Boise State coach should weigh Idaho history when invoking Christianity

Boise State University head football coach Spencer Danielson has brought his team considerable success.
His players seem to respect and admire him, with good reason. He promotes good character and hard work at least as well as he prepares players to win.
He has been criticized, including by this board, for his excessive expressions of his Christian faith in his capacity as a public university's employee.
As the Idaho Statesman's Shaun Goodwin reported, the criticisms from outside don't seem to be shared by those on the inside — members of the team, their parents and others.
That doesn't mean his possible encroaching of the separation of church and state should be taken lightly.
'Coach D, he's an amazing human, and religion is a huge part of him, and he doesn't force it upon anybody,' long snapper Mason Hutton told Goodwin.
But another thing is clear: If Danielson were not acting as a Christian leader to his players, he would not be permitted this freedom for very long.
To test this, ask yourself a question: What if Danielson led the athletes in Muslim prayer or quoted from the Quran in TV interviews? What if he led them in Hindu worship? What if he repeated passages from ardent atheist Richard Dawkins?
The answer is obvious: It would not be tolerated for a second. Idaho lawmakers would call for him to be fired and likely ax college budgets. There would be outrage, and then some, from the state's growing far-right population.
Danielson does not operate in a vacuum, and the state of Idaho has a very ugly history of religious intolerance. When the state was founded, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were not allowed to vote, hold office or serve on juries.
That was a long time ago, but there are plenty of contemporary examples, like the repeated efforts to demonize Idaho's refugees because some of them are Muslim.
The Idaho Legislature begins each day with a prayer, invariably a Christian one.
There was an exception a decade ago, when leaders of the then-more moderate Idaho Senate decided to embrace ecumenicism by allowing a Hindu cleric to give the prayer — in a country founded on freedom of religion. In response, Sen. Sheryl Nuxoll, as far-right a senator as could then be found, who would find herself a relative centrist today, denounced Hinduism as a 'false religion with false gods.' Not to be outdone, Sen. Steve Vick accused Hindus of 'worshiping cows.'
The following year, members of the Legislature invited Pastor Shahram Hadian to give a talk called 'The True Face of Islam,' a hate-filled rant attacking members of the world's second-largest religion. Also that year, lawmakers killed a bill that allowed interstate collection of child support payments under the bizarre theory that it would cause Idaho to be governed by Sharia.
That was a decade ago. Today, things are different. Now, it is inconceivable that far-right legislative leaders would allow a Hindu, Buddhist or Muslim religious leader to give the opening prayer. Now, bills are introduced to require all public school students to read the King James Bible at length.
Add all that up, and there's a clear message being sent to any non-Christian in Idaho: Here, the official religion is Christianity.
Here, if you are something else, you may be tolerated or you may be persecuted. The one thing you will never be is equal.
Danielson is not responsible for this history, but he operates within it. He carries a special obligation to ensure that non-Christian players and potential recruits can be assured that they will be treated as equals. Thankfully, that appears to be what he is doing.
As Danielson said: 'There are guys on our team that are Christian, there are guys on our team that are LDS, there's guys on our team that are Muslim, there's guys on our team who at this point in their life want nothing to do with religion.'
Given that, isn't it reasonable that, from time to time, the team would be given readings and inspirational passages from the Book of Mormon and the Quran, as well as critiques of religious belief? And perhaps they are; Danielson would not be interviewed specifically for Goodwin's story.
There is no doubt that Danielson is well-intentioned. There is no doubt he is striving to be a good coach and a good mentor.
But he is also a state actor. He is the highest-paid employee of Idaho's largest public university. It is incumbent upon him not to cross lines.
And he has considerable personal power over his players' futures. He decides when and if they will play, who starts, and — with colleges now paying players — he may also be responsible for how they are compensated. He is something very akin to his boss.
He should realize that when he says things like, 'It will be based on giving Jesus the glory. … If people don't like that, don't come here.'
That could mean some very good, upstanding and talented teenagers might think they are not welcome at Boise State if they don't want to give Christ the glory.
Statesman editorials are the opinion of the Idaho Statesman's editorial board. Board members are opinion editor Scott McIntosh, opinion writer Bryan Clark, editor Chadd Cripe, newsroom editors Dana Oland and Jim Keyser and community members Greg Lanting, Terri Schorzman and Garry Wenske.

