How Farris Helped Overturn Roe & His Role in Trump’s Attempted Coup
In recent months, the national media has been connecting the dots, revealing a network of conservative Christian lawyers and political activists who have become very powerful in shaping our nation’s future, creating a nexus of prosecutors, state attorneys general and legal scholars who are working to redefine America’s political landscape and cultural ideals.
A seminal figure in this network is Michael Farris, Loudoun’s Christian constitutional jurist, advancing the idea that public schools are a godless monstrosity, and, contrary to popular belief, are unnecessary for democracy to function. Further, Farris’ vision for America calls for a ban on abortion and gay marriage and restricting voting and LGTBQ rights.
Locally Farris has changed the face of Loudoun’s Republican party during the past two decades from its moderate moorings into a Christian/activist-dominated party. He’s enjoyed phenomenal success, relying on two institutions of his creation, the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) established in 1983 and Patrick Henry College founded in 2000, both based in Purcellville. These two organizations provide a get-out-the-vote cadre of teenagers from around the nation who campaign for Loudoun Republican candidates..
Recently, the January 6th Committee and investigative journalists have revealed that Farris, his protégé, Virginia’s 33rd District Delegate Dave LaRock, and key associates played important roles in the legal and political efforts to overturn the 2020 Presidential election, according to open-source material and reports:
Farris wrote a legal brief for the Supreme Court that challenged millions of votes in swing states, which if it had been successful, could have given President Donald Trump an Electoral College victory. That document was adopted and submitted by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in Texas v. Pennsylvania, and it was accompanied by an amicus brief filed by John Eastman, the mastermind of the “alternate electors” plot on behalf of Trump. Eastman and Farris have previously been co-counsel in pleadings before the Supreme Court.
LaRock hosted Stuart Rhodes, founder of the Oath Keepers militia, at Loudoun’s first Stop the Steal rally in Purcellville just days after the November 2020 election. Rhodes, who is under federal indictment for seditious conspiracy for attempting to prevent the certification of President-elect Biden’s electoral votes on Jan. 6th, goes on trial at the end of September with Thomas Edwin Caldwell of Berryville, an Oath Keepers collaborator and supporter of LaRock, who helped LaRock organize the Purcellville rally.
Jenna Ellis, one of President Trump’s personal lawyers, is a protégé of Farris, who she regards as her mentor. She studied Constitutional law with Farris in a high school, home-schooling course offered by HSLDA. She’s appeared publicly with him, and he assisted her in writing a book on how Christians should interpret the Constitution.
Ellis appeared alongside Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powel at press conferences and state legislative hearings hawking election conspiracy theories, which remain unproven. Giuliani is “a target” of the Fulton County Georgia grand jury investigating Trump and his allies attempt to subvert the official vote while Ellis has been subpoenaed by the January 6th Committee and the Fulton County grand jury. She is also being investigated by a Federal grand jury.
In 2017, Farris took the helm of Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), possibly the largest conservative Christian legal advocacy group in the country. According to its IRS (990) filing for 2020, ADF’s revenue was $78,833,050; it spent $67,142, 893; and Farris’s compensation was $503,909.
Not widely known is that ADF hatched a plan to overturn Roe v. Wade in a manner similar to Farris’ efforts to overturn the 2020 election. ADF wrote a model bill to restrict abortion to 15 weeks and shopped around to find state legislators to back the bill. They found willing participants in Mississippi and with the aid of ADF lawyers the legislators crafted the Mississippi Gestational Age Act, which became law in March of 2018. With a conservative majority, the Supreme Court upheld that law in Dobbs vs. Jackson Woman’s Health Org., and overturned Roe v. Wade. ADF’s Erin Hawley, wife of Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, joined the Mississippi team to argue the case.
In 2017, ADF took on another landmark case, representing Jack Phillips in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case, in which the Supreme Court ruled that the bakery could legitimately, on religious grounds, refuse to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple.
Eastman, working in support of ADF and Farris, provided amicus briefs for both cases.
Texas v. Pennsylvania, et. al.
Farris initiated one of the most significant legal challenges to the 2020 election on behalf of Trump, Texas v. State of Pennsylvania et. al. If successful, the case would have temporarily withheld the certified vote count in crucial swing states before the Electoral College voted on Dec. 14 and would have invalidated millions of votes placing Biden’s win at risk. Farris was then CEO of ADF.
That case was based on a 42-page brief, written by Farris, which could only be filed with the Supreme Court by a state attorney general. After putting out proffers to a few Republican AGs, Farris’ brief found its way to Ken Paxton, Attorney General of Texas, whose office functioned almost as an adjunct of ADF.
Paxton is a Christian activist, who like Farris, homeschooled his children. After taking office in January 2015, he hired Hiram Sasser as his chief-of-staff and Jeff Mateer as his first assistant attorney general, both Texas religious liberty activists and ADF-affiliated/allied attorneys.
