Jackson Lahmeyer launches 'Pastors for Trump' 2024 group

Remember Jackson Lahmeyer, the Tulsa pastor who got trounced running against Sen. James Lankford earlier this year? He's back in the news, having kicked off a new organization to promote Donald Trump's 2024 candidacy:

Pastors For Trump Launches, Backed by Faith Leaders With 200k Congregants

TULSA, Okla., Dec. 7, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Counting a chapter in each state and the backing of dozens of Christian pastors with over 200,000 congregants, Pastors for Trump (PFT) is aiming to galvanize support in the evangelical community for President Trump as he seeks to return to the White House as Commander-in-Chief in 2024. 

Pastor Jackson Lahmeyer created the coalition to help recognize the efforts of millions of Christians across the United States in the political process and to provide a way to advocate for issues central to the faithful including the importance of life, marriage, freedom of speech, and personal responsibility. 

Pastor Lahmeyer is currently the Lead Pastor for Sheridan Church in Tulsa. Lahmeyer attended Oral Roberts University (ORU) and graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.A. & M.A. in Theological & Historical Studies. Lahmeyer was Crusade Director for Christ for All Nations, which is the ministry of Reinhard Bonnke, a ministry that has helped lead 74 million people to Christ since 1974. Lahmeyer also served as the Oklahoma State Coordinator for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association leading more than 300 churches across Oklahoma to get engaged and fight for conservative values. In 2021-2022, Lahmeyer was a candidate for the United States Senate in Oklahoma and received endorsements from many America First Patriots including Roger Stone, Rudy Giuliani, John Paul Mac Isaac and Sebastian Gorka.

"President Trump made it clear during his 2016 campaign for President of the United States that he was committed to bringing Christian leaders into the fold. During his historic first term, he proved that he would deliver on the promises he made. Heading into 2024, it is more important now than ever to reaffirm the strength of the Christian faith and our willingness to support President Trump in his fight to return to the Oval Office," explained Lahmeyer. 

Lahmeyer is joined by Pastor Craig Hagan, who is co-Pastor of Rhema Bible Church and Chief Operating Officer For Keith Hagin Ministries and Pastor Mark Burns, Co-Founder & CEO of The NOW Television Network, a Christian television network based out of South Carolina reaches 11 Million Homes named by Time Magazine as "Trump Pastor."  Hagin and Burns will serve on the Board of Directors for Pastors for Trump. 

PFT has a monthly prayer call, daily prayer requests, and allows all Americans to voice the issues most important to their Christian faith that they want to see influence public policy in the coming months. Pastors looking to join PFT can visit pastors4trump.com to fill out an application and receive regular updates. 

Poll: Lankford, Stitt with huge majorities, Mullin ahead in Senate special election

SoonerPoll is out with their latest survey of the statewide GOP primaries, and the results are pretty interesting. 

• Sen. Lankford leads his two challengers by a 7-1 margin
• Gov. Stitt leads his three challengers by a 7-1 margin
• Gentner Drummond has a large lead over Attorney General John O'Connor
• Markwayne Mullin has a substantial lead in the Inhofe special election, with T.W. Shannon clearly in second
• State Auditor Cindy Byrd has a lead, but the rest of the statewide offices are a complete jumble

News9 and NewsOn6 GOP Statewide Primary Poll

First fundraising reports for U.S. Senate, CD2 candidates

Candidate filing has concluded, and at the same time the first campaign fundraising reports are available for some of the leading candidates for federal office. In this post, I'm going to briefly cover the fundraising figures for the GOP U.S. Senate and U.S. House candidates that have filed their first quarter reports.

Poll: Lankford, Stitt, Mullin lead respective races by large margins

Here's the latest poll of the Oklahoma election landscape, from Amber Integrated.

Key takeaways:

• U.S. Sen. James Lankford leads Jackson Lahmeyer. Massively.
• Gov. Kevin Stitt leads Mark Sherwood in the GOP primary (massively) and holds a consistent 14% lead over RINO-turned-Democrat Joy Hofmeister in the general.
• U.S. Rep. Markwayne Mullin has the very early lead in the U.S. Senate special election. 
• Voters don't care about COVID.

Amber Integrated Releases Survey on Upcoming Primary and General Elections

OKLAHOMA CITY – The Oklahoma-based public affairs firm Amber Integrated has released two surveys measuring attitudes about the current political environment and the upcoming primary and general elections in Oklahoma.

The first of these surveys was conducted from March 24-27, 2022 and included a pool of 455 likely GOP primary voters in Oklahoma.  It has a margin of error of 4.59% at a 95% confidence interval. 

The second of these surveys was also conducted from March 24-27, 2022, and included a pool of 500 likely general election voters in Oklahoma. This survey has a margin of error of 4.38% at a 95% confidence interval. 

Toplines and crosstabs for both surveys are available here.

Some key observations from both surveys are below:

Nathan Dahm switches over to open Senate race, Lahmeyer sticks with Lankford challenge

U.S. Sen. James Lankford drew two main challengers in the latter half of 2021 (sorry, Joan Farr, but you don't count as "main"): State Sen. Nathan Dahm and Tulsa pastor Jackson Lahmeyer. Jim Inhofe's retirement announcement, opening his seat up for contest this year, caused both to consider their options.

