the authors of the Declaration, who explicitly grounded human rights in a Creator long before MSNBC panels existed to workshop panic over it.
At this point, the Founding Fathers would probably need a fact-check banner to get through an MSNBC segment unscathed.
Wow 🤦♂️
MS NOW’s Katy Tur appears clueless about our country’s founding documents:
“What about this passage from Mike Johnson declaring that our rights do not derive from government?
‘They come from you, our creator and heavenly father.’
Is this him putting God over the… pic.twitter.com/VUSFj2T42Y
— CatholicVote (@CatholicVote) May 19, 2026
