Russian Money is Behind Marjorie Taylor Greene's Message

MGT is pushing the false narrative that Ukraine persecutes Christians and Russia does not - exactly the opposite of reality. Documents show a Russian oligarch is funding that message on Capitol Hill.

Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens are aggressively lying about religious freedom in Ukraine. If you look at MGT’s most recent media hit on Steve Bannon’s show (and do it only if you have to) you can see she uses the classic bridge technique to go from frozen Russian assets to what she wants to talk about - Ukraine is somehow a war on Christianity. She has gotten talking points and wants to stick to them. And they echo a document put out just before Easter by the Russian Orthodox Church declaring a Holy War against Ukraine and the West.

MTG is part of a campaign.

(Also, everything she says in that thirty-six seconds is, in fact, a lie. And it covers up the Russians torturing and murdering evangelical Christians in occupied Ukraine.)

Campaigns to promote or defeat legislation have public components - surrogates like MTG and Candace Owens giving talking points on TV - and they have a lobbying component. I don’t know what motivates Owens, Tucker and MTG, but the lobbying component of this campaign is funded by a Russian/Ukrainian oligarch known as “Putin’s Whip” who is currently a deacon in the Russian Orthodox Church.

I have been working to get the truth out about this for nearly a year. The following is just about everything I know that pushes back on MTG and the crew. It starts with a few myths and facts, and then delves into highly documented detail for those who are interested in diving deep.

A clip from Marjorie Taylor Greene featured on Russia24, one of several dozen media hits we found of her on propaganda channels owned by the Russian government.

FACT: The Ukrainian Orthodox Church is a National Security Problem for Ukraine

The Ukrainian government is trying to curtail a national security problem posed by the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which has direct ties to the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow. Some conservative influencers are calling this “religious persecution.” Their message is being amplified on Capitol Hill by a lobbying team being paid by a Russian-Ukrainian oligarch known as “Putin’s Whip,” who is currently a deacon in the Russian Orthodox Church in Zurich.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church has direct ties to the Russian Orthodox Church – it represents a working arm of the Kremlin. Some 22 Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) priests have been convicted of crimes like helping Russians target artillery or reporting on Ukrainian troop movements. 72 priests are under investigation. With approx. 10,000 priests who have spent a lifetime reporting to Moscow, the UOC makes an excellent spy network.

The Russian Orthodox Church is not a church like most Americans would think of one. Pope Francis has characterized Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill as “Putin’s altar boy.” Kirill has said Russian soldiers who die in Ukraine will have all their sins washed away Kirill stopped short of promising 72 virgins, but the strategy of creating martyrs is the same as that of ISIS.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church, with its ties to the Russian Orthodox Church, is a national security problem for Ukraine much like TikTok is for the United States. It is a channel for a foreign government to do harm. Congress wants to ban TikTok unless it gets new ownership. The parliament of Ukraine has drafted a bill to close individual churches affiliated with Russia unless they find “new ownership” and renounce the Russian affiliation.

Despite what advocates for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church might say, the church is still connected to the Russian Orthodox Church. The claim of a “break” from the Russian Orthodox Church came from a May 2022 Facebook post by the UOC; no formal announcement of the split has been communicated to local UOC churches. Many senior officials in the UOC maintain positions in the Russian Orthodox Church. The UOC has taken no steps to police their own bad actors who have collaborated or are collaborating with the Russians.

FACT: There is Systematic Persecution of Christians by Russian Forces in Ukraine

The disinformation campaign being conducted by some conservative influencers is covering up the systematic destruction of Protestant churches in Russian-occupied Ukraine and the torture and murder of evangelical pastors. Thirty Christian leaders have been murdered by Russian forces and 26 pastors are imprisoned. As many as 87 percent of Ukrainians identify as Christians. Baptists, with 105,000 members and nearly 2200 congregations, are the third largest denomination in Ukraine. More than 400 Baptist congregations have been lost in Russian occupied Ukraine.

Evangelical ministers report being tortured with electricity to their genitals. Evangelical pastors from Russian occupied Melitopol report that every Protestant church in their city has been closed. The Russians cut down the cross from the Melitopol Christian Church and replaced it with a Russian flag, making it the Russian Ministry of Culture.

FACT: The Ukrainian Orthodox Church Has Little Support in Ukraine

Some conservative influencers say “Zelensky is arresting nuns and priests,” but there is no widespread arrest of priests. Fewer than 1 percent of Ukrainian Orthodox priests are in the Ukrainian justice system.

The vast majority of Ukrainians view the UOC as a national security threat. Eighty-five percent of Ukrainian citizens want the government to do something about the UOC. Sixty-six percent want the church banned completely.

Ukrainians have been leaving the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in droves for years. Polling shows that less than 4 percent of Ukrainians identify as parishioners of the UOC, down from 70 percent in the 1990s. As many as 968 UOC parishes have begun reporting to the Kyiv Patriarch since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The parishes left in the UOC are the last holdouts for Moscow.

