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Compiled by GayToday
The Rev. Pat Robertson: Bailing on the Christian Coalition |
Virginia Beach, Virginia--Television preacher Pat Robertson announced yesterday that he is resigning as president of the Christian Coalition, the right-wing political organization he founded in 1989 following his failed campaign for the U.S. presidency.
The move spells the certain demise of the floundering group, says Americans United for Separation of Church and State. |
Robertson, in a letter delivered to the organization's board based in Virginia Beach,
claims he is stepping down to focus his energies on his Christian ministry and The Christian Broadcasting Network.
"The Christian Coalition has been a sinking ship for several years, and now the captain's jumped overboard," said the Reverend Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United. "Without Robertson's money and political clout, it's only a matter of time before the organization collapses outright."
Added Lynn:
"The sooner the Christian Coalition collapses the better as far as I'm concerned. Its activities have taken politics closer to the gutter than to Heaven. The country will be better off without it."
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Although the Coalition enjoyed some political successes in the early to mid 1990s, the group has fallen on hard times in recent years. Its budget has plummeted from $25 million annually to less than $3 million.
Top staffers have fled the group in droves, and earlier this year it was sued by several African American employees who alleged racial discrimination at the Coalition's Washington, D.C., offices.
Americans United has been the leading critic of the Coalition since its founding. In September of 1997, Americans United obtained a tape of Robertson outlining a partisan agenda for the group during a closed-door meeting of group activists and turned it over to the Federal Election Commission and Internal Revenue Service.
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Related Stories from the GayToday Archive:
Falwell & Robertson Burn in the Fire of Angry Media Scorn
Evesdropping on Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition
Christian Coalition Crumbling from Within
Related Sites:
Americans United for the Seperation of Church & State
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Americans United has also taken the lead in warning churches nationally that distribution of Christian Coalition "voter guides" could endanger the tax-exempt status of houses of worship. The guides, AU asserts, are really partisan campaign material that endorse conservative Republican candidates while attacking Democrats.
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