Bush Faith-Based Initiatives (2001)

On January 29, 2001 — his ninth day in office — President George W. Bush signed Executive Order 13199 establishing the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives (OFBCI), with satellite centers in five federal agencies. The initiative was presented publicly as expanding the capacity of religious charities to deliver social services. Its operational consequences were considerably broader. The explicit policy goal was to allow religious organizations to compete for federal funding for social services (substance abuse treatment, homeless shelters, prisoner re-entry programs, welfare-to-work programs) without being required to remove religious content from their services or separate their religious and secular operations. Previous rules had required faith-based organizations receiving federal funds to maintain secular subsidiaries for federally-funded work; the new rules loosened or eliminated this requirement. David Kuo, who served as deputy director of the OFBCI from 2001 to 2003, published a detailed insider account ('Tempting Faith,' 2006) documenting the initiative's political function. According to Kuo: - White House political staff privately referred to evangelical leaders as 'nuts' and 'the base' - The OFBCI was valued primarily as a political relationship-maintenance tool — a mechanism for creating financial loyalty among evangelical organizations - The office was chronically underfunded compared to its stated mission; its actual purpose was symbolic and relational rather than substantive service delivery - Senior Rove political staff prioritized the office's capacity to generate evangelical voter enthusiasm over its policy effectiveness The funding flows were real, however. Between 2003 and 2006, faith-based organizations received approximately $2.1 billion annually in federal grants. Major recipients included organizations aligned with Catholic, evangelical Protestant, and Jewish religious institutions. The IRS and civil liberties organizations documented numerous cases of federally-funded religious organizations maintaining discriminatory hiring practices (refusing to hire LGBTQ employees or those of other faiths) and providing religiously-themed services to beneficiaries who had no alternative secular providers. Under subsequent administrations, the office was renamed (Obama renamed it the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships) but the basic structure of federal funding flowing to religious organizations was maintained and expanded. The Trump administration's version, combined with the Blaine Amendment challenges and the Supreme Court's Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue ruling (2020) and Carson v. Makin (2022), completed the framework by which public money flows to private religious institutions.

Themes this entry appears in

• Christian Nationalism
• Anti-Democratic
• Political Strategy

Connections to Bush Faith-Based Initiatives (2001)

• Republican Revolution (1994) influenced (1996) — The 1994 Republican Revolution produced the Gingrich Congress's 1996 welfare reform legislation (Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act), which included a 'Charitable Choice' provision authored by John Ashcroft allowing religious organizations to compete for federal social service contracts without losing their religious identity. Charitable Choice was the direct legislative precursor to George W. Bush's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, established in January 2001. The 1994 Congress created the statutory framework; Bush's faith-based initiative expanded it into executive policy. The Religious Right organizations who had provided the ground infrastructure for the 1994 revolution received, in return, the legal architecture for federal funding of their social service programs.

Sources

• Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction — David Kuo (2006), pp. 1–260
• The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism — Katherine Stewart (2020), pp. 50–70
• Thy Kingdom Come: How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America — Randall Balmer (2006), pp. 75–100