DOCUMENTATION

The Ukrainian parliament is debating Draft Law 8371, a bill that would prohibit Ukrainian religious entities from affiliating with religious organizations that are based or have a management center in a country waging armed aggression against Ukraine.

From a Wall Street Journal Op-Ed by Jillian Melchior, Is Religious Liberty ‘Under Attack’ in Ukraine?

The bill wouldn’t establish new crimes or criminal penalties. It would prohibit Ukrainian religious entities from affiliating with religious organizations that are based or have a management center in a country waging armed aggression against Ukraine. It would also prohibit religious entities from spreading propaganda, including material calling for the destruction of Ukraine, genocide of the Ukrainian people, and Russia’s violent conquest and occupation of other states.

Each of the thousands of Ukrainian Orthodox Church parishes would be treated individually under the law. If it is found in violation of the law and refuses to cut ties with Russia, it would lose its legal status as a religious entity. That would terminate its tax benefits and lease agreements, including for state-owned religious properties. Its assets would be liquidated under court supervision.

The bill would impose no restrictions on believers’ right to assemble, preach or pray. Nor would anything prevent a church that loses its status from reincorporating as a business or other legal entity, says Mykyta Poturaiev, head of the legislative committee drafting the bill.

The Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) is a working arm of the Kremlin.

Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill has said Russian soldiers who die in Ukraine will have all their sins washed away. Kirill stopped short of promising 72 virgins, but the strategy of creating martyrs is the same as that of ISIS. Pope Francis characterized Kirill as “Putin’s altar boy. A search of Google Images on the phrase “Russian Orthodox priests blessing tanks will show dozens of photos of men in robes sprinkling holy water on weapons of war. Russian Orthodox priests preach about how to bless rockets before they are launched. Just before Easter 2024, the Russian Orthodox Church declared a “Holy War” on Ukraine.

Evangelical pastors from occupied Ukraine say that the Russian military is shutting down all Protestant churches in occupied regions of Ukraine because they see the Baptist faith, Pentecostal faith and other Protestant denominations as American religions, so they assume them to be agents of the US government like the Russian Orthodox priests are agents of the Kremlin.

The disinformation campaign being conducted by these conservative influencers is covering up for the systematic shutting down of Protestant churches in Russian-occupied Ukraine and the torture and murder of evangelical pastors.

While Russia is persecuting people of many faiths in Ukraine, Protestants are being targeted disproportionately. Protestants make up about 4% of the Ukrainian population, but they comprise more than a third of the documented incidents of Russian persecution. At least thirty Christian leaders have been murdered by the Russians and some 26 pastors are imprisoned.

Post war surveys show as many as 87% of Ukrainians identify as Christians. Baptists, with 105,000 members and nearly 2200 congregations, are the third largest denomination in Ukraine after Orthodox and Greek Catholic. More than 400 Baptist congregations have been lost in Russian occupied Ukraine.

Evangelical ministers report being tortured by Russians with electricity to their genitals. One minister reports being tortured with an electrical taser while a Russian Orthodox priest tried to cast demons out of him for being an Evangelical Christian. Evangelical pastors from occupied Melitopol report that every Protestant church in their city has been closed. As one example, the Russians cut down the cross from the Melitopol Christian Church and replaced it with a Russian flag and turned the church into the Russian Ministry of Culture. The Grace Baptist Church in Melitopol has video of a Russian soldier in full combat gear taking the stage from the worship team and telling believers to stay in their seats so the Russians can search their phones and fingerprint them.

Many UOC priests have collaborated with the Russians.

Many UOC priests preach pro-Russian messages. Media reports indicate UOC priests and bishops in regions liberated from Russian occupation collaborated with Russians. Ordinary Ukrainians liberated from Russian occupation report monasteries and churches linked to the UOC and Russia being used to aid Russian soldiers. Almost 1% of the priests are under investigation for treasonous activities. Many UOC priests in occupied regions like Kharkiv and Kherson fled to Russia when the Ukrainians liberated these areas.

With just more than 8,000, the UOC has the most parishes of any religion in Ukraine, although with 4% of Ukrainians identifying as parishioners, that is a lot of empty churches. However, with some 10,000 clergy across Ukraine who have spent a lifetime reporting to Moscow, the UOC makes an excellent spy network.

Some 22 Ukrainian Orthodox Church officials have been convicted of unlawful collaboration with Russians or other war-related crimes, according to Viktor Yelenskyi, Ukraine’s top executive official on matters of religion and freedom of conscience. Priests have been convicted for informing Russia of Ukrainian positions and otherwise spying and for disseminating propaganda urging the government’s overthrow. Mr. Yelenskyi estimates another 72 people connected with the church are subject to criminal proceedings or have been issued notice of suspicion. – Wall Street Journal Op-Ed by Jillian Melchior, Is Religious Liberty ‘Under Attack’ in Ukraine?

However, despite Tucker Carlson saying “Zelensky is arresting nuns and priests,” there is no widespread arrest of priests. Fewer than 1% of Ukrainian Orthodox priests are in the Ukrainian justice system.

