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Republican vice-presidential nominee JD Vance’s appearance at a far-right Christian revival tour last month may have broken tax and election laws, experts say.
On Sept. 28, Vance held an official campaign event in Monroeville, Pennsylvania, in partnership with the Courage Tour, a series of swing-state rallies hosted by a pro-Trump Christian influencer that combine prayer, public speakers, tutorials on how to become a poll worker and get-out-the-vote programming.
Ziklag, a secretive organization of wealthy Christians, funds the Courage Tour, according to previously unreported documents obtained by ProPublica and Documented. A private donor video produced by Ziklag said the group intended to spend $700,000 in 2024 to mobilize Christian voters by funding “targeted rallies in swing states” led by Lance Wallnau, the pro-Trump influencer.
Even before the Vance event, ProPublica previously reported that tax experts believed Ziklag’s 2024 election-related efforts could be in violation of tax law. The Vance event, they said, raised even more red flags about whether a tax-exempt charity had improperly benefited the Trump-Vance campaign.
According to Texas corporation records, the Courage Tour is a project of Lance Wallnau Ministries Inc., a 501(c)(3) charity led by Wallnau. There have been five Courage Tour events this year, and Vance is the only top-of-the-ticket candidate to appear at any of them.
Wallnau has said that Vice President Kamala Harris is possessed by “the spirit of Jezebel” and practices “witchcraft.” As ProPublica reported, Wallnau is also an adviser to Ziklag, whose long-term goal is to help conservative Christians “take dominion” over the most important areas of American society, such as education, government and entertainment.
The Vance campaign portion was tucked in between Courage Tour events, and organizers took pains to say that Wallnau’s podcast hosted the hourlong segment, not the Courage Tour. Two signs near the stage said Wallnau’s podcast was hosting Vance. And during Vance’s conversation with a local pastor, the Courage Tour’s logo was replaced by the Trump-Vance logo on the screen.
An email sent by the Courage Tour to prospective attendees promoted the rally and Vance’s appearance as distinct events but advertised them side by side:
An email promoted the Courage Tour and the town hall with Vance side by side. (Obtained and redacted by ProPublica)But the lines between those events blurred in a way that tax-law experts said could create legal problems for Wallnau, the Courage Tour and Ziklag. The appearance took place at the same venue, on the same stage and with the same audience as the rest of the Courage Tour. That email to people who might attend assured them that they could remain in their same seats to watch Vance and that afterward, “We will seamlessly return to the Courage Tour programming.”
The Trump-Vance campaign promoted the event as “part of the Courage Tour” and said Vance’s remarks would take place “during the Courage Tour.” And although the appearance included a discussion of addiction and homelessness, Vance criticized President Joe Biden in his remarks and urged audience members to vote and get others to vote as well in November.
Later in the day, Wallnau took the stage and asked for donations from the crowd. As he did, he spoke of Vance’s appearance as if it were part of the Courage Tour. “People have been coming up to us, my staff, and saying we want to help you out, what can we do, how do we do this? I want you to know when we do a Courage Tour, which will be back in the area, when we’re in different parts of the country,” he said. Asking for a show of hands, Wallnau added: “How many of you would like to at least be knowing when we’re there? Who’s with us on the team? If we have another JD Vance or Donald Trump or somebody?”
An employee of Wallnau’s, Mercedes Sparks, peeked out from behind a curtain. “I just wanted to clarify: You said they came to the Courage Tour,” Sparks said. “They didn’t. For legal reasons, the podcast hosted that. It was very separate. I don’t need the IRS coming my way.”
Despite the disclaimers, Vance’s campaign appearance at the Courage Tour raises legal red flags for several reasons, according to experts in tax and election law.
Both Lance Wallnau Ministries and Ziklag are 501(c)(3) charities, the same legal designation as the Boys & Girls Club or the United Way. People who donate to charities like these can deduct their gift on their annual taxes. But under the law, such charities are “absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office,” according to the IRS.
Internal Ziklag records lay out how the Courage Tour could influence the 2024 election. “Our plan,” one private video states, “is to mobilize grassroots support in seven key swing states through large-scale rallies, each anticipated to attract between 5,000 and 15,000 participants. These ‘Fire and Glory’ rallies will primarily target counties critical to the 2024 election outcome.” Wallnau said he later changed the name of his swing-state tour from Fire and Glory to the Courage Tour, saying the original name “sounds like a Pentecostal rally.”
Four nonpartisan tax experts told ProPublica and Documented that a political campaign event hosted by one charitable group, which is in turn funded by another charitable group, could run afoul of the ban on direct or indirect campaign intervention by a charitable organization. They added that Wallnau’s attempt to carve out Vance’s appearance may not, in the eyes of the IRS, be sufficient to avoid creating tax-law problems.
“Here, the [Trump] campaign is getting the people in their seats, who have come to the c-3’s event,” Ellen Aprill, an expert on political activities by charitable groups and a retired law professor at Loyola Law School, wrote in an email. “I would say this is over the line into campaign intervention but that it is a close call — and that exempt organization lawyers generally advise clients NOT to get too close to the line!”
