(courtesy of The Texas Freedom Network)
http://www.tfn.org/site/PageServer?pagename=RRwhoCathie Adams
Longtime leader of the Texas Eagle Forum, one of the religious right’s most extremist advocacy groups, Adams has argued for dropping children from the Children’s Health Insurance Program when they turn nine years old to prevent them from using health insurance to access family planning. Adams also has supported efforts to water down the discussion of evolution in biology textbooks and to censor information on contraception and the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases in high school health textbooks.
Betty Anderson
Chairs the Montgomery County Christian Coalition.
Chuck Anderson
Chuck Anderson in 2000 was the youthful and earnest leader of the Texas Christian Coalition, where he first found employment working for Jeff Fisher. (See below for more on Fisher.)
David Barton
Founder and head of Wallbuilders, a national, Christian organization that publishes books and videos promoting theocracy, since 1997. As vice-chair of the Republican Party of Texas, Barton is a key member of the religious right’s control over the party. Barton was hired in 2004 by the Republican National Committee to travel the country and speak to about 300 evangelical pastors in an effort to win support for President George W. Bush’s reelection. He has also called the United States a “Christian nation” and called the separation of church and state “a myth.” Barton has also been involved with a group of biblical literalists called the Dominionists who believe God has called them to take over the U.S. government. For more about Barton, see Chapter 4 of The Anatomy of Power: Texas and the Religious Right in 2006.)
Wayne Christian
Christian Coalition and Promise Keepers activist and state representative, Christian (R-Center) is part of the religious-right voting bloc in the Texas Legislature.
Sue Fancher
Fancher’s bid for the state legislature in 1998 was unsuccessful, despite $25,000 in funding from James Leininger. (See below for more on Leininger.)
Becky Farrar
Farrar, of the Concerned Women for America PAC, lost her campaign for the state legislature in 1998 despite receiving $20,000 in contributions from James Leininger. (See below for more on Leininger.)
Jeff Fisher
Fisher served as executive director of the Texas Christian Coalition. He also ran Winning Strategies’ political operations with Bob Reese. (See below for more on Reese.) When Winning Strategies became mired in controversy over the use of economic development monies funding their partisan political operations, the company officially separated their political business, which Fisher then ran. He resigned from Winning Strategies and formed his own consulting group, Jeff Fisher & Associates, which has done work for radical-right candidates in races from state representative to State Board of Education. In 2000, he was elected county judge (constitutional county judge) of Van Zandt County in a special election. He won re-election to a full term in 2002 by only 84 votes, after a recount. Fisher lost his post as Van Zandt County Judge to a challenger in late September 2004. He has been the subject of dozens of news stories and much controversy during his tenure as judge. His campaign contributors in 2000 included James Leininger. (See below for more on Leininger.)
Richard Ford
Richard Ford is head of the Heritage Alliance and a longtime veteran of the so-called “culture wars.” He has led or founded a series of groups tied to the Christian right since the 1970s. But his conservative views on abortion, homosexuality and public education are not what make him remarkable. Ford is infamous for the smear campaign his political action committee, Free PAC, launched against six Republican legislative candidates in the 2002 GOP primary. Learn more about Richard Ford in a Dallas Observer profile.
Steve Hotze
Hotze is a prominent leader of anti-abortion, anti-gay and politically active religious political extremism in Houston. Hotze gained prominence while promoting a ‘Straight Slate’ of political candidates in response to Houston Mayor Kathy Whitmire’s support from the gay community. Using Christian Coalition tactics of organizing through churches and organizing on the precinct level, Hotze led the religious right’s campaign to take over the Harris County Republican Party from moderate Republicans.
Tim Lambert
President of the Texas Home School Coalition, an outgrowth of Christian Home Educators Association, Lambert frequently partners with Jeff Fisher (above) and Cathie Adams (above).
