Prevo’s boast proves why we need to tax politician preachers
On Halloween of 1980, the late historian Gore Vidal appeared on an episode of “The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson” to talk about politics in advance of the upcoming presidential election. Vidal took the occasion to mock Republicans’ recent embrace of evangelical Christianity, remarking sarcastically that it was the first time he’d heard “that Jesus was a Republican.”
The line got laughs after a campaign season that had seen Ronald Reagan join forces with a newly emerging brand of evangelical Christianity that was rapidly gaining popularity due to the rise of megachurch television preachers like Jerry Falwell, Billy Graham and Pat Robertson.
Vidal went on to tell Carson he thought religious organizations ought to have the same free-speech protections guaranteed to everyone under the Constitution. But, he said, churches should also have their privileged status taken away if they want to use their wealth to influence American elections.
“Tax them.”
The audience erupted in applause.
A week later, Falwell’s “Moral Majority” political organization was widely credited with helping sweep Reagan to victory over Jimmy Carter, and over the next four decades the power of evangelical pastors — virtually all of them men — over American politics has only grown, to the point now where the preachers and the politicians are literally the same people.
Perhaps no place is that more evident than Anchorage, Alaska, where former televangelist Jerry Prevo has amassed a personal fortune for himself and his family while simultaneously becoming the most powerful political figure in the state without ever having to pay a cent in taxes on any of his church-related political activities. Prevo was a close friend and confidant of Falwell’s, and founded the Alaska branch of the Moral Majority in 1979.
Prevo is the founder and former leader of the Anchorage Baptist Temple, an East Anchorage megachurch that comes complete with its own media empire, a K-12 school and more ties to local politics than Tennessee’s got moonshiners. But he now serves as president of Liberty University, which was founded by the segregationist Falwell in 1971 in Lynchburg, Virginia and now boasts an enrollment of more than 45,000 undergrads.
Falwell and Prevo both routinely used their pulpits to preach against homosexuality, an issue both men seem to have fixated on throughout their careers. Prevo was a leading voice against anti-discrimination ordinance that eventually passed the Anchorage Assembly in 2015, with Clary helping funnel $80,000 to an effort to defeat the ordinance in 2012, according to state filings.
At the time of that donation, it was reported that the church was able to make such a large donation to a political campaign because the rules on referendums were murky, according to the Anchorage Daily News.
Falwell, meanwhile, popularized the phrase “Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” during his opposition to gay marriage legislation and was accompanied by Prevo on a 1985 to South Africa in support of the pro-apartheid government of F.W. DeKlerk.
Prevo has long used his tax-exempt status to wield power and influence in Anchorage and has occasionally come under public scrutiny.
In 2004, tax assessors in Anchorage revoked Anchorage Baptist Temple’s tax exemptions for several properties that were determined to have little or nothing to do with church business. But just two years later, Prevo was able to restore many of those exemptions when the Alaska Legislature broadened the list of properties that could be considered exempt for religious purposes.
The issue came up again in 2010, when it was revealed that Prevo’s son, Allen, was gaining equity in a home that was receiving tax breaks through the church while not employed as a minister there. According to reporting by Jeanne Devon in the “Mudflats” blog, the judge in that case was floored to learn of the agreement.
“If there was a tax assessor or a reporter from the Anchorage Daily News, things would not look good,” the judge said during the case, according to multiple media reports at the time.
The church has enjoyed federal tax-exempt status since 1970, according to the IRS.
The tax exemptions carved out for the church were secured in part by Prevo’s right-hand man in Alaska, the longtime Anchorage Baptist Temple pastor who until recently also served as chair of the Alaska Republican Party. Clary recently left Alaska to take a job alongside Prevo at Liberty, where he will again serve under his old boss as a vice president.
Religious institutions are barred from intervening in politics by federal law, but religious leaders like Prevo and Falwell have long been adept at finding ways around this prohibition. Prevo’s ability to influence local politics is far-reaching.
The church-owned “Christian Broadcasting Network” has its own radio station, Eagle River’s KVNT, which for several years hosted “The Amy Demboski Show,” a daily program featuring the conservative Eagle River politician who now serves as chief of staff to Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson.
Bronson himself is a member of the Anchorage Baptist Temple, which is now led by Ron Hoffman. Under Hoffman, the church has remained adept at taking advantage of free taxpayer money, receiving hundreds of thousands in federal COVID bailout funding despite loudly protesting any measures on gathering sizes or masking that may have helped slow the spread of the disease.
Prevo’s church has not been shy in its attempts to shape local politics, primarily in areas in which ABT sought greater protections for its right to discriminate.
The Anchorage Baptist Temple’s ability to both play a major role in local politics while also shielding itself from having to pay its share of taxes recently came under greater scrutiny when it was revealed that Prevo was caught on tape bragging about his ability to evade taxes and influence local politics at the same time.
“I have a 50c3 church. For 30 years, I’ve known how to handle that and not get into trouble,” Prevo said, according to a report in Politico. “The homosexual community has tried to take me down for at least 30 years, and they have not been successful because I know how to work the 50c3.”
Prevo went on to say that “getting people elected” is one of his “main goals,” according to the tape, which was recorded secretly by former Liberty vice president Scott Lamb.
That Prevo is so brazen about his ability to influence politics while taking advantage of tax loopholes should anger every Alaskan, regardless of political or religious affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity or anything else. Because the bottom line is that people should not be able to hide behind religion to advance the cause of their politics.
Gore Vidal was right. We need to remove all tax exemptions for churches in all shapes and forms because as Jerry Prevo himself admits, the pulpit has become nothing more than a tax shelter for those who want to tell other people what to do. It’s not fair that churches like the Anchorage Baptist Temple should receive tax breaks they can then use to help stuff the ballot box.
It’s time for Jesus to go back to being nonpartisan. Either that or he needs to register as a lobbyist.
Matt Tunseth is a freelance writer from Anchorage, Alaska. He has previously worked as a journalist at numerous media outlets in Alaska, including the (Kenai) Peninsula Clarion and others. Write to him at matthew.tunseth@gmail.com.
