Florida House Chaplain Secretly Funded by anti-LGBTQ+ Group
Florida House Chaplain Secretly Funded by anti-LGBTQ+ Group
"Oh, my God. That's the chaplain?"
This is the first of a series on the Fellowship Foundation, aka The Family, and its employee in the Florida House. You can support future stories and accountability journalism with a donation or by becoming a paid subscriber.
Florida’s legislative chaplain has been paid for years by the secretive Christian group that sent a member of Congress last year to bolster Uganda against blowback from its new LGBTQ+ death penalty, tax filings show.
The records say that Florida House Chaplain Tim Perrier has been paid six figures in some years, as recently as 2019. The House directory describes the office of the chaplain as “a volunteer-staffed office.”
The payments came from The Fellowship Foundation, aka The Family, which runs the National Prayer Breakfast and has received backing from GOP megadonors and anti-LGBTQ+ crusader Franklin Graham. Fellowship leaders backed the lie that Pres. Joe Biden stole the 2020 election.
Perrier is listed on Fellowship tax forms as a 40-hour-per-week employee. When the Florida House is in session, Perrier is typically there.
He also helps run Florida’s weekly legislative prayer sessions and annual prayer breakfast. (The guest speaker at last year’s Florida prayer breakfast praised a former Navy SEAL accused of murder but pardoned by Pres. Donald Trump.)
Perrier is also involved in at least two Fellowship activities not officially tied to Florida legislators. One is the Florida Student Leadership Forum that Perrier runs, with varying degrees of transparency about its Christian proselytizing or The Fellowship’s role.
The other activity is the National Prayer Breakfast. Perrier has been entrusted by The Fellowship as part of its Florida team that gets to hand out coveted invitations to the once-prestigious event. He’s also participated in at least two spinoff events in other countries.
Like most Fellowship insiders, Perrier is no fire-breathing evangelical. They pride themselves on embracing anyone, from lobbyists to dictators. (Rarely journalists, however; Perrier did not respond to my request for comment.)
A source who’s been close to The Fellowship described Perrier to me as “very funny” and not especially political (Perrier’s a registered Republican but donated to a Fellowship-connected Democrat). The source told me, “A lot of people like him — he would be engaged with anybody.”
That’s consistent with The Fellowship’s m.o. Its associates are often social, soft-spoken and thoughtful, and not brazenly political. But they also provide emotional and spiritual support to political “key men,” including far-right politicians and literal dictators enacting Draconian policy.
For instance, as I revealed last year, The Fellowship paid for Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI) to attend the 2023 Ugandan National Prayer Breakfast. Uganda’s president is under global economic pressure since signing an LGBTQ+ death penalty into law. Walberg urged the nation, “Stand firm.”
Congressional Equality Caucus Chair Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) asked The Fellowship about my reporting. But The Fellowship defied his request by to take a position on the law or Walberg’s remarks.
In the only interview I could find where Perrier discusses The Fellowship, he doesn’t disclose the payments he receives from them. But he does discuss the secrecy.
“It’s not being secretive,” Perrier told Pastor John Charles Royer. “It’s being discreet.”
Perrier is so discreet, one Florida lawmaker told me they thought someone else was the chaplain. So I showed them Perrier’s picture.
“Wait,” they said. “Oh my God, that’s the chaplain? Because he's always on the House floor. … I thought he was, like, in the speaker's office.”
“Encouragement and Prayer”
The Florida House directory says Perrier’s job includes “personal meetings [with House members] for encouragement and prayer.”
Historically, The Fellowship has maintained a nonsectarian public veneer while aggressively encouraging leaders toward Jesus. A judge even ruled that Nebraska’s version of Perrier’s student forum encouraged Christian theocracy.
“The evidence is abundant that the design of these activities is to let those in leadership positions know that it is acceptable and possible to lead with their faith rather than hide their faith,” the judge wrote.
Author Jeff Sharlet has written that The Fellowship encourages leaders to the political right, both overseas and here.
Sharlet wrote that The Fellowship moved former Rep. Tony Hall (D-OH) to the right. A few years ago, I uncovered how The Fellowship created the Mike Lindell we know today.
A 2021 report by the European Parliamentary Forum on Sexual and Reproductive Rights concluded that right-wing Christian politicians“socialised political elites onto regressive positions through prayer breakfasts.”
In Florida, I’m told, at least one LGBTQ+ legislator has attended the weekly legislative prayer meetings. But there’s no indication Perrier has reached out to encourage them as the House majority legislates their rights away.
House Republicans, however, appear grateful for the chaplaincy’s encouragement.
Speaker Paul Renner (R-Palm Coast) has been leading the Florida House drive to the right. House votes have targeted Black history, drag performers, LGBTQ+ education, and abortion rights. House Republicans also voted to let untrained self-styled chaplains operate in public schools.
And last year, the National Day of Prayer came one day after the House passed a bill barring diversity, equity, and inclusion measures at public universities. Renner used the occasion to post an appreciation of Perrier for his “friendship, prayers, and encouragement.”
In 2014, as Perrier stepped up from associate chaplain, then-Speaker Pro Tempore Marti Coley praised departing Chaplain Bob West for his “support and encouragement.” Later that year, Coley co-sponsored a fetal-viability bill banning some abortions and imposing restrictions on doctors.
It’s not as if Perrier doesn’t associate with any Democrats. But they tend to be religious and centrist. By contrast, his Republican circle includes right-wing extremists.
