Chris Smith's Family Business is Restricting Women's Rights

Many voters in the Fourth District know Chris Smith is Congress’ biggest abortion foe. But as he faces Navy veteran Josh Welle in the biggest fight of his career, voters may not know his crusade goes well beyond advocacy.

You could say it’s the family business.

Chris Smith and his wife, Marie, have deep ties to a controversial nonprofit, Priests for Life, and its radical leader, Father Frank Pavone, who caused a firestorm in November 2016 when he broadcast a fetus on an altar to “get out the vote.”

Marie Smith joined Pavone’s ministry in March 2010, as questions about its finances escalated. Since then, Pavone has drawn scrutiny from bishops, charity watchdogs, and the IRS. But 2016 tax filings showed a $2.7 million increase in revenue as Pavone championed the election of President Donald Trump, making his group and Marie Smith more powerful than ever.

The Smiths’ careers as anti-abortion warriors have been intertwined since their days at Trenton State College. Yet there’s no disclosure how much Marie Smith makes from this arrangement, despite the 38-year congressman lending his name and stamp of approval to his wife’s employer, especially at its lowest point.

Pavone’s enterprise does not name Marie Smith as a “key employee” in IRS filings, which would trigger disclosure of her salary. Marie Smith is on the front page of the group’s website, while videos featuring endorsements from “our friend” Congressman Chris Smith are easily found.

Meanwhile, Priests for Life is back in action for the 2018 midterms. Earlier this year, Pavone asked donors for $10.2 million to influence 11 key Senate contests; a 10-page mailer targeting Catholic donors reached a Fourth District home and reads, “Your U.S. Representative: Christopher H. Smith,” on both covers, along with the names of both U.S. Senators from New Jersey (photo in article).

Years of Financial Questions

Priests for Life was running up a deficit that reached $1.4 million when Marie Smith affiliated her Parliamentary Network for Critical Issues (PNCI), under Pavone’s Gospel of Life Ministries. In May 2010, Gospel of Life Ministries lost its tax-exempt status but kept raising money for more than year.

In 2012, Chris Smith celebrated Priests for Life’s 20th anniversary with a speech on the floor of the US House of Representatives, heaping praise on Pavone for speaking out, “whether it be from pulpit or in the public square.” A video shows Smith never mentioned he was endorsing his wife’s employer, to say nothing of Pavone’s 2011 suspension by his bishop for “incorrigible defiance of my legitimate authority.”

By 2014, after being asked to gain control over the group’s finances, Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York said he wanted “nothing further to do with the organization,” which prompted Priests for Life to relocate to Florida. There, the Orlando area bishop warned local priests not to deal with Priests for Life because it lacked canonical status.

Amarillo Bishop Patrick Zurek, who became Pavone’s superior in 2008, has called Priests for Life a “civil organization” but tax filings show that Priests for Life uses a Catholic marketing group to target donors who have given to similar religious causes. The Form 990 reports $13.2 million in contributions for 2016, and if the mailer is accurate, the average gift is $26.47. Charity Navigator rated Priests for Life just one star out of four as recently as 2014; the current rating of three stars is based on erasing the deficit. Charity Navigator still rates it 78 out of 100 for “accountability and transparency,” or two out of four stars.

Priests for Life almost entirely funds Gospel of Life Ministries, according to 2015 filings, and the latter lists Marie Smith’s PNCI as its only major activity. It also pays out 88 percent of its funds in salaries to unnamed parties. PNCI is among many activities listed under Priests for Life for 2016. While Marie Smith is not listed as a key employee on Form 990s, she is on the website under “Officers and the Pastoral Team.”

Rising influence Under Trump

President Trump named Pavone to his Catholic Advisory Council, and the group vigorously backed the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Marie Smith’s PNCI report for 2017 credits her with setting up meetings for pro-life groups at the State Department and at HHS, arranging a meeting with UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, and highlights “private collaboration with State department/Trump administration personnel” on matters relating to the United Nations. However, Marie Smith is not a registered lobbyist.

The group’s biggest coup may have come last week. Kavanaugh was familiar to Priests for Life because as a District Court judge he had written a key dissent, supporting the group’s effort to aid employers who did not want to include birth control in health plans. An attorney for Priests for Life in that case, Eric Drieband, was just confirmed as assistant attorney general for the US Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.

Priests for Life’s 2016 IRS filing outlines its political activism, despite its tax-exempt status: “[During] the elections of 2016, Priests for Life conducted a wide range of activities to educate voters on prolife issues. … We continue to raise awareness about the freedom that the church has under the law to preach, teach and ‘pass moral judgment even in matters relating to politics,’ ” per the Second Vatican Council.

The 2018 mailer, sent before Trump nominated Kavanaugh, suggests more of the same. It sought another Supreme Court justice “in the mold of Judge Neil Gorsuch,” and vowed “to make certain every pro-life voter knows who the pro-life candidates are, and who the pro-abortion candidates are.”

Last, it is interesting that Representative Smith publishes a quarterly newsletter that highlights his activities, photo opportunities, and legislation he has proposed; but the newsletter NEVER includes activities and issues around the “family business”. Usually one advertises their business….