Gluesenkamp Perez Misled Town Hall About Her Bible Study

At a town hall, the Democrat gave different accounts to angry constituents than she has to friendly media

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Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, far right, was questioned at a Jan. 30, 2025, town hall in Salmon Creek, WA, about my reporting on her Capitol Ministries Bible study. (Screengrab / CRTV video.)

When Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA) was challenged at a January town hall about her participation in a far-right Bible study, her responses differed sharply from what she had told friendly media for portraits extolling her centrism.

Despite her professed religiosity, she even got her Bible references wrong.

Gluesenkamp Perez did not respond to my questions, including a request for a transcript or video, but local news accounts of her Jan. 30 town hall describe her Bible study differently than she’s described it — before I revealed who runs it.

She gave different reasons for attending. She gave a different account of who’s influencing who at the Bible study and apparently tempered her praise for the right-wing Republicans there. In the face of aggressive questioning, Gluesenkamp Perez expressed a reluctance to discuss the subject that she hasn’t shown when it stood to benefit her politically.

Why Discuss It?

Gluesenkamp Perez’s Bible study became controversial after I revealed in January who runs it: Ralph Drollinger, a far-right evangelical who says openly that his life’s work is converting politicians to his right-wing version of Christianity.

Drollinger says he’s not a theocrat; he doesn’t want government to be religious. He just wants politicians running it based on his religious precepts.

At the town hall, according to The Chronicle, Gluesenkamp Perez suggested her commitment to separation of church and state is so strong it was only my reporting forcing her to discuss it:

“Yes, the separation of church and state is critically important,” she said, adding that she doesn’t put her faith toward her political work and that if Larsen’s article was not written, she would not be talking about it.

In fact, Gluesenkamp Perez has put her faith into her politics plenty of times, unprompted. She has defended Democratic policy on religious grounds, and volunteers that fact to friendly media.

It was Gluesenkamp Perez herself who first revealed her Bible study participation — she told the New York Times last March that she attended two Bible studies.

One, the Times reported, included Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC). The Times didn’t identify who runs it, but Hudson is a “long-time sponsor” of Drollinger’s Bible studies.

The Bible studies came up in the context of Gluesenkamp Perez’s supposed isolation from fellow Democrats. “[H]er social circle consists mostly of two Republican Bible study groups,” the Times reported. And she “says she often feels more at home among religious Republicans.”

In subsequent reporting, she only mentioned one Bible study. And heading into her state’s 2024 open primary, she offered her involvement in it, unsolicited, as part of her candidate statement.

“I attend Bible study to stay rooted and find common ground with Republicans,” she offered. She did not identify the Bible study.

She’s volunteered her Bible study in multiple media accounts in which her bipartisan engagement was portrayed — prior to Pres. Donald Trump’s second term — as an asset, a positive.

The same month as her candidate statement, Gluesenkamp Perez told Politico she’d been invited to join the group by Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-AR). The story didn’t say so, but he’s another Drollinger student.

Days before the November elections, a Seattle Times report concluded that she “sounded at times like a rural Republican legislator”:

She said she attends a regular Bible study with GOP lawmakers “because I need more Jesus, not because I need more politics.”

She’s given that reason before. And that’s what she told her January town hall. But it’s not exactly true and it’s not the only reason she’s given.

Why Attend Drollinger’s Bible Study?

Gluesenkamp Perez gave angry voters at her town hall a few reasons she attends Drollinger’s Bible study, which is held on Capitol Hill. In a statement to local media after her town hall, Gluesenkamp Perez’s office neatly summarized some of them. As the Clark County Columbian reported:

Perez said being in the group has allowed her to stay connected to her faith while traveling and share a different perspective with her colleagues while finding common ground where they agree in Scripture.

Travel came up during the town hall, too, when Gluesenkamp Perez was challenged about participating in Drollinger’s group. “I am on a plane every three days, and my faith is really central to who I am and how I’m navigating any given choice, while upholding my beliefs,” she reportedly said.

But that doesn’t explain why she chose Drollinger’s Bible study, out of multiple religious gatherings available to members of Congress. And her 2024 campaign statement said she already had a spiritual home: “I come home every weekend to be with family and go to church.”

