Back in November Sen. Chuck Grassley launched an investigation of some big-name TV preachers believing they no longer deserve to maintain their tax-exempt status because they have become rich off of the donations of their viewers.
Four of the ministers have agreed to cooperate but two, Creflo Dollar and Bishop Eddie Long, have refused.
Which isn’t surprising. These guys ARE frauds and they SHOULD be afraid of this investigation.
Dollar and Long are charlatans who rob their faithful viewers and use the cash to pay themselves huge salaries, fly in private jets and buy millions of dollars in real estate. In the process, they are abusing their tax-exempt status and Sen. Grassley, as a senior member of the Senate Finance Committee, has every right to investigate them.
As Senator Grassley prepares a second round of letters urging the ministers to comply with his request for information- some in the evil evangelical empire are coming out in defense of the ministers.
One of these is Jay Seklow, the fear-mongering, wingnut lawyer from the ACLJ.
Again- no surprise here… Sekulow has been accused of doing the same thing with his tax-exempt organizations!
According to a 2005 article in Legal Times “through the ACLJ and a string of interconnected nonprofit and for-profit entities, has built a financial empire that generates millions of dollars a year and supports a lavish lifestyle — complete with multiple homes, chauffeur-driven cars, and a private jet that he once used to ferry Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.”
Shame on you, Mr. Sekulow!
It seems to me that the best thing real evangelicals could do is get behind this investigation to help drive out the corrupt few ministers who give their whole movement a bad name.
