Rachel Tabachnick

Rachel Tabachnick (former PRA associate fellow) researches, writes, and speaks about the impact of the Religious Right on policy and politics including civil rights, education, economics, environment, foreign policy, and labor. She produces presentations and speaks on conservative infrastructure and the intersection of the Religious Right and other sectors of the Right, including “free market” think tanks. Rachel has been interviewed on NPR and other radio and print media across the nation on topics including the New Apostolic Reformation, Christian Zionism, and education privatization.

Right Moves: Historian Jason Stahl Opens a New Era of Scholarship on Conservative Think Tanks

The role of conservative think tanks in the modern resurgence of the Political Right has been a topic of interest to progressive activists for decades. However, academia had failed to produce a full-length historical study of conservative think…

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Profile on the Right: Oath Keepers

Oath Keepers is one of the largest anti-government “patriot” groups in the nation. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) includes the organization in its list of Hate and Extremist Groups and its Patriot Movement Timeline. Oath Keepers differs from…

Profile on the Right

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While Fischer Takes the Blame, RNC Israel Trip Will Be Led By An Even More Influential Christian Nationalist

The duplicity of those on the Right known for loudly declaring their love for Israel in an effort to inoculate their activism from charges of Christian supremacism has become increasingly transparent thanks to the RNC’s trip.

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Opening Pandora's Box

The Rise & Fall of the Right's School Voucher Pioneer

Polly Williams, the Wisconsin African American lawmaker behind the nation’s first school voucher program, believed vouchers could help students of color in urban Milwaukee. Conservative donors and right-wing think tanks saw her program as opening…

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Racist Nevada Assemblyman Ira Hansen's Long Family History of Reactionary Third-Party Politics

Assemblyman Ira Hansen (R) stepped down as speaker-elect of the Nevada Assembly on Sunday, following national publicity of a report on his racist and misogynistic columns in a local newspaper—including his labeling of Black people as “simple minded…

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Midterm Elections: School Privatization Continues to Advance DeVos/Heritage Foundation Strategy

Midterm elections present a particularly fruitful opportunity for the school privatization movement to maximize their investment. Since 1974, in mid-term or non-presidential election years, the federal election turnout has failed to reach 40% of…

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Lou Engle’s TheCall to be Held on Berkeley Campus On 50th Anniversary of Free Speech Movement

Lou Engle will not be there to commemorate the events of fifty years ago, but, in his words, to “break the curse” of that rebellion. Engle is a leading anti-LGBTQ and anti-choice activist, whose incitement has been documented in the movie God Loves…

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Profiles on the Right: Dennis Peacocke

Dennis Peacocke, one of the leading modern-day apostles of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), and, interestingly, an alumnus of Berkeley’s Free Speech Movement (FSM) protests.

Profile on the Right

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AUDIO: Officer Who Pushed CNN's Don Lemon Claims There's a Military Plot For One-World Government

St. Louis County police officer Dan Page is best known for shoving CNN host Don Lemon while the journalist was covering the Michael Brown protests in Ferguson, Missouri. Page has since been suspended after video of his speech to a right-wing militia…

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The Christian Dominionists Who Benefit from David Tyree’s Fame

Former New York Giant David Tyree’s personal views on gay marriage have been the topic of much debate since his recent hiring as director of player development for that franchise, but the press has overlooked an even more significant problem. For…

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Anti-Gay Gatekeepers of the NFL

The NY Giants’ David Tyree Controversy

The New York Giants’ hiring of former player David Tyree as the director of player development has resulted in controversy and a statement from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC). The controversy stems from a 2011 interview with the National…

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“Libertarian Scaife” and His Religious Right Legacy

Richard Mellon Scaife was the “epitome of a libertarian,” or at least, that’s how he was described in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review following his death on July 4. “Libertarian Scaife” is apparently how he wished to be remembered in the city where…

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Profile on the Right: Mike Bickle, Founder of the International House of Prayer

Mike Bickle is the founder and director of the International House of Prayer (IHOP) and one of the pioneers of the apostolic and prophetic movement (also known as the New Apostolic Reformation or NAR). IHOP, based in Kansas City, Missouri, is a…

Profile on the Right

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CPAC Counter Events Include Security Con, Ted Cruz, & Secretive White Nationalist Gathering

Several alternative events being held in conjunction in CPAC, hosted by and featuring those the American Conservative Union chose not to include in their annual gathering.

