Rick Perry’s ties to PHC

An interesting article in the August 27, Huffington Post describes the relationship between Rick Perry and “conservative Christian” businessman and financier Dr. James Leininger.  The entire article is worth a read.  I’ll quote the section on Leininger’s largess to Patrick Henry College.  Readers may also want to note that Dimitri Kesari, Eugene Delgaudio, and his former aide Donny Furgeson all have Texas ties, as does Prison Fellowship Ministries.  The head of the Texas State Board of Education is a PFM “Centurion” (an activist who has completed a program of ideological training to implement the PFM/Chuck Colson “worldview”).

Leininger has also bankrolled a number of anti-abortion groups, including Texas Right to Life, Heidi Group and the Christian Pro Life Foundation. His charity, The Covenant Foundation, Inc., contributed at least $450,000 from 1997 to 2005 to the Medical Institute for Sexual Health, an abstinence-only advocate. In 2005, he gave $100,000 in support of an amendment banning gay marriage.

The Covenant Foundation, Inc., charity has also been another way for Leininger to project his money into Christian conservative causes. The biggest benefactor of the charity’s largesse in the past few years has been the conservative Patrick Henry College, which received $9.3 million in contributions from 2008 to 2009. Leininger sits on the Board of Trustees of the school.