James Leininger
San Antonio physician and hospital-bed magnate James Leininger is one of the biggest funders of far-right causes in Texas. He has given millions of dollars to state political leaders in support of his efforts to create a private school voucher program in Texas. The Anatomy of Power: Texas and the Religious Right in 2006 includes a profile of Leininger.
Debe McGuire
McGuire, a Christian Coalition and American Family Association activist, is a failed candidate for the Texas legislature.
Marvin Olasky
University of Texas journalism professor and editor of World magazine, Olasky has been called "the Godfather of Compassionate Conservatism" and has been a major influence on George W. Bush's political philosophy. While his formal role as policy advisor to the Bush campaign ended after Bush’s first presidential bid in 2000, Olasky continues to act as an informal liaison between Bush and religious-right leaders nationally.
Allan Parker
Parker is an attorney who heads The Justice Foundation, a spin-off of the Texas Public Policy Foundation that litigates on behalf of far-right causes. Parker is also the Texas representative of the Washington, D.C.-based American Center for Law and Justice (an organization started by Pat Robertson to litigate for "religious and constitutional freedoms"). In addition, Parker represents Catholics United for Life in Texas and was the former Bexar County Christian Coalition president.
Bob Reese
Reese serves as head of Winning Strategies, a telemarketing and printing firm started by James Leininger (above). Winning Strategies, the political consulting firm of choice for extremist candidates funded by Leininger, benefited from public economic development funds, until press scrutiny highlighted the inappropriateness of taxpayer-subsidized partisan political operation. Reese also served on the board of CEO America, a pro-voucher group founded by Leininger.
Rick Scarborough
Scarborough is a Lufkin-based pastor with a long history of preaching politics from the pulpit. In 1996, National Public Radio called him "The Rising Star of the Religious Right" for his efforts to elect fundamentalist Christians and promote religious-right issues on the state and national levels. He has authored a number of books, including Enough is Enough: a Call to Christian Involvement, In Defense of Mixing Church and State and It All Depends on What Is...Is. In 1998, he founded Vision America, an organization that aims to “inform and mobilize Pastors and their congregations to become salt and light, becoming pro-active in restoring Judeo-Christian values in America.” The advisory board of Vision America consists of notable religious-right leaders from around the country. In 2005, Rick Scarborough launched the Judeo-Christian Council For Constitutional Restoration (JCCCR), a religious-right group created to push for limits on judicial oversight on religious and moral issues essentially removing the checks and balances provision of the U.S. Constitution and the impeachment of judges with whom the JCCCR disagrees. Scarborough has also been involved with a group of biblical literalists called the Dominionists who believe God has called them to take over the U.S. government, as noted in a Rolling Stone article entitled "The Crusaders."
Kelly Shackelford
Shackelford is president of the Free Market Foundation, which focuses on social not economic issues, and founder and chief counsel for the far-right Liberty Legal Institute. Free Market Foundation is the Texas affiliate of Focus on the Family, a far-right national organization headed by Dr. James Dobson. Shackelford's numerous religious-right legal and legislative battles in Texas are documented in a 2005 expose in the Dallas Observer.
Susan Weddington
Elected as Chair of the Texas Republican Party in 2000, Weddington was the pick of her right-wing predecessor Tom Pauken. A San Antonio native, Weddington has longstanding ties with James Leininger (above) and once worked for Leininger’s think-tank, the Texas Public Policy Foundation. With Pauken, Weddington packed party leadership with other religious-right figures. Weddington is now president/chief executive officer of OneStar Foundation, an organization created by Gov. Rick Perry in 2004 to promote the Governor’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.
Dick Weinhold
Longtime member of Pat Robertson’s inner circle and former chair of the Texas Christian Coalition, Weinhold was credited with bringing the national Christian Coalition’s headquarters to Texas in order to skirt the IRS ruling denying the group’s tax-exempt status.
Kyleen Wright
Wright is president of Texans for Life Coalition, which opposes reproductive rights including the right to choose for women. She was a prominent spokesperson for religious-right groups that supported the adoption of high school health textbooks in 2004 that included no information on contraception and the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases except through abstinence.
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