The source who’s been close to The Fellowship told me that Perrier isn’t independently wealthy, and that he relies on donor support to subsidize his work at the Florida Capitol.
In fact, the source said, Perrier “was one of the top-paid associates” one year. The source said The Fellowship doesn’t pay associates like Perrier out of a common pool. Associates raise their own salaries, from their own donors, which The Fellowship then handles as sort of an administrative clearinghouse.
So who exactly are the donors who have paid to keep Perrier encouraging Florida lawmakers for the past two decades? “Friends.”
“I Have Friends Who Are Very Supportive”
In a 2020 interview, Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops Executive Director Michael Sheedy asked Perrier about ministering to lawmakers of varying faith traditions.
Sheedy: “I would imagine it’s a little stretching, sometimes, just to kind of connect to folks from different traditions. You know, how have you experienced that, or what is some of the wisdom that Bob West imparted, or, how do you think about that? How’s that journey been for you?”
Perrier: “Yeah, well, it’s, uh, again, I have friends who are very supportive of the work I’m doing and who really are excited about it. But they say, ‘Gosh, I could never do that. I would, I’d, number one, either want to, you know, talk politics to ‘em and try to see eye to eye in politics,’ or they’d say, ‘Gosh, I’d keep trying to steer them towards my particular faith.’”
Perrier didn’t say who his friends are, how or why they support his work, or what their politics and faith are. But we do know who he chose to invite to the National Prayer Breakfast in two recent years.
Internal Fellowship records I obtained show that Perrier handed out coveted tickets to the National Prayer Breakfast in 2016, when Pres. Barack Obama spoke, and 2018, when it was Pres. Donald Trump. Typically, private citizens who attend are only those who can afford the travel, lodging, and ticket fees, which are in the hundreds of dollars.
Perrier invited dozens of people.
The Museum of The Bible — built by the billionaire Green family that won the Supreme Court Hobby Lobby ruling allowing religious anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination — has strong connections to the breakfast. Hobby Lobby CEO and founder Steve Green was a guest of Sen. James Lankford (R-OK).
Museum President Cary Summers attended at Perrier’s invitation. So did Executive Director Tony Zeiss, who now helps CEOs “transform their workplace into faith-based cultures.” A consultant paid $100,000 by the museum also attended as Perrier’s guest.
He has connections to other wealthy people, as well. His breakfast guests include Florida business owners and executives in construction, real estate, finance, and health care. A handful are Democrats, but they’re outnumbered by Republicans active in semi-theocratic organizations.
A 2011 tax filing shows a $1,000 donation to Perrier via the Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative. The organization is a donor-advised fund — meaning the donor is anonymous.
The filing says that “The donor advisor is recommending this contribution be in support of Tim Perrier, Florida Vision Account #845.”
The account number suggests that Perrier has had a standing Fellowship account to which his donors direct their gifts. By the time of that donation, Perrier was officially associate chaplain of the Florida House.
Perrier’s Florida Student Leadership Forum also generates financial backing. In 2019, he got a check for $2,000 from a committee of then-Rep. Cary Pigman (R-Sebring). It was made out to The Fellowship’s d/b/a. The address was Perrier’s residence.
In 2011, Perrier and a consultant for Harbour Petroleum attended the First Dominican Youth Forum in Santo Domingo. By 2016, the consultant was a financial advisor at a firm with strong ties to The Fellowship, and Perrier invited him to the National Prayer Breakfast.
The Dominican event was explicitly modeled on Perrier’s Florida student forum.
Last May, Perrier flew to Bulgaria, attending the Bulgarian National Prayer Breakfast, another Fellowship spinoff.
Federal tax law requires The Fellowship to disclose for every year its five highest-paid employees making more than $100,000. That means Perrier would not be named in years when he made less than $100,000 or in year when five other associates were paid more than he was. He appears in the Fellowship returns for three years:
2016 - Associate ($105,572, 40 hours/week)
2018 - Associate ($126,388, 40 hours/week)
2019 - Associate ($116,721, 40 hours/week, plus $2790 from other organization)
When I told the legislator about Perrier making six figures a year from The Fellowship, they responded, “That’s crazy.”
Other than chamber leadership, Florida’s part-time legislators earn $29,697 a year, which makes it difficult for working-class people to afford the job. Reportedly, about half of the Florida House and Senate are millionaires.
Some of Florida’s lawmakers meet every week for prayer.
Invitations are sent out by Rep. David Borrero (R-Sweetwater), a conservative who sponsored a bill to ban LGBTQ+ Pride flags at government facilities. One invitation I saw from earlier this year, however, said it was sent on behalf of an outside group.
“This is a friendly reminder,” Borrero’s mass email said. “[T]he House Legislative Prayer Caucus invites you to join us again for our weekly morning prayer meeting…”
The House Legislative Prayer Caucus is the Florida arm of the Congressional Prayer Caucus Foundation, which is co-chaired by Walberg and Lankford.
I’m a veteran journalist and TV news producer who’s worked at MSNBC, CNN, ABCNews, The Daily Show, Air America Radio, and TYT. You can support my independent reporting with a donation or a paid subscription.
This is why no government should *EVER* have or support a chaplaincy. If a legislator or government official feels the need to talk to and/or pray with a member of the clergy, let them do so in an *UNOFFICIAL* capacity.
Florida. The home of Anita Bryant. Enough said.