Dahm and Lahmeyer have taken divering paths, with Dahm opting for the open Senate race (joining U.S. Rep. Markwayne Mullin and Inhofe staffer Luke Holland), while Lahmeyer is sticking with challenging Lankford.

Report: U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe to announce retirement on Monday

 

Sen. Inhofe at a recent Senate hearing.

It is being widely reported this evening that U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe is planning on announcing his retirement from the Senate on Monday (Politico, New York Times).

Inhofe (elected to the U.S. House in 1986 and then the U.S. Senate in 1994) turned 87 in November, and his wife Kay has, evidently, been in poor health in recent years.

Back in December 2019, my Muskogee Politico Insiders Panel discussed the then-uncertainty over Inhofe's 2020 reelection plans. I asked the panelists who they thought would jump into the Senate race should Inhofe retire, and here are some of the names they tossed out back in 2019:

Lankford launches first TV ad of reelection campaign, holds massive cash advantage

Incumbent U.S. Senator James Lankford is out with his first television ad for his 2022 reelection campaign:

Lankford is being challenged in the GOP primary by State Sen. Nathan Dahm of Broken Arrow, Tulsa pastor Jackson Lahmeyer, Joan Farr (who is also, bizarrely, running for Senate in Kansas), and Jessica Garrison (daughter of the late Democrat state senator from Muskogee, Earl Garrison).

Meet the candidate running for U.S. Senate in Oklahoma and Kansas -- at the same time

The 2022 campaign for U.S. Senate here in Oklahoma figures to be a lively one, featuring a well-known incumbent, two upstart challengers (one fringe newbie, the other a multiterm conservative legislator), and... someone who's giving it a shot in two states "hoping to get into office in at least one of them!"

No joke.

Meet Joan Farr, candidate for United States Senate in the states of Oklahoma and Kansas.

She's certainly got a colorful campaign pitch, detailed on her website. Here are some highlights from her website:

Poll: Stitt, Lankford hold large leads, Dahm now second in Senate primary

According to a new survey from Amber Integrated, Governor Kevin Stitt (R) holds a 47% to 32% lead over Joy Hofmeister (D) in the 2022 gubernatorial race, while U.S. Senator James Lankford (R) holds a commanding lead over his two GOP challengers - garnering 56% to State Sen. Nathan Dahm's 9% and Jackson Lahmeyer's 8%.

I find the Senate results to be somewhat ironic. When Nathan Dahm announced he was joining the race, Jackson Lahmeyer supporters loudly complained on social media that Dahm was getting in too late (a laughable statement). 

In the previous Amber poll, Lankford had 62%, Lahmeyer had 21%, and Dahm (who had just entered) was at 3%. Now, Dahm and Lahmeyer are statistically tied after Lahmeyer's support plunged dramatically. 

Anyway, the following release has some more results and details:

New Survey Shows Partisan Split on COVID; Gov. Kevin Stitt Maintains Lead Over Supt. Joy Hofmeister in Governor’s Race

OKLAHOMA CITY – The Oklahoma-based public affairs firm Amber Integrated has released a survey measuring voter attitudes about elected leaders and other political issues and current events. This survey was conducted from December 15 - December 19, 2021, and included a pool of 500 registered voters in Oklahoma. This survey has a margin of error of 4.38% at a 95% confidence interval. 

The full survey, including crosstabs, can be downloaded here.

Some key findings include:

Republicans list economic concerns as their number one priority, while Democrats say COVID is.

In December, 13% of voters identified COVID-19 as their number one public policy concern that state lawmakers should address, topped by “jobs and the economy” (28%) and education (15%). Concern over COVID sharply diverges among party lines.

• For Democrats, fighting COVID is the number one issue, with 22% identifying it as a priority, before “jobs and the economy” (18%) and education (16%).
• Just 6% of Republicans, however, identify COVID as their number one issue. Instead, Republicans say they are primarily concerned with “jobs and the economy” (36%), “law and order” (16%) and education (16%).Independents list their priorities as “jobs and the economy” (26%), COVID-19 (18%) and education (15%).

Gov. Kevin Stitt is beating Supt. Joy Hofmeister in a head-to-head matchup.

• Gov. Kevin Stitt is currently leading Joy Hofmeister in a head-to-head matchup, with 47% of voters saying they would vote for Stitt or lean towards voting for Stitt and 32% saying they would vote for Hofmeister or lean towards Hofmeister. Twenty-one percent remain undecided. Those numbers remain almost unchanged from an October survey that showed 49% of voters reporting they would vote for Stitt or leaned towards Stitt and 33% saying the same of Hofmeister.

U.S. Sen. James Lankford has a large lead in his primary election; other Republican primaries are toss-ups.

• Fifty-six percent of Republican voters say they plan on voting for Lankford or lean towards Lankford in the upcoming primary election for U.S. Senate, compared to 9% for State Sen. Nathan Dahm and 8% for Jackson Lehmeyer. Twenty-four percent remain undecided.
• In other Republican primary races, however, a majority of voters remain undecided, making these races wide-open. Fifty-six percent of Republican voters are undecided when it comes to who they will support in the race for attorney general, 57% are undecided on who they will support in the race for state superintendent of public instruction, and 52% are undecided on who they will support in the primary election for state treasurer.

Voters support Gov. Stitt’s decision to take Julius Jones off death row. 

OK Poll: Lankford leads with 62%, slim