Pastor Who Defended Rapists Got Millions to Run Private School

A private school started by a North Carolina pastor who has generated outrage over comments defending rapists has received $3.6 million in taxpayer funds since the state started its school voucher program a decade ago.

The Tabernacle Christian School has received $3,649,766 in public taxpayer funds since the 2014-2015 school year, according to the North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority. The private school in Monroe, which was started by the Reverend Bobby Leonard in 1970, has received nearly $2 million in the past two school years alone. The figures were first reported by Notes From the Chalkboard.

Leonard came under fire last week after a clip of an August sermon resurfaced online. In the video, the pastor is heard criticizing women who wear shorts instead of pants in public. He said, "If you dress like that and you get raped, and I'm on the jury, he's going to go free.... A man's a man."

The backlash led Leonard to post an apology on the church's marquee last Thursday that said: "I am sorry for any hurt. I was wrong." But community members continued to organize protests over the weekend.

Leonard's comments, and his founding of the Tabernacle Christian School, have also reignited a debate over school voucher programs, not just in North Carolina but across the nation. Educational savings programs have proliferated in recent years. As of January 31, at least 29 states and the District of Columbia have a private-school choice program available, according to an Education Week analysis. North Carolina's Republican-controlled Legislature, which has a veto-proof supermajority, created the state's voucher program in 2014.

Proponents say vouchers, which direct public school funds toward private schools, give parents and families more options to tailor their children's education to their needs. Critics argue that these programs hurt public school systems by depriving them of much-needed resources.

Notes From the Chalkboard's Justin Parmenter criticized the state's program in light of Leonard's comments. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), he wrote, "Our public tax dollars shouldn't be subsidizing violent misogynistic rhetoric."

One user tweeted, "This is another great reason why vouchers are horrible ideas: they led to state-sponsored rape apologists."

Another user called for Republican governors to "quit defunding public schools," while a third said Leonard's remarks were "One more reason why #PublicDollars are for #PublicSchools. No taxpayer dollars should flow to this bigot through his school."

Newsweek reached out to North Carolina House Speaker Tim Moore and the Tabernacle Christian School via email for comment.

The debate is also part of a larger partisan fight that has played out in Texas, where Republican Governor Greg Abbott has made school vouchers a top legislative priority. Last year, he called lawmakers back for four special sessions to get his program passed, but it is still in limbo, with rural Republicans joining forces with a united Democratic coalition to block the bill.

In Pennsylvania, Governor Josh Shapiro made headlines last year after the Democrat crossed partisan lines during his first year in office to pass the state's voucher program.

Responding to the viral clip of Leonard, Education Voters PA tweeted, "In PA, tax dollars fund vouchers for religious schools that kick out girls who get pregnant. Do the PA religious voucher schools' church leaders believe that rape victims deserved to be raped like the pastor at this NC voucher school? We do not know..."

On Monday, Democratic Governors Andy Beshear of Kentucky and Roy Cooper of North Carolina put out a USA Today op-ed titled "Welcome to the GOP's new education agenda: Loot our public schools for private vouchers."

In the opinion piece, the governors argued that one of the major drawbacks to giving private schools taxpayer money is that those dollars can be received "with no real accountability." They note that North Carolina's program has been described as "the least regulated private school voucher program in the country."

By 2031, Notes From the Chalkboard projects, more than half a billion dollars in public funding will be going to private religious schools every year.

"We are going to keep standing up for our public school students to ensure that they have the funding they need, and that teachers are paid like the professionals they are. It's what's best for our children, our economy and our future," Cooper said on X.