Paxton also hired three attorneys directly from ADF. Austin Nimocks, who was serving as ADF’s Senior Counsel in their Washington, D.C. office, became Texas Associate Deputy Attorney General for Special Litigation. David Hacker and Heather Hacker, who were working as litigation lawyers for ADF, became senior counsel for Special Litigation and Assistant Solicitor General respectively. Together, this group of attorneys lead legal culture wars from Paxton’s office in state and federal cases including providing amicus briefs for both Masterpiece and Dobbs, which Paxton filed on behalf of 20 Republican attorney generals.
Paxton filed a version of Farris’ brief on Dec. 7, 2020. The following day, Eastman filed an amicus brief on behalf of President Trump. Also filing an amicus brief was former ADF national spokesman Congressman Mike Johnson and 105 of his Republican congressional colleagues. As support for the case grew, Trump called it “the Big One”. But, like the other three score lawsuits challenging the 2020 election results, the Supreme Court rejected the case for “lack of standing” on Dec. 11.
The attorney who had argued on behalf of the Paxton brief for ADF Congressman Johnson was William J. Olson of Fairfax. Olson had a private phone call with Trump on Christmas Day to discuss a memo he’d written hoping to rescue the Paxton petition. Olson claimed that while the high court rejected Texas’ standing to bring the challenge, the Justice Department would have standing to submit a version of Paxton’s petition directly to the court. He urged that it must be done immediately, and if it failed, he urged Trump to use Presidential powers invested in the Constitution to investigate the fraud. Neither the DOJ nor Trump pursued Olson’s proposals.
An aside of particular interest to Loudoun residents, Paxton’s spokesperson and political consultant at this time was Ian Prior, who would go on to create “Fight for Schools,” unsuccessfully seeking to unseat Loudoun school board members and making Loudoun a national flashpoint for the fight over “Critical Race Theory” and parental rights in public education.
Going After Mike Pence
Olson has also been counsel for Intercessors for America (IFA), a Christian prayer and action network of over 300,000 followers also based in Purcellville, whose President and CEO is pastor David Brubal, an associate of Farris.
Brubal embraced the scheme to have Pence block the election certification on December 23, urging his internet followers to pray for Pence and send messages to the Vice President urging him not to accept electors from states “where there has been unresolved vote fraud.” Brubal’s missive relied on a White House memo leaked to him that laid out a rationale by which the Vice President had the authority to reject those electors.
In the days leading up to the Jan. 6th electoral certification, Farris protégé Ellis was also active, circulating legal briefs to individuals close to the President arguing for schemes, based upon her view of the Constitution, that would allow Pence to overturn the election.
And, Delegate LaRock also pressured Pence on Jan. 5, writing a letter on his House of Delegate stationery urging Pence not to certify the electoral count until there had been an investigation of alleged vote fraud in Virginia. He attended the rally at the Capitol the following day.
The January 6th Committee’s final report may shed some light on what, if any, additional role these activists played in the events leading to the insurrection at the Capitol. Minimally, what drove all these actors was their fervor to employ almost any tortured interpretation of law and the constitution to build popular support to keep Trump in office and retain his adherence to their Christian nationalist values and goals.
Hosting Terrorists
The Sunday after Election Day 2020, LaRock organized Loudoun’s first “Stop the Steal” rally in Purcellville. Many speakers argued that it was their responsibility as Christian’s to stop the steal. LaRock was the most emphatic. Citing the Protestant Christian doctrine of The Lesser Magistrates, LaRock got into the specifics of the doctrine, urging those in attendance: “The lesser magistrate doctrine is rooted in the historic Christian (biblical) doctrine of Interposition. Interposition is when one steps into the gap, placing themselves in between the oppressor and his intended victim. Interposition can take place verbally or physically. The law of God is the objective standard to which all men in government of man are accountable. If civil authorities make a law or policy, or court opinion that is contrary to his law, - and I’ll insert in there, try to steal an election, - the lesser magistrate are to interpose and stop the evil.”
LaRock hosted two special speakers that day who would later be charged as key leaders of the violent insurrection at the Capitol, Oath Keepers leader Stuart Rhodes, of Texas, and his ally Thomas Edward Caldwell, of Berryville, who helped LaRock stage the rally. Rhodes and Caldwell were indicted earlier this year by federal prosecutors on charges of seditious conspiracy. Their trials are scheduled for late September.
Rhodes live streamed the Purcellville rally on the Oath Keeper’s You Tube Channel to almost four thousand of his supporters. The rally poured fuel on the simmering flames of anger for those who thought the election was stolen. In the live chat, one person wrote “Time for all of this to stop, get your guns, and start killing everyone til no one is left.” Another wrote “We are the militia and very well armed.”