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Sixty-six Assemblymembers also signed a letter in 2023 calling the legislation 'a ploy to demonize Jewish charities with connections to Israel.' The lawmakers also said the legislation serves to 'attack Jewish organizations that have wide ranging missions from feeding the poor to providing emergency medical care for victims of terrorism to clothing orphans.' Mamdani touted his work to draft the legislation — a non-starter in the Legislature — as one of his top two policy accomplishments in his campaign literature for mayor. 'My support for BDS is consistent with the core of my politics which is non-violence,' Mamdani said in a May interview with the UJA-Federation, which his campaign referred to POLITICO. 'I think it is a legitimate movement when you are seeking to find compliance with international law and I think we have seen the Israeli government out of compliance with international law. ' 7. 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Minimized claims of antisemitism Mamdani has repeatedly said accusations he is antisemitic are politically motivated or efforts to censor him. 'The conflation of anti-zionism and antisemitism is a conflation that seeks to distract, delegitimize, and really, what it is, is an attempt to silence,' Mamdani said in an interview with the South Asian Avant-Garde in 2021. 'Antisemitism is such a real issue in this city, and it has been hard to see it weaponized by candidates who do not seem to have any real interest in tackling it, but rather in using it as a pretext to make political points,' he also said on the campaign trail, less than a week before Election Day. 9. 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'I think just the fact of registering opposition that business as usual cannot continue any longer, and it is so, so important that we do not cede any ground to apartheid and to supporters of apartheid, and that we'd be unabashed in our criticism of it.'

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The day my little brother was murdered in 2022, he was standing with friends on a street in the Morgan Park community on the South Side of Chicago when a black SUV pulled up and several men got out with various guns and opened fire indiscriminately. For a heartbeat, time seemed to pause, the world holding its breath in confusion. 9 Author Gianno Caldwell (r) with his brother Christian, who was killed by gunfire in Chicago in 2022. Caldwell's new book details the philanthropists and politicians whose failed leadership allowed Christian's murder to happen. Courtesy of Gianno Caldwell Then came the recognition — the burst of defensive moves and noise; the staccato crack-crack-crack, harsh and unnatural against the night. People screamed, the sound primal and raw, as the crowd scattered. Advertisement The SUV now sped away, its engine roaring, leaving behind more cries and glittering fragments of shattered glass. Some 50 shell casings were found on the street, and bullets went through the windows of nearby houses. Three in the crowd were rushed to the hospital; only two survived. Christian had just turned 18 years old. He loved school and sports and was excited about starting college. So much so that he and I had taken the tour at the University of California, Los Angeles, when he was just 16. His future was very bright. 9 Author Caldwell testifying before Congress about Chicago's gun violence epidemic in 2022. C-SPAN Advertisement The police tell me Christian was not the intended target. He just happened to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was part of a legacy now. Slaughtered. Another innocent victim of America's ongoing violence. And my family was now part of this terrible escalating pattern. 'Heartbroken' isn't enough. My family's hearts were shattered. I was — and remain — devastated and beyond understanding. My grief was quickly accompanied by a burning need to learn more, to uncover why things like Christian's murder happen far too often. To know how our laws, institutions and societal values perpetuate tragedies like his. To ensure that others never experience the same loss my family has and that justice truly serves the people it should protect. 9 Billionaire investor George Soros has donated tens of millions of dollars to ultra-progressive causes — with a special focus on elections for local prosecutors. AP I met with hundreds of other experts on these issues as I wrote the book 'The Day My Brother Was Murdered.' From district attorneys and congressmen to community organizers, gang members and families, like my own, too often left behind in the wake of violence. I've traveled our country, the world even, to uncover the roots of the violence that claimed my brother's life and to explore all avenues for meaningful reform. 