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White Supremacist “Analyst” on Cable News’ Coverage of Zimmerman & Dunn Trials

Media coverage of the trials has become enormous boon for certain white supremacists, who have managed to use mainstream news outlets as a platform for bigotry. Nowhere is this more evident—and disturbing—than in the case of Frank Taaffe.

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Beyond Bullying: Equally Excellent Education for All?

The 2014 Creating Change Conference was held in Houston, Texas on January 29 - February 2 and included several panels led by staff and fellows of Political Research Associates. The following is a summary of my portion of the panel titled “Beyond…

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Ted Cruz & ALEC

Seceding from the Union One Law at a Time

Tea Partiers, Tenthers, and the corporate sponsors who support them have come up with a variety of ways to circumvent the federal government and bypass the federal regulatory system, including efforts to hold an Article V Convention, commonly called…

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The John Birch Society's Anti-Civil Rights Campaign of the 1960s, and Its Relevance Today

Founded in 1958, the John Birch Society (JBS) fiercely opposed the Civil Rights Movement during the 1960s and 1970s. Decades later, the rise of the Tea Party and the ongoing “Ron Paul Revolution” have helped the JBS make a comeback as it attracts…

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Nullification Bills Already on the Move in 2014

Less than a month into 2014, nullification initiatives - legal theory that states can block federal laws that those states deem to be unconstitutional - are continuing to make their way through state legislatures.

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Review - Home is Where the School Is: The Logic of Homeschooling and the Emotional Labor of Mothering

Intensive Mothering

Mothers overwhelmingly bear the burden of the “immense emotional, temporal, and physical workloads required to homeschool,” Lois explains. This, she devotes her ethnography to these mothers, bypassing the more commonly researched homeschooled …

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Nullification, Neo-Confederates, and the Revenge of the Old Right

Behind the recent surge of nullification bills in state legislatures there is an ongoing battle for the soul of the GOP—and the future of the union itself. The nullification movement’s ideology is rooted in reverence for states’ rights and a…

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Anti-LGBTQ, Anti-Union "Apostles" Fielding Another Democratic Candidate

Apostle Ed Silvoso, a pioneer of the New Apostolic Reformation sweeping the nation, has mentored and supported both Republican and Democratic candidates across the nation through his franchise-like “Transformation” organizations.

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Christian Right Antigay PA Gov. Candidate Launches Democratic Campaign at LGBT Center

On March 18th, Max Myers officially kicked off his campaign for Pennsylvania governor at the William Way LGBT Community Center in Philadelphia. Touting himself as a moderate Democrat, Myers failed to mention his leadership in a politico-religious…

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The Christian Right, Reborn

The New Apostolic Reformation Goes to War

The New Apostolic Reformation, an aggressively political movement within Christianity, blames literal demonic beings for the world’s ills and stresses the power of “spiritual warfare” to deliver people and nations from their power. It is rapidly…

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The Revisionaries: Documentary Goes Inside Texas Textbook Controversy

From 2009 to 2010, the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) set about the once-a-decade task of writing curriculum standards for Texas’ almost five million school children. Claiming that “Academia is skewed too far to the left,” right-wing Board…

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The Right's "School Choice" Scheme

In June 1995, the economist Milton Friedman wrote an article for the Washington Post promoting the use of public education funds for private schools as a way to transfer the nation’s public school systems to the private sector. “Vouchers,” he wrote…

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From Schoolhouse to Statehouse

Curriculum from a Christian Nationalist Worldview

On May 21, Texas School Board member Cynthia Dunbar opened the board’s meeting with an invocation: “Whether we look to the first charter of Virginia, or the charter of New England, or the charter of Massachusetts Bay, or the Fundamental Orders of…

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The New Christian Zionism and the Jews: A Love/Hate Relationship

In late October, Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace laureate Elie Wiesel spoke at a Christians United for Israel (CUFI) event hosted by the controversial Christian Zionist John Hagee at his Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas. Internationally…

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Rachel Tabachnick

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