There are about 10,000 priests in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. As noted above, just under 1% are currently undergoing criminal proceedings. These are a response to treasonous activities by clergy who report to a hostile power in a time of war, rather than any widespread political or religious clampdown.

The vast majority of Ukrainians view the Ukrainian Orthodox Church as a national security threat. Eighty-five percent of Ukrainian citizens want the government to do something about the UOC. Sixty-six percent want the church banned.

A May 2023 poll shows that 85% of Ukrainians want the government to do something about the activities of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. This is up seven percentage points from December 2022, when 78% of Ukrainians wanted government intervention in the affairs of the UOC.

The May 2023 poll shows that 66% Ukrainians want the church banned completely, up 12 points from the December 2022 poll.

Advocates for the UOC try to portray the situation with the UOC as a conflict with its rival, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine that reports to the Patriarch in Kyiv. It is worth noting that the 85% of Ukrainians who want the government to do something about the UOC is nearly twice the 45% of Ukrainians who are adherents to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine – Kyiv Patriarchate. This is not a dispute between sects, the UOC is seen as a national security problem by almost all Ukrainians.

Ukrainians have been leaving the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in droves for years. Polling shows that less than 4% of Ukrainians identify as parishioners of the UOC, down from 70% in the 1990s. More than 1000 UOC parishes have come to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine that reports to the Kyiv Patriarch since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The parishes left in the UOC are the last holdouts for Moscow.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church was once the most-attended church in Ukraine. In the nineties, as many as 70% of Ukrainians were members of the church.

After the 2014 invasion of Donbas, where Ukrainians saw reports of UOC priests sheltering Russian officers in their monastery and blessing the leaders of the breakaway Luhansk Republic, membership in the Moscow-backed church dropped. 

By 2015, the UOC was the second largest denomination in Ukraine, behind the homegrown Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) that reports to the Patriarch in Kyiv. Twenty-four percent of Ukrainians identified as parishioners in the UOC that reports to Moscow, versus 33 percent for the OCU that reports to the Kyiv patriarch.

A November 2021 survey, three months prior to the full-scale invasion, showed only 14 percent of Ukrainians with the UOC. Today, while as many as 87% of Ukrainians identify as Christians, surveys show that just 4% of Ukrainians identify as parishioners of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

According to the Religious Information Service of Ukraine, a branch of the Ukrainian Catholic University, 968 UOC parishes have joined the Orthodox Church of Ukraine – Kyiv Patriarch since the beginning of the war. Other sources report 589.  The parishes that remain are the last holdouts for Moscow.

Despite what advocates for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church might say, the church is still connected to the Russian Orthodox Church.

The extent of the UOC separation from the Moscow Patriarchate is a Facebook post announcing their independence and a statement at the beginning of the war expressing regret. The DC lobbyist for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church wrote a white paper with a page cataloguing the supposed UOC separation efforts from the Russian Orthodox Church. It devotes a paragraph each to the two statements referenced above while the rest details UOC humanitarian aid efforts. Humanitarian aid is admirable, but it is not a separation from Moscow.

The process for an Orthodox Church to gain independence from the Moscow Patriarch requires extensive proceedings in the Orthodox church, a years long process recently completed by the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Nearly two years after their Facebook announcement, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church has taken no action to begin these proceedings.

In May of 2023, officials from the UOC met with Ukrainian government officials and asked how they could prove the UOC was not controlled by the Moscow Patriarchate. The Ukrainian government asked for simple actions such as notifying local UOC churches of the separation from Moscow. They requested UOC bishops and clerics who currently hold positions in the Russian Orthodox Church to publish statements of their withdrawal from the ROC. They asked that the UOC to police their own bad actors and punish clerics who had collaborated with the Russian occupying forces. As of April 2024, there is no record of these requests have been acted upon.

While it is difficult to gauge the motivations of Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens and other conservative influencers, Russian money is paying for lobbyists on Capitol Hill to amplify their message.

Attorney Bob Amsterdam is leading a team of lobbyists on Capitol Hill that is telling members and staff that Zelensky is persecuting the branch of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

One of his main messages is that the UOC has broken ties with the Russian Orthodox Church. He is being paid to say that by Russian-Ukrainian oligarch Vadym Novinsky, who is currently a deacon in the Russian Orthodox Church in Zurich District Six.

Novinsky received Ukrainian citizenship from pro-Russian Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych. Yanukovych also gave Novinsky a seat in parliament, where Novinsky became known as “Putin’s Whip” for aggressively promoting pro-Russian legislation.

Amsterdam’s other clients include the government of Venezuela and Kim Dotcom.

Ukraine is a Christian nation.

A 2022 poll shows that 87 percent of Ukrainians identify as Christian.

Orthodox 62.7%

Roman Catholic 1.9%

Greek Catholic 10.2%

Protestant and Evangelical 3.7%

I am simply Christian 8.7%

Thirty-two percent of Ukrainians report attending church at least once a week, vs. 31% of Americans.