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Advertisement His efforts have negatively impacted my family at a personal level. The former Cook County state's attorney Kim Foxx, for instance, has been funded by Soros — and her far-left, soft-on-crime policies have contributed to the death and violent crime epidemic in Chicago. I hold her and former mayor Lori Lightfoot responsible for my brother's murder. In 2023, I testified before a House Judiciary Committee focused on Chicago's crime problem. Afterwards, Foxx told the press she was sorry for my brother's murder. She should be sorry. Not just about Christian, but the countless others who are being slaughtered. And it's not just Foxx. 9 Caldwell believes that Kim Fox, the Cook County Prosecutor, is directly responsible for his brother's death owing to her departments' lax enforcement efforts. AP It's Larry Krasner in Philadelphia. It was George Gascón in Los Angeles. Chesa Boudin in San Francisco. It was Kim Gardner in St. Louis. It's Alvin Bragg in New York. They are all around the country — and they all have one thing in common: they were all financially supported by George Soros. Interesting how people like Soros, Fox, Lightfoot, Newsom, Pelosi, Biden . . . all have these grandiose ideas on making America 'more just' but do so behind professional security guards and gated communities. Security, in many cases, paid for by taxpayers. Through his primary philanthropy vehicle, Open Society Foundations, Soros has impacted American politics on a national level for years. But the local level is where he has done the most damage. An elected prosecutor is an extremely powerful position in this country. Soros very smartly understood you can spend tens of millions of dollars on a presidential race or millions on a US Senate race. But by spending just a fraction of that on a local prosecutor race, you may be able to effect more of the change you seek. And so he poured resources into local prosecutor races all over the country. 9 Caldwell also believes former Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot is equally responsible. Getty Images Advertisement We cannot ignore the shadow that crime casts over our everyday lives. It's not just the statistics, the headlines, or the body counts — it's the sheer fact that crime strikes at the very foundation of what it means to live freely. It is about good people, minding their business, walking to work, riding the subway, or going to the store in neighborhoods they've called home for years — only to find themselves at risk of harm. When that happens, when danger creeps into the places we know and love, society itself begins to erode. If we can't keep crime in check, we lose the glue that holds us together — the trust, the freedom and the simple right to feel safe. A single act of crime reverberates, making us question not just our safety, but our place in the world. I moved to Miami in the spring of 2020. Los Angeles, where I had lived since 2017, was looking more and more like my hometown of Chicago. The shootings. Carjackings. Homeless camps. Drug dealers and addicts roaming the streets. The gangs. Leadership in LA was far more interested in whether or not you were wearing a mask or standing on a beach than in its rising rates of property and violent crime. I packed up my things. 9 Miami Mayor Francis X. Suarez, whom Caldwell believes is helping to lead Florida's push toward ensuring rule of law in the state. DAX TAMARGO/Shutterstock Advertisement One of the reasons I chose Florida, and Miami especially, is that the leadership there is doing all the right things when it comes to law and order. 'It's a tale between two types of cities,' says Miami mayor Francis Suarez, who has held the position since 2017. 'Where elected officials believe that the rule of law and public safety are the foundations of a free and prosperous society, versus other types of cities where elected officials fail to uphold the law, refuse to enforce the law, and blame those who follow the law, from police to small businesses, as the causes of crime.' It helps that the mayor can count on support from Florida's governor and state attorney general. Gov. Ron DeSantis cautions that prosecutors in his state don't get to 'pick and choose which law that they enforce. If you disagree with a law, run for the legislature and change it, but you don't get to be a law unto yourself.' Advertisement Crime is at a 50-year low in Florida, with overall crime down by nearly 10% compared to 2021. Murder is down by 14%; burglary is down by 15%. It's one of the few places in the nation that can truly claim meaningful reductions in crime. While Democrats focus their attention on abortion, transgender rights and condemning Israel, the other party works to make sure I can take my family to lunch downtown without fear of being carjacked or shot. 'A permissive society is not a civilized society,' Suarez warns of our other once-great cities. 'It's a decaying one.' People here are less likely to commit a crime in Florida because they know they will get caught. They know the police are everywhere — and the prosecutors will lock them up. 9 Gianno Caldwell and Pres. Trump. Courtesy of Gianno Caldwell Advertisement Suarez provides the simplest path to our salvation. 'If mayors are held responsible for the crime levels in their cities, then we should also hold district attorneys accountable in every local race where it affects their citizens and the quality of life in their cities.' Fund and train our police. Enforce already-existing laws. Secure our southern border and dismantle the gangs. Focus resources, from money to time, on organizations already addressing the root causes of crime. Treat mental health and addiction as the diseases they are, not as a crime after the fact. These are all solutions that have worked in our past. We already know the ways to a safer society. Gianno Caldwell is a political analyst for Fox News channel and the founder of the Caldwell Institute for Public Safety. He is the author of the new book 'The Day My Brother Was Murdered: My Journey Through America's Violent Crime Crisis' (Broadside Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, copyright 2025 by Gianno Caldwell), from which this essay is adapted.