Televangelists brush off Senator Grassley's fund-raising probe


In God We Trust A few weeks ago, I wrote about Senator Charles Grassley's plans to investigate the fund-raising and spending practices of several prominent televangelists.

Well it looks there's some foot-dragging going on. Four of the ministries in question did not turn over the information requested by Thursday's deadline.

Particularly egregious is the behavior of the ministry of Creflo Dollar, whose lawyer has told the Senate Finance Committee that it will have to subpoena to get the information it is seeking. That way, the lawyer says, the information can't be posted publicly.


But what exactly is Mr. Dollar worried about? That Americans will learn about his $2.5 million apartment in Manhattan? The New York Times already wrote about that!

But it's pretty clear that Creflo & Co. like to hide information. According to the Times, "Wall Watchers, an evangelical organization that monitors the finances of Christian ministries, gave Mr. Dollar's organization an 'F' grade for financial transparency in its yearly report and urged donors not to give to it and similar groups."

It's possible that these organizations are just stonewalling for fun. It seems more likely that Senator Grassley has stumbled into a world of greed and malfeasance, and probably won't be able to fully penetrate it without subpoenas. Hopefully he will have the backbone to do just that.

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