cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/17518823

A network of ultrawealthy Christian donors is spending nearly $12 million to mobilize Republican-leaning voters and purge more than a million people from the rolls in key swing states, aiming to tilt the 2024 election in favor of former President Donald Trump.

These previously unreported plans are the work of a group named Ziklag, a little-known charity whose donors have included some of the wealthiest conservative Christian families in the nation, including the billionaire Uihlein family, who made a fortune in office supplies, the Greens, who run Hobby Lobby, and the Wallers, who own the Jockey apparel corporation. Recipients of Ziklag’s largesse include Alliance Defending Freedom, which is the Christian legal group that led the overturning of Roe v. Wade, plus the national pro-Trump group Turning Point USA and a constellation of right-of-center advocacy groups.

UIhlein Family

August Uihlein emigrated to the United States around 1850 to work at the Krug Brewery in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Founded by his uncle August Krug, the brewery later became the Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company, when after Krug’s death, his widow Anna Maria married fellow German-American Joseph Schlitz. In 1875, Schlitz died in the sinking of the SS Schiller. Per Schlitz’s wishes, management was passed to the four Uihlein brothers, August, Henry, Alfred, and Edward. When Anna Maria Schlitz died in 1887, the Uihleins acquired full ownership of the firm and the Uihlein family continued to run the brewery for the next century. The Uihleins kept the name Schlitz for the brewery because Americans had difficulty pronouncing their surname.

David Green

David Green (born November 13, 1941) is an American billionaire businessman and the founder of Hobby Lobby, a chain of arts and crafts stores. He is a major financial supporter of Evangelical organizations in the United States and funded the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.

Eventually, Green bought out Pico and the growing business staffed a small factory with cerebral palsy patients, paying them ten cents per frame.

Waller Family (Debra S Waller) (No Wikipedia page at all?)

A year later Jockey said it was moving overseas. “It was a very big shock,” Herrington said.

Now Waller is launching Jockey Person to Person, a home party business (Ed note: that’s an MLM) that sells higher-priced intimate and active apparel through independent salespeople. Last month 120 “comfort specialists,” as they are called, gathered for a convention in suburban Chicago.

Ziklag Definition:

1 Samuel 30 claims that by the time of David, the town was under the control of Philistines, but subsequently was given by their king – Achish – to David, who at that time was seemingly acting as a vassal of the Philistines. David requested “a place in one of the country towns” and was awarded Ziklag, which he used as a base for raids against the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites, which he conducted away from the oversight of Achish. David’s reports to Achish state that he had been conducting raids on Saul’s lands in southern Judah and on the Jerahmeelites.