She told town hall attendees that she goes to Drollinger’s Bible study because she needs “more Jesus,” not more politics. But she actually does go for more politics. She’s said so herself, and politics is the whole purpose of Drollinger’s Bible studies.

In 2018, Drollinger told the BBC that he founded Capitol Ministries to police politicians, to make sure they didn’t stray from his interpretations of The Bible. Capitol Ministries was born because his wife’s political action committee could help right-wing Christians beat liberals in California, but then her candidates wouldn’t follow through.

“They would send guys to California's capitol … but they would soon lose their Christian moorings," Drollinger said. Capitol Ministries keeps them moored.

And his study guides are typically about justifying religious thinking in politics or steeling oneself against unbiblical influences. Some are explicitly about current issues.

Recent ones include “Theological Liberalism: How Bad Theology Leads to Bad Policy,” from this April. It begins like this:

In the Capitol, the “compassion” and “mercy” of Liberal Theology has been used to foist a myriad of unbiblical concepts that have led to bad policy, one of the most egregious examples being entitlement programs.

This is the study guide that was used for the House study group that week. Another, last month, was titled, “Why Believers Should Be Involved in Politics.”

That same month, Gluesenkamp Perez told PBS that she uses Bible study to foster connections with Republicans, an explicitly political purpose.

She also contradicted her claim of not wanting “more politics” during the town hall itself, confirming that politics is part of it.

“It’s so important that Christians on the left are engaged in staying in the church,” she said, in a slight against the secular left. She was making the case that Bible-study attendance serves her political aims and helps her causes.

“I’m there to uphold my values and to say, ‘Use the whole [Bible]; don’t cherry pick the parts you agree with,’” she reportedly said.

She suggested to her constituents that she uses the Bible study to persuade her Republican study partners. “Being present in the space has allowed me to share a perspective that is different than my colleagues, while finding common ground on where we agree in scripture,” she said.

But that’s not what she’s said when telling the media about her bipartisanship. Outside the town hall, she’s suggested that she’s the one getting a Republican perspective from Drollinger’s group, not the other way around.

Referring to the Republican men who comprise the rest of her group, Gluesenkamp Perez told The Chronicle, “I talk to them and take counsel from them.”

She made that same point — that the Bible study influences her, despite telling her town hall she tries to influence them — during her campaign.

Last July, she told Politico that Bible study provided an “extrinsic values check.” Her campaign statement said, “I attend Bible study to stay rooted.” Not to persuade Republicans.

A Capitol Ministries social-media post last year makes clear that the sessions aren’t freewheeling colloquies.

Drollinger teaches. Politicians pay attention: “Ralph Drollinger talks about the Bible study he is teaching to political leaders in D.C.,” the post says. “PRAY for open and attentive hearts as they study God’s Word.”

Whatever converting Gluesenkamp Perez does attempt, it doesn’t seem to have yielded much fruit. Despite her bipartisan, aisle-crossing reputation, her only bill to become law was for naming a post office. Other bills she supports, and that have bipartisan support, concern issues such as right-to-repair where there was already bipartisan support.

Despite her appeals to bipartisanship and dialogue, Drollinger’s group espouses just the opposite. So did she in a January recruiting letter she co-signed and that I obtained. Arguably theocratic throughout, it specifically advises members of Congress to associate with like-minded believers.

Drollinger’s goal isn’t for members to learn from each other. It’s for them to buttress each other against outside pressure. “[S]urround yourself with people you can trust and who will encourage and uplift you when times are tough,” the letter reads. Specifically, “other believers.”

(Ironically, Gluesenkamp Perez told the town hall she joined Drollinger’s group for just the opposite reason: “As a Christian, it’s important to me that we not divide ourselves along partisan lines, but instead stay in community and conversation with others.” It’s not clear whether she participates with any progressive religious groups.)

And Drollinger has claimed he succeeds at influencing Democrats, according to a 2018 BBC article:

One Democrat, struggling with her party's support for same-sex marriage, contacted Drollinger for advice. He explained the Bible's teaching, as he saw it.

