Yahoo News Pat Robertson, Conservative Televangelist and 1988 Presidential Candidate, Dead at 93
The longtime '700 Club' host was influential in Republican politics throughout his career — a controversial tone-setter for Christian conservatism in the U.S.
Pat Robertson, an influential religious broadcaster whose career blurred the line between Republican politics and evangelical ministry, died in his Virginia home early Thursday morning. He was 93.
Robertson faced a series of health challenges in recent years — including an embolic stroke in 2018 — that put his health in decline, according to an announcement by his legacy media empire, the Christian Broadcasting Network.
He is survived by four children, 14 grandchildren and 24 great-grandchildren. His wife, Dede Robertson, died last year at 94.
Robertson — who frequently came out against women's rights and the LGBTQ+ community in the name of his Christian faith, drawing widespread criticism — is best known for founding the Christian Broadcasting Network and hosting its flagship show, The 700 Club, for decades alongside televangelists like Jim Bakker and Gordon Robertson, his son and successor.
But the Southern Baptist minister's mind for business extended beyond the lucrative media empire he built with CBN. In 1977, he founded Christian Broadcasting Network University — a private Christian college in Virginia Beach, Virginia — which was later renamed Regent University. The next year, he founded Operation Blessing, an international humanitarian organization. And the family-oriented media company he spun off from CBN would undergo several sales and name changes, eventually landing in Disney's hands and leading to the birth of ABC Family and Freeform.
With his influence as a leading evangelical voice in the United States, Robertson was drawn into the world of Republican politics, a world he never fully left behind.
In 1986, Robertson prayerfully decided that he would seek his party's nomination for president in the 1988 election, ultimately losing the long-run battle to then-Vice President George H.W. Bush. He endorsed Bush for the general election.
Because Robertson had forayed into politics, he did not act as a minister in any official capacity again, returning to CBN to continue his career and plot the next move. That move quickly led to the formation of the Christian Coalition, a powerful political lobbying organization that advocates for socially conservative Christian ideals.
He also founded the Christian legal organization American Center for Law & Justice, a right-leaning antithesis to the ACLU that has, in part, served to blur the separation of church and state.
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Robertson's large legacy, which later included endorsing campaigns like Rudy Giuliani's 2008 presidential bid, comes with its stains.
Throughout the years, Robertson's intolerant comments on topics like women's rights, the LGBTQ+ community, and people of non-Christian faith drew heavy backlash for putting others down in the name of his religion.
Among his most notorious moments: suggesting that Hurricane Katrina was punishment from God for U.S. abortion policy; agreeing that gay people, feminists and the ACLU should take blame for the September 11 terrorist attacks; and calling for the assassination of Venezuela President Hugo Chávez.
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