A record number of rogue Christian pastors are endorsing candidates from the pulpit this election cycle, using Sunday sermons to defiantly flout tax rules.Their message to the IRS: Sue me. |
| At issue is the churches’ tax break as tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organizations. | AP Photo |
But the tax agency is doing anything but. Although the
IRS was sued itself for not enforcing the law and admitted about 100
churches may be breaking the rules, the pastors and their critics alike
say the agency is looking the other way. The agency refuses to say if it
is acting.
At the same time, the number of pastors endorsing candidates in what
they call Pulpit Freedom Sunday jumped from 33 people in 2008 to more
than 1,600 this year, according to organizers, Alliance Defending
Freedom. And this year, they’ve stepped up their drive, telling pastors
to back candidates any Sunday up until the election, not just one Sunday
as in past years.
The church leaders are jumping in high-profile races that will help
decide the Senate and tight governor races across the country, endorsing
candidates from Thom Tillis (R) over Sen. Kay Hagan (D) in North
Carolina to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R) over Alison
Lundergan Grimes (D) in Kentucky.
Rev. Mark Cowart, pastor at Colorado Springs-based Church For All
Nations, suggested good Christians should vote Democratic Colorado Gov.
John Hickenlooper out of office in an Oct. 19 sermon, where he endorsed
his GOP rival, Bob Beauprez.
“Beauprez is against more gun control, does not support abortion and
he does protect the man-woman marriage — that’s the one I’m voting for. …
I’m endorsing biblical principles,” the preacher said in a video of the
service, pacing a church stage and chopping his hand through the air
for emphasis.
At issue is the churches’ tax break as tax-exempt 501(c)(3)
organizations. They don’t pay taxes, and donations to them can be
deducted from contributors’ taxable income.
But with that break comes limits on political endorsements. Charities are barred from engaging in political campaigns.
So while pastors can discuss abortion, gay marriage and other
controversial issues in their sermons, they’re not allowed to back
candidates or use church money to fund campaign activities, and keep
their tax break.
“You can’t have a tax-exempt entity engaged in politics because that
involves using tax-exempt money for political purposes, so it’s an
unfair playing field,” said Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-founder of the
Freedom From Religion Foundation, the organization that sued the IRS in
2012 for failing to enforce electioneering restrictions on churches. The
group settled this summer with an understanding that the IRS would
eventually take action.
So far there’s been no evidence they have.
IRS Commissioner John Koskinen in an interview last month with Tax
Analysts suggested the IRS isn’t planning to crack down on churches
anytime soon. He said the FFRF lawsuit news “spread out into the world …
somehow we are doing something very different and we are going to show
up either more aggressively or more often in a different way than we
have in the past, and that is not what that case was about at all.”
It’s another sign of the tax agency turned upside down by the tea
party targeting controversy. Although the IRS is under fire from the
right for being heavy-hand with conservative tax-exempt entities, it’s
also getting hit from the left for failing to enforce decade-old rules
governing churches and politics.
The law was written in 1954 by then-Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson (D-Texas),
who was facing a contentious reelection challenge where several
501(c)(3)s endorsed his opponent, labeling him soft on communism.
The pastors, who make it easy for the IRS by often taping their
sermons and mailing them to the tax agency, argue that it infringes on
their First Amendment rights.
“The church is God’s organization — what right does the government
have to control this?” said Rev. Kevin Baird of Legacy Church in
Charleston, S.C.
In a recent sermon Baird questioned the integrity of a local state
Senate Republican official up for reelection, who calls himself
“pro-life” yet has not advanced legislation on the issue in his
committee.
In Charlotte, N.C., Southern Baptist preacher Mark Harris — who made
his own failed bid for Sen. Hagan’s seat in the GOP primary earlier this
year — said he made clear to his congregation that he backed Tillis,
decrying Hagan’s pro-choice and gay marriage stances as “deeds of
darkness” during an October service.
In Georgia a week later, Rev. Jeff Whitmire used his sermon to back
Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal (R) and Senate candidate David Perdue (R), over
their Democratic counterparts Jason Carter and Michelle Nunn, he said.
And Cowart in Colorado also endorsed Rep. Cory Gardner (R) over incumbent Sen. Mark Udall (D) saying, “We need to see him out.”
Their ultimate goal: igniting a lawsuit with the IRS and taking the issue to the Supreme Court.
“If by chance a member of the IRS gets this sermon and is listening,
sue me,” said evangelical pastor Jim Garlow of the San Diego-based
Skyline Church, after backing Democratic Rep. Scott Peters for
reelection. His Republican challenger, Carl DeMaio, is gay, and could
advance a “radical homosexual agenda,” Garlow warned.
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