Roger Colinvaux, a professor at Catholic University’s Columbus School of Law, said that regulators consider whether a consumer would be able to distinguish the charitable event from the political activity. Does the public know these are clearly separate entities, or is it difficult to distinguish whether it’s a charity or a for-profit company that’s hosting a political event?
“If it looks like the (c)(3) is creating the audience, then that again is potentially an issue,” he said.
Ziklag, Wallnau and the Vance campaign did not respond to requests for comment.
First image: Vance talks with Howard. Second image: Lance Wallnau gives a presentation. The Vance discussion was tucked in between Courage Tour events, and organizers took pains to say that Wallnau’s podcast, which is owned by his for-profit company, hosted the hourlong segment, not the Courage Tour. (Stephanie Strasburg for ProPublica)Marcus Owens, a tax lawyer at Loeb and Loeb and a former director of the IRS’ exempt organizations division, said there were past examples of the agency cracking down on religious associations for political activity similar in nature to Vance’s Courage Tour appearance.
In the 1980s, the Pentecostal televangelist Jimmy Swaggart used his personal column in his ministry’s magazine to endorse evangelist Pat Robertson’s campaign for president. Even though the regular column, titled “From Me to You,” was billed as Swaggart’s personal opinion, the IRS said that it still crossed the line into illegal political campaign intervention. Swaggart had also endorsed Robertson’s campaign for president during a religious service.
In that case, the IRS audited Swaggart’s organization and, as a result, the organization publicly admitted that it had violated tax law.
Phil Hackney, a professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh who spent five years in the IRS’ Office of Chief Counsel, said the fundamental question with Vance’s Courage Tour event is whether the 501(c)(3) charity that hosted the event covered the cost of Vance’s appearance.
“If the (c)(3) bore the cost, they’re in trouble,” Hackney said. “If they didn’t, they should be fine.” The whole arrangement, he added, has “got its problems. It’s really dicey.”
And even though Ziklag did not directly host the Vance event, tax experts say that its funding of the Courage Tour — as described in the group’s internal documents — could be seen as indirect campaign intervention, which federal tax law prohibits.
“The regulations make it clear that 501(c)(3) organizations cannot intervene in campaigns directly or indirectly,” Samuel Brunson, a law professor at Loyola University Chicago, said. “So the fact that it’s not Ziklag putting on the event doesn’t insulate Ziklag.”
Potential tax-law violations aren’t the only legal issue raised by Vance’s appearance.
Federal election law prohibits corporations from donating directly to political campaigns. For example, General Motors, as a company, cannot give money to a presidential campaign. That ban also applies to nonprofits that are legally organized as corporations.
Election experts said that if the funding for the Vance appearance did come from a corporation, whether for-profit or nonprofit, that could be viewed as an in-kind contribution to the Trump-Vance campaign.
Do you have any information about Ziklag or the Christian right’s plans for 2024 that we should know? Andy Kroll can be reached by email at andy.kroll@propublica.org and by Signal or WhatsApp at 202-215-6203.
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The billboards have popped up along both Interstates 55 and 170 around St. Louis. They’re along I-70 between Columbia and St. Charles, in central Missouri. And there’s one across from a shopping center in Cape Girardeau, along the Mississippi River in the state’s southeast corner.
In fact, as the Nov. 5 election approaches, motorists can see the billboards all over Missouri.
Each one spreads claims designed to undermine support for an abortion rights amendment that was placed on next month’s ballot through the state’s initiative petition process. Some billboards warn voters to “STOP Child Gender Surgery,” even though the amendment doesn’t mention gender-affirming care. Other billboards say it would permit abortions in the ninth month of pregnancy, though a state appeals court ruling in a case challenging the wording of the amendment’s summary on the ballot said that was not true.
Missouri’s abortion law, which bans nearly all abortions except in cases of medical emergencies, with no exceptions for rape or incest, was put into effect in June 2022 after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Amendment 3 would enshrine reproductive freedom in the state constitution, nullifying any law that restricts abortion before fetal viability, typically around the 24th week of pregnancy. The amendment would also safeguard other reproductive rights, such as access to in vitro fertilization and birth control. Polls show the measure is likely to pass — a recent survey showed 52% in favor and 34% opposed.
But abortion opponents, saddled with poll numbers that show their argument is losing even with the state’s largely conservative voters, are taking steps to undermine support for the amendment.
“Abortion rights are broadly popular all across the country, even in red states,” said Matthew Harris, an associate professor of political science at Park University, just outside Kansas City. “If you’re going to lose on the substance of that issue, you sort of have to try to make it about something else.”
The opponents have poured about $1 million into a late-hour misinformation campaign that has paid for radio ads and at least some of the billboards. The goal appears to be to sink the effort, or at least to try to redefine what it means to support it. Among the biggest contributors are John Sauer, the Missouri solicitor general from 2017 to 2023 who has served as a lawyer for former President Donald Trump.