"The next bible study, she said 'that was really good'. Now she can't necessarily stand publicly on what I just taught her, but it's going on in her heart.”

It’s unclear how granular Drollinger does or doesn’t get with his study groups, so we don’t know whether he’s used those weekly opportunities to flip congressional votes.

For instance, on March 5 of this year, Gluesenkamp Perez voted with her party to table — or kill — a motion to censure Rep. Al Green (D-TX) for vocally fact-checking Pres. Donald Trump during his speech to Congress. Her vote to table may have been for reasons of procedure or optics, but the next morning, Drollinger’s House Bible study met, and coincidentally or not, a couple hours later, Gluesenkamp Perez joined just nine other Democrats voting for censure.

Either way, Slate had already noted back in 2023 that Gluesenkamp Perez was shifting politically. To the right.

Why Did She Start Going to Bible Study?

Gluesenkamp Perez told her town hall, “After arriving in Congress as a freshman, I joined Bible study not due to an adherence to a political or social ideology, but instead as a way to remain grounded in my faith away from home.”

And yet, she made no mention of her faith in her 2022 campaign statement, when she was running on a more progressive platform, touting her support for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). In fact, her parents wouldn’t pay for college because she had stopped going to church.

At the town hall, she suggested that she joined the Bible study because she wanted to find a group consisting of spiritual, committed family men. She said she found that with Drollinger’s group.

“These are men who are committed to maintaining strong marriages and raising good kids, and who are trying to maintain an inner life and hold themselves to a higher standard. As a freshman, it was important to me to find that — and frankly, that can be hard to find in Congress.”

But according to an interview she gave last year, she didn’t find Drollinger’s Bible study, it found her. Not because she was searching, but because she was proselytizing and using Jesus to scold a member of Congress. Here’s Politico from July 2024:

Once she arrived in Washington, Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.) invited Gluesenkamp Perez to a Bible study on Capitol Hill after he heard her tell another lawmaker they “needed Jesus” in response to a crude comment.

Setting aside the sectarian bigotry of her remark, if Gluesenkamp Perez had wanted to find a Bible study group it should not have been hard, as she claims it can be. They make themselves quite known on the Hill and are easily findable online.

And the way she described her study partners at the town hall left out something she had said earlier. In December, before anyone knew who she was talking about, she said, “I have real admiration for these men.” As I reported the following month, some of the co-signatories on her recruiting letter had:

• Shot at two teenagers

• Called gay people “worthy of death”

• Opposed the Juneteenth federal holiday

• And, obviously, all opposed LGBTQ+ and reproductive rights.

There’s no public sign that Gluesenkamp Perez has ever moved any of her Bible study partners with her scripture-based arguments. Which may have something to do with her getting scripture wrong.

How Studied Is the Bible?

Gluesenkamp Perez often shares anecdotes of countering GOP Bible verse with verses of her own. At the town hall, for instance, she said she reminds her Republican study partners of Jesus’s commandment: “The Bible does say to take care of your neighbor, to love your neighbor.”

As she explained to Politico last year, “I’m going to respect you when you hold a different policy position than me and when you use the Bible to back that up.” She added, “I’m also going to point to what I know about Jesus.”

But despite being homeschooled in an evangelical home, with a conservative pastor for a father, and despite all her Bible studying, in her public examples of what she knows about Jesus, she points to the wrong places, what she knows isn’t always correct, and she’s not citing Jesus.

I could only find one specific passage that she’s publicly discussed flinging at Republicans. She’s used it multiple times, on two different issues. It’s Old Testament, not Jesus. And she got it wrong.

Gluesenkamp Perez shared one example during the town hall, discussing how the Bible studies veer into politics. The conversation she described appears to have been about Republicans trying to impose work requirements for low-income families to get federal food subsidies.

