The Associated Press reported that a fellow service member had flagged Hegseth as a possible "Insider Threat" due to "a tattoo on his bicep that's associated with white supremacist groups."

But are the tattoos really associated with white supremacists, or is that just what far-Left activists want you to think?

Retired Master Sgt. DeRicko Gaither, serving as the DC Army National Guard's physical security manager in 2021, flagged the "Deus vult" tattoo to authorities before Joe Biden's inauguration on Jan. 20, 2021, and as a result, Hegseth has said, he was told to stay home on Inauguration Day.

Gaither told The Associated Press that he researched Hegseth's tattoos and "determined they had sufficient connection to extremist groups to elevate the email to his commanding officers."

The AP uncritically quotes Heidi Beirich of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, who acknowledged that the tattoos "are associated with an expression of religious faith" but insisted that they "have also been adopted by some far-right groups and violent extremists."

Beirich isn't exactly a neutral source. She led the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project for eight years—a period during which the SPLC added Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian law firm that has won multiple cases at the Supreme Court, to a "hate map" that includes chapters of the Ku Klux Klan.

As I wrote in my book "Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center," the SPLC uses this "hate map" to scare donors into raising money and to demonize its political opponents, suggesting they are driven by the same kind of hate as the Klan.

The SPLC often demonizes conservative Christians for dissenting from its LGBTQ agenda. But the organization also demonizes nonprofits that warn against the threat of radical Islam, a particularly salient fact for the AP to note when uncritically quoting the activist Beirich on the meaning of crusader symbols.

Even Beirich, however, noted that the meaning of the symbols "depends on context," according to the AP.

Yet the AP didn't provide any context explaining that the symbols aren't white supremacist in nature.

Vice President-elect JD Vance condemned the AP's report as "anti-Christian bigotry," and he's exactly right.

The Jerusalem Cross

So what is the Jerusalem Cross?

The Jerusalem Cross consists of a large cross surrounded by four smaller Greek crosses, one in each quadrant of the larger cross. Godfrey of Bouillon, a key leader in the First Crusade, reportedly adopted the symbol.

According to Catholic News Agency, the cross predates the First Crusade (1096-1099), but became more common after the Kingdom of Jerusalem adopted the cross as its chief banner in the 1200s before Muslim forces expelled the crusaders in 1291. The cross remains the main insignia of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem—the Latin Catholic diocese for the Holy Land.

After the end of the crusader era, pilgrims carried an image of the Jerusalem Cross as they made the journey to the City of David to walk in the footsteps of Jesus. Pilgrims often get a tattoo of the cross after completing a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, in a tradition dating back more than 700 years.

Hegseth personally has gone to Jerusalem to walk in Jesus' footsteps, and it seems plausible he received the cross tattoo after one such journey.

Catholic News Agency gives multiple interpretations of the five crosses. They may represent the four Gospel writers—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—plus Jesus at the center. They may represent Jesus' five wounds during the Crucifixion: the nail piercings in his hands and feet and the spear piercing in his side. The crosses also may represent the spread of the Gospel to the four corners of the earth.

Father David Grenier is a Catholic priest and member of a religious order called the Holy Land Franciscan Friars, which uses the Jerusalem Cross as its symbol. Grenier told Fox News Digital that he isn't familiar with the cross being used to represent Christian supremacy or white supremacy. Rather, he said, it represents the message of salvation spreading to all people across the globe.

What Is 'Deus Vult?'

"Deus vult" is a Latin phrase meaning, "God wills it." It became a rallying cry for European Catholics in the First Crusade, although Christians throughout history—including the Puritans as well as Catholic chivalric orders—also adopted the phrase as an expression of divine Providence.

Although white nationalists have occasionally adopted the phrase, medieval scholars have condemned this as an abuse of history.

The phrase "Deus vult" has much more to do with Providence and the Crusades than it has to do with any racist movement in the US today... Subscribe for free to Breaking Christian News here

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Tyler O'Neil is managing editor of The Daily Signal and the author of two books: "Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center," and "The Woketopus: The Dark Money Cabal Manipulating the Federal Government."

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