Mother Jones illustration; Getty
Last Saturday, vice presidential candidate JD Vance appeared at an event in Monroeville, Pennsylvania, hosted by Lance Wallnau, a self-proclaimed “apostle,” which means he’s a leader in a rapidly growing religious movement called the New Apostolic Reformation. NAR is a loose network of evangelical Christians, who believe that they are called to take over all aspects of society, including the government. They also believe that God speaks directly to certain Christians, whom they call prophets, often in dreams.
Lance Wallnau, a former businessman who hails from Texas, has been an influential leader in NAR circles for some time. He popularized one of its most popular concepts, the idea that there are seven “mountains” that Christians must conquer: family, religion, education, media, arts and entertainment, business, and government. That last one has become a centerpiece of his mission. He has said he believes that the political left is possessed by demons, that there is “witchcraft” controlling the presidential election, and that Vice President Kamala Harris is a Jezebel—a reference to a prostitute in the Bible. As he put it in a recent broadcast, “When you’ve got somebody operating in manipulation, intimidation, and domination—especially when it’s in a female role trying to emasculate a man who is standing up for truth—you’re dealing with the Jezebel spirit.”
But for Wallnau, politics are more than just material for fire-and-brimstone sermons, because he has an ambitious plan for the 2024 presidential election. It’s called Project 19, a reference to the 19 counties in swing states that could determine the outcome.
Fred Clarkson, a researcher with the religious extremism watchdog group Political Research Associates, has reported that Wallnau sometimes says swing states aren’t fully red because people aren’t praying hard enough. Wallnau said earlier this year, “If we don’t have apostles and prophets in the territory, then demons control the territory and the minds of people are under the influence of devils.” As my colleague David Corn wrote this week, Wallnau has been promoting Project 19 on what he has called the Courage Tour—a multi-stop traveling road show through swing states to energize evangelical voters and encourage voter registration. The Pennsylvania event last weekend that featured JD Vance took place after visits to Arizona, Michigan, and Georgia.
“If we don’t have apostles and prophets in the territory, then demons control the territory and the minds of people are under the influence of devils.”
The specifics of Project 19 are hard to come by, but one key detail is that Wallnau’s partner on the project is the America First Policy Institute, a right-wing political activism group helmed by a cadre of former Trump administration officials, including Brooke Rollins, who was acting director of the United States Domestic Policy Council under Trump, and Larry Kudlow, the former director of the National Economic Council. After he lost the 2020 election, Trump donated $1 million to AFPI.
AFPI hasn’t said much about Project 19 in recent months. But there are some signs that the initiative is quietly mobilizing for a final electoral push.
It turns out that over the past several weeks, America First Works, the political action arm of the America First Policy Institute, has posted several listings on Red Balloon, a right-wing job board. The posts, which have separate entries for each swing state, solicit applications for “county coordinators,” who “will lead and implement Project 19’s strategic vision in their region, providing boots on the ground and hands-on experience. This includes managing local research, content creation, coalition building, grassroots contact, and educational initiatives focused on America First messaging.”
Like its parent organization, America First Works is helmed by right-wing power players. Texas billionaire Tim Dunn serves as chairman, and Linda McMahon, a former pro-wrestler who led the Small Business Administration under Trump, serves on its board. The group has partnered with other conservative and Christian organizations around political organizing; last July, for example, it teamed up with Turning Point Action on a voter mobilization initiative.
Back in April, America First Works’ executive director, Ashley Hayek, appeared on Fox News. She explained that Project 19, which Lee Zeldin, a former Republican member of Congress from New York leads, is about “messaging and data, it’s unifying the movement, it’s Project 19, focusing on the counties that we believe will ultimately determine the next election, it’s our ballot harvesting and voter mobilization, and then, of course, day one of what a new administration looks like.”
How successful this initiative will be remains to be seen—evangelicals themselves point out that as a group, they are famously under-registered as voters. But getting out the vote is only part of the strategy. As independent journalist Judd Legum reported, Wallnau’s rally with Vance in Pennsylvania also featured Joshua Standifer, founder of the Christian political activism group Lion of Judah. Standifer described what he called a “Trojan horse” strategy: having evangelicals sign up to become poll workers. A guide that can be downloaded for free at the Lion of Judah’s website tells readers that by becoming poll workers, they can “bring light into darkness and influence the communities around them by running for office and actively seeking to bring Jesus’ Kingdom on Earth as it is in Heaven.”
It continues: “Simply put, our goal is to elevate as many Christian Patriots as possible to become Election Workers. Having Believers in key positions of influence in government like Election Workers is the first step on the path to victory this Fall.”
Correction, October 2: An earlier version of this story misidentified Lee Zeldin as a current state House representative in New York. His term ended in 2023.
