Conventional wisdom is that Mitt Romney is persona non grata among fundie voters. After all, he's got two strikes against him--he's a Mormon, and he isn't a stark raving wingnut on social issues. Well, he finally picked up an endorsement from a major religious right figure--namely, Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice.
"In order for conservatives to make the changes in Washington that we have been fighting for, we must first defeat President Obama and have a leader with a proven record of getting things done," Jay Sekulow said.
"Mitt Romney is the one candidate who can take his pro-growth message to the American people and defeat President Obama. Throughout his life, he has proven that he will not back down from difficult situations," he said.
Not surprisingly, Romney jumped at Sekulow's endorsement, calling him a frontline leader for conservative values.
Sekulow's endorsement comes as no surprise. After all, his boss, Pat Robertson, appeared at a Romney fundraiser back in July, stopped just short of endorsing Romney in October.
As it turns out, Sekulow and Romney are made for each other--like Romney, Sekulow has a tendency to stray very close to the ethical line in his business transactions. And in many cases, he's gone over it. It's been an open secret in the legal community that Sekulow uses the ACLJ as a piggy bank for himself and his family. And not only that, the ACLJ is only allowed to involve itself in First Amendment cases, but has frequently and flagrantly violated that restriction.
More after the jump ...
Back in 2005, Legal Times reported that Sekulow bought three homes for himself and his wife--with ACLJ money. It also revealed that much of the money donated to the ACLJ actually wound up with a sister organization, Christian Advocates Serving Evangelism (which does business as the ACLJ). Apparently Sekulow used CASE to report several other transactions that could easily be construed as inurement, rather than report them on the 990s for the better-known ACLJ.
The Tennessean got its hands on this story in September (the link is to a reprint from Gannett stablemate USA Today). It dug deeper, and revealed that Sekulow and his family have gotten a whopping $33 million from the ACLJ, CASE and other charities they control. It also revealed that when someone donates to the ACLJ, the actual funds go to CASE.
It also turns out that the ACLJ was heavily involved in the effort to throw out the health care bill as unconstitutional. It actually filed a lawsuit seeking to have it thrown out. The brief makes no First Amendment arguments.
Granted, this doesn't rise to the level of John Hagee's anti-Semitic rantings back in 2008 that forced John McCain to reject his endorsement. But it sure says a lot about Romney's character that he would take an endorsement from someone with Sekulow's record of playing fast and loose with tax law.