For the last six seasons, Mary Mary’s Tina Campbell has shared so much of her life with the world, from her career as one half of the Gospel duo to her issues with her husband’s infidelity. Although the television series is coming to an end, Tina admits that she’s changed a lot since the first season, and that she’s learned from the mistakes and decisions she’s made.
However, one decision in particular, has forced the songstress to be on the defense. Earlier this year, Campbell wrote an open letter to the masses, encouraging everyone to “pray for” then-President-elect Donald Trump. At that time, celebrities, especially people of color, were quickly criticized for their support of Trump amid his controversial statements and divisive comments. Since then, however, in the wake of the Trump-era, Campbell has defended her stance regarding the celebrity-in-chief, saying her religious beliefs led her to vote against Hillary Clinton. But, she made it clear that Trump will never be discussed on her show.
“You ain’t never going to see that in there. Donald Trump is not that much a part of my life,” she told the Root. “I had a perspective. I had a feeling. And I put it out there. I know there’s some people who don’t agree. I do not agree with a lot of the decisions that this man makes. And I made that very clear in my statement.
“I was faced with two presidential candidates that I really did not approve of,” Campbell said. “And so I had to find something, a commonality with one of them, that would make me feel like if I have to vote, I should utilize my right to vote. Since I don’t prefer either of them, what can I find that would make me vote? And some of Donald Trump’s views on Christianity, honestly, is what caused me to vote for him.
“Many of the decisions that he has made afterwards, I have not been in agreement with at all, which I wasn’t in agreement with my last president that I voted for,” she added. “But however, as a Christian, my perspective is to pray for the president, to not use my social platforms or other platforms to try to destroy this man, because at the end of the day, he still represents the country that I live in.
“So if I’m going to use my platform, my power, my voice, I ought to use it to pray for him. To pray that he would make wise decisions, that he would be true to the oath that he took, and to not incite fear by talking about everything that’s wrong, especially with people that’s my color,” she continued.
“So all the fear that I was hearing in churches everywhere and amongst African-American people, I was like, ‘Man, we’re making a god out of this fellow. We think that our life is going to go to hell in a handbasket if he don’t get it right. And is he our god or is God our god? Are we going to pray for him or are we going to continue to bash him, which don’t help nothing?”
“I don’t make those statements to become politically charged,” she continued. “I have an opinion and I expressed it because I was so disheartened from what I was hearing in churches in our community. So that is literally where that came from. Not a ‘Let me tell everybody how for Donald Trump I am and try to get everybody to be on the Trump train.’ That was not it.
“And I didn’t feel like trying to explain that or argue that. So I didn’t. So I never talked about it again. I ain’t never explaining that any further,” she maintained. “They can understand it or not understand it. I don’t have an agenda to make people agree with me, believe me, understand me. I have a platform and I use my voice. I understand sometimes people will agree. They will disagree. They will lift me up or they will tear me down. They will bash me or they will build me. That comes with the territory. So I don’t try to chase that stuff. I don’t care to.”
