One new member of Congress is openly agnostic. Another's religion? "None."

CQ Roll Call says two new members of Congress will identify as openly non-religious

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Every couple of years, when the new Congress is sworn in, the Pew Research Center offers a deep dive into the religious makeup of the new government. Their assessment, based on responses to a CQ Roll Call questionnaire, hasn’t been published yet—it’ll come out later this week— but Roll Call just posted its own analysis of the data.

And when it comes to openly non-religious members of Congress, there’s some interesting news.

Consider first where we were just two years ago. In 2023, Rep. Jared Huffman was the only openly non-theistic member of Congress; he was listed as a “Humanist.” Only one member was listed as "Unaffiliated": Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ). Another 20 members of Congress chose not to answer the religion question at all, and the only Republican on that list was (wait for it) George Santos.

Santos was humiliated out of office. Sinema is thankfully on her way out as well. That suggests a decrease in the non-religious cohort… but the new survey apparently shows the number is actually growing.

Beginning this Friday, Congress will include Rep. Emily Randall (D-WA), a newly elected lawmaker whose religion will be listed as “none.” (Whether that’s synonymous with non-theistic is unclear.)

Alongside her will be Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-AZ) who will be listed as “agnostic.”

Rep.-elect Yassamin Ansari, after her primary win (screenshot via YouTube)

A small, but growing, number of Democrats identify as nonreligious. Incoming Washington Rep. Emily Randall told CQ Roll Call to list her religion as “none,” while future Rep. Yassamin Ansari of Arizona identifies as agnostic. California Rep. Jared Huffman remains Congress’ only self-identified nonreligious humanist.

Neither Randall nor Ansari were on my radar when I was putting together a list of openly non-religious candidates. But when Phoenix Magazine’s Tom Zoellner profiled Ansari on November 1, he mentioned her religious background:

Despite a potential surface assumption, Arizona will not be electing its first two Muslim Congresspersons come November 7. Ansari’s grandparents fled Iran after the revolution of 1979, and she says her family generally left religious practice behind in the trauma. “I actually consider myself agnostic… I respect everyone’s faith, but I do not personally practice one.”

Previously, Ansari was sworn into office as a Phoenix city councilwoman with her hand not on a book of scripture but the Arizona Constitution. This is a not a common practice, but it mirrors the decision of Kyrsten Sinema – a self-described “Mormon apostate” – to be sworn into Congress with her hand on the U.S. Constitution in 2013.

Randall is making history in other ways, too. She’ll be the first openly queer Latina in Congress. Still, I couldn’t find any mention of her citing a religious label (or lack thereof).

CQ Roll Call noted that 21 other Democrats chose not to answer the religion question, which would still be a slight increase from two years ago. (The outlet did not release a list of specific names yet.) Only one Republican, Rep. Dave Taylor of Ohio, chose not to mention a religious affiliation.

Even though we’re just talking about a handful of Congress members, it’s still a pleasant surprise to see a few courageous politicians willing to be honest about their non-religious label. Not that long ago, such an act would have been political poison. These days, it doesn’t seem nearly as dangerous, at least for people who are in safely blue districts.

But even in blue districts, there are plenty of representatives who might not want to use a non-religious label. Why was Ansari willing to do it?

There’s a story behind that, courtesy of Ron Millar, Political Manager for the Center for Freethought Equality (the advocacy and political arm of the American Humanist Association).

Millar told me he ran into Ansari shortly after her victory at an event hosted by the Congressional Progressive Caucus PAC. He was telling her about his organization and she seemed excited to hear about it. That could just be a politician being cordial, but Ansari told him she was agnostic. Millar, knowing the Roll Call religion survey would soon be coming her way, asked her if she’d consider identifying that way publicly:

I urged her to write in “agnostic,” because it would not be one of the options given by CQ—and apparently she did!

That means Rep. Huffman won’t be the only openly non-religious member of the 119th Congress. That’s partly because a representative of our broader non-theistic community personally made the request when he spoke to her. (Secular organizations still matter!)

“I am delighted that Yassamin Ansari decided to complete the CQ questionnaire and publicly identify with our community,” Millar told me.

One more interesting note about Ansari: As the former Vice-Mayor of Phoenix, she comfortably won the seat that was vacated by Rep. Ruben Gallego when he ran for U.S. Senate. So even though Gallego replaced one non-religious member of Congress (thank goodness, in this particular case), it’s because of his vacancy we’ll now have another one.

Ansari also won her primary by 39 votes (following a recount). She’s a reminder of why voting matters and how those votes can help change the conversation when it comes to diversity and representation at the highest levels of government.

I have reached out to Rep. Huffman’s office to see if Randall and Ansari have been invited to join the Congressional Freethought Caucus—and, if he has, whether they have accepted.

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