Carrie Prejean Boller, the former Miss California turned Catholic activist, was removed from President Trump's White House Religious Liberty Commission on Wednesday after she hijacked a public hearing on antisemitism to push her own agenda on Israel.

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who chairs the commission, announced the decision on X and made clear it was his call alone.

"Carrie Prejean Boller has been removed from President Trump's Religious Liberty Commission. No member of the Commission has the right to hijack a hearing for their own personal and political agenda on any issue. This is clearly, without question, what happened Monday in our hearing on antisemitism in America. This was my decision."

The hearing was supposed to address antisemitism in America — a real and growing problem that deserves serious attention. Instead, Boller turned the proceedings into a spectacle, confronting witness Shabbos Kestenbaum — a former Harvard student who sued the university over its response to antisemitism — and demanding he "condemn what Israel has done in Gaza." Patrick stepped in to shut the line of questioning down, telling Boller the topic could be "another discussion on another day."

Kestenbaum was reportedly ready to respond before Patrick intervened. He never got the chance.

The Statement That Sealed It

Boller refused to go quietly. She issued a series of statements on Tuesday and Wednesday refusing to resign, culminating in a post on X that left little room for interpretation:

"I will never bend the knee to the state of Israel. Ever. Christians have been manipulated into believing that God blesses bombing, starvation, and mass killing. That is the opposite of Christ, who came to stand with the suffering and confront power. I reject that lie completely."

There's a version of this sentiment that could be expressed thoughtfully within a serious theological or policy debate. This wasn't that. Boller wasn't raising difficult questions about foreign policy in a forum designed for that purpose. She was ambushing a witness at an antisemitism hearing — a hearing specifically convened to address hatred directed at Jewish Americans — and using it as a platform for her own cause, as Fox News reports.

The commission exists to protect religious liberty. That's a broad mandate, and it encompasses hard conversations. But there's a difference between raising uncomfortable truths and derailing proceedings meant to address a specific form of persecution. Boller confused the two.

Candace Owens Enters the Chat

Commentator Candace Owens — who Boller reportedly defended during the hearing — wasted no time rallying to Boller's side. Her response went considerably further than Boller's own statements:

"Carrie didn't hijack anything. Carrie spoke truth, as a Catholic, and Christians, the Truth cannot be defeated. Zionists are naturally hostile to Catholics because we refuse to bend the knee to revisionist history and support the mass slaughter and rape of innocent children for occult Baal worshipers."

Read that again. "Occult Baal worshipers."

Owens, who has been accused of antisemitism over many controversial remarks, also addressed Patrick directly:

"Your decision will only further the Christian enlightenment which is taking place in this country. And for that, we thank you."

Owens claimed the commission was pushing a "performative Zionist" message meant to neuter the Christian faith." No evidence was offered for this claim beyond the assertion itself.

What this isn't

This is not a story about Christians being silenced. Christians sit on the commission. The commission was created by President Trump specifically to defend religious liberty — including the religious liberty of Christians. Dan Patrick, a conservative stalwart, chairs it. The idea that this body exists to suppress Christian expression requires ignoring everything about its origin and purpose.

What happened here is simpler and less dramatic than Owens wants it to be: a commission member used a hearing on antisemitism to grandstand on a different topic, was asked to stop, refused, doubled down publicly, and was removed by the chair. That's not persecution. That's the consequences for a lack of discipline.

The Bigger Problem

There is a growing faction that treats any hearing, any institution, any conversation about antisemitism as an opportunity to relitigate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The two are not the same discussion. You can hold serious views about the conduct of the war in Gaza. You can raise moral questions about civilian casualties. Conservatives are not monolithic on these issues, and they shouldn't be.

But when a Jewish student who sued Harvard over campus antisemitism is testifying about hatred directed at him in America, and your first instinct is to demand he answer for Israel's military operations — you've lost the thread. You haven't spoken truth to power. You've used someone else's hearing about their persecution as a prop for your own message.

The religious liberty movement in America is too important to be undermined by members who can't read a room or respect the scope of their own mandate. President Trump created this commission soon after his inauguration to do serious work. That work requires focus, credibility, and the ability to address one form of hatred without immediately pivoting to your preferred grievance.

A note on the rhetoric

The language coming from Owens in particular deserves scrutiny, not because it's offensive — though it is — but because it poisons the well for legitimate conversations conservatives need to have. When you accuse Jewish people of being "occult Baal worshipers" in the same breath as defending a Catholic's right to speak, you haven't advanced religious liberty. You've handed every critic of the conservative movement exactly the ammunition they've been looking for.

Conservative credibility on religious freedom is built over decades and destroyed in a sentence. The people who care most about protecting that credibility aren't the ones censoring Christians. They're the ones who understand that the cause is bigger than any single member's desire for a viral moment.

Patrick made the right call. The commission's work continues without Boller — and it's better positioned for it.