She told the crowd that “when one of my colleagues says ‘he who doesn’t work won’t eat,’ it’s really important for me to say, ‘Yeah, well, yes, First Corinthians say[s] that. Leviticus also says that you should leave the corners of your field…’”

The rest of her quote isn’t included, but she recounted what appears to be the same incident more completely on the podcast of David Axelrod, former campaign and White House advisor to Pres. Barack Obama:

…when we were debating the Farm Bill, somebody quoted, a Republican quoted Corinthians where they say, like, “he who doesn't work, won't eat.” First Corinthians. And I was like, “yeah, well, Leviticus also says not to harvest the corners of your fields. You leave it for the widows and the orphans and the bastards.”

First of all, it’s not First Corinthians that forbids food without work. It’s 2 Thessalonians 3:10:

“…if any would not work, neither should he eat.”

First Corinthians is actually a pep talk/scolding to get the Corinthians in line — they were incesting even more than the pagans were — and remind them how awesome Jesus is. (Perhaps more pertinent to the Bible study group, First Corinthians also says, “Bad company corrupts good character.”)

And Gluesenkamp Perez misquotes her own Bible passage. She’s right that it’s Leviticus, but she’s wrong about who gets the harvest from the field corners. It’s not women and children and bastards. It’s a bit more progressive than that. Here’s Leviticus 23:22:

…thou shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of thy field when thou reapest, neither shalt thou gather any gleaning of thy harvest: thou shalt leave them unto the poor, and to the stranger…

“The stranger” is often interpreted as travelers who have come to the land. Immigrants.

And Republicans have already been lectured about Leviticus 23:22, to little apparent avail. An official for the Jewish nonprofit MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger quoted it in congressional testimony in 2017.

In fact, Leviticus 23:22 seems to be something of an all-purpose go-to for Gluesenkamp Perez when quoting Scripture. It was not only her example for the town hall and Axelrod’s podcast the month before, last summer she described using it to debate a different issue. Here’s Politico’s account:

Once, a lawmaker in the group suggested cutting Social Security based on a passage from 1 Timothy. Gluesenkamp Perez quoted scripture in return: “You can’t harvest out of the corners of your fields, [so] people could go out and get food,” she recounted to me…

If Gluesenkamp Perez has used other Bible verses in her ostensible Bible study sessions, she doesn’t seem to have shared it publicly. Which may mean it doesn’t happen as often as she suggested to her town hall audience.

In one respect, it shouldn’t be surprising if Gluesenkamp Perez gives different accounts of her religious/political dealings depending on who she’s talking to. The Bible advises pretty much that:

I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law… I have become all things to all people…

As it happens, that’s First Corinthians.

The Other Bible Study

Gluesenkamp Perez hasn’t publicly identified which other Bible study she was attending when she told the Times she goes to two, but there’s reason to think it might be the weekly prayer breakfast run by the Fellowship Foundation, the secretive group behind the National Prayer Breakfast.

She was endorsed by a Fellowship insider, former Rep. Don Bonker (D-WA), in her first congressional run. She’s since been active in Fellowship events, even after The Fellowship paid for another member of Congress to go boost Uganda’s LGBTQ+ death penalty.

The Fellowship’s weekly House prayer breakfast is more bipartisan than Drollinger’s group, with more Democrats and less focus on The Bible or politics. Instead, it’s been described as a discussion of personal issues outside of politics.

But it’s not clear that Gluesenkamp Perez participated in this year’s Fellowship events. And Drollinger is openly contemptuous of The Fellowship’s relatively laissez-faire approach to biblical doctrine.

Westerman, who brought Gluesenkamp Perez to Drollinger, used to be active with The Fellowship and the breakfast. But I can’t find any indication he’s participated in Fellowship activities since 2021, when Pres. Joe Biden headlined the National Prayer Breakfast.

Westerman’s last public involvement with The Fellowship was a 2020 press release about his guests at the prayer breakfast. He is, however, still active with Drollinger’s group.

And the most recent study guides say their House study sessions take place in a room allocated to the Natural Resources Committee, which Westerman chairs.

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I’m a veteran journalist and TV news producer who’s worked at MSNBC — as co-creator of Up w/ Chris Hayes and senior producer for Countdown with Keith Olbermann — CNN, ABCNews, The Daily Show, Air America Radio, and TYT. My original reporting on Substack is made possible by a handful of paid subscribers. Thank you.