Sauer, who has a long history of anti-abortion activism and represented Trump before the U.S. Supreme Court in his immunity case, has put $100,000 into a new political action committee — Vote “No” on 3 — that is funding many of the billboards, according to campaign finance reports. Sauer did not respond to voice and text messages to his cellphone. The PAC’s treasurer, Jim Cole, a longtime official with Missouri Right to Life, declined to comment.
Opponents are trying to capitalize on polls showing that Missourians oppose gender-affirming medical care for minors, which is already illegal for transgender children in the state, and allowing athletes to compete outside their birth gender. By combining the issues, political observers say, opponents are banking on confusing voters and building a broader base against the amendment.
The anti-transgender messaging in Missouri is part of a national trend, where Republicans are leveraging cultural issues like transgender rights to rally conservative voters in the 2024 campaigns.
Opponents are also strategizing about next steps if they lose at the ballot box. They are ready to shift their efforts to a more receptive audience: a state legislature dominated by deeply conservative politicians who have frequently acted against public opinion.
The Missouri General Assembly has a history of using “ballot candy,” where lawmakers add politically charged language they support to amendments to undo voter-approved measures that they don’t like. Some legislators have vowed to keep on fighting the abortion-rights amendment if it passes.
In 2018, for instance, voters overwhelmingly approved the Clean Missouri initiative, which aimed to reform some of the worst abuses of legislative redistricting. Two years later, Republican lawmakers introduced new ballot language that reframed the issue, focusing on minor ethics reforms while quietly seeking to reverse many of the changes in the Clean Missouri initiative. That repeal effort narrowly passed.
A similar tactic is evident in Missouri’s Amendment 7, which the legislature placed on this year’s ballot. While it is dressed up as a measure to ensure that only U.S. citizens can vote, something already required by law, its real impact would be to ban ranked-choice voting in the state, a move strongly supported by Republicans in the General Assembly.
Benjamin Singer, the former communications director for the Clean Missouri campaign, called the legislature’s action to undo Clean Missouri “brazen” and said the effort on Amendment 7 is part of a pattern. Singer, now chief executive officer of Show Me Integrity, a group focused on promoting democracy reforms in Missouri, said voters shouldn’t underestimate the lengths legislators will go to reverse popular measures.
“Think of the dirtiest trick in Missouri political history,” Singer said, “and plan for worse.”
State Rep. Brian Seitz, a Republican from Branson, said abortion-rights proponents were the ones playing tricks by trying to protect transgender men playing women’s sports and sex changes for minors. “What is Amendment 3 actually talking about? I say it’s a multisubject amendment that should not even be on the ballot. So might we look at those individual subjects? Of course, we will.”
Seitz said that if conservative lawmakers weren’t adequately representing the will of the people, “Why are we continuously elected?”
But while Missouri voters tend to elect conservative leaders into a legislative majority, many of the issues that resonate with voters tell a different story. Voters have rejected a law that would have allowed employees to opt out of paying union dues, legalized recreational marijuana and expanded Medicaid — policies at odds with the priorities those lawmakers have championed.
Those leaders this year tried to limit the ability of citizens to file amendments to directly change the constitution. Republicans wanted to include ballot candy in the measure that would have added unrelated issues about immigrants voting and foreign fundraising. But that measure went down to defeat after an all-night Democratic filibuster.
“Missouri voters don’t love the idea of government interference generally, but at the same time, they support conservative principles,” said Beth Vonnahme, associate dean in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences and professor at University of Missouri-Kansas City. “So when you have a candidate who’s advocating conservative principles, they win. But when you have amendments that are progressive but focus on government interference, they also tend to do pretty well.”
Before the abortion amendment made it on the ballot, it survived a number of legal challenges. In September, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled 4-3 to keep Amendment 3 on the ballot, rejecting claims that the initiative failed to list all laws it might affect.
Still, state Sen. Mary Elizabeth Coleman, a Republican from Jefferson County and an architect of the Missouri abortion ban — and one of the plaintiffs in the state Supreme Court case — said amendment proponents are lying “by saying it won’t do some things that it very obviously will do.” She said that if Amendment 3 passes, the only way for lawmakers to undo the damage would be to put a new amendment on the ballot to overturn it.
Marcia McCormick, a Saint Louis University law professor who specializes in sexuality and the law, called the billboard claims highly misleading “straw man” arguments. She emphasized that while Amendment 3 ensures reproductive freedom, it is narrowly focused on fertility and childbirth.
Michael Wolff, a retired chief justice of the Missouri Supreme Court, said he was confident anti-abortion lobbyists are already working with legislators on a new amendment. Wolff, who helped advise the Amendment 3 proponents on ballot language, said he anticipated that the effort would lead with the transgender medical care issue, as the billboards have done.
He said lawmakers might lead a new amendment “the same way they started out with Clean Missouri — they started out with something that people would agree with,” adding, “Everybody with any resources that puts together ballot propositions is going to poll on what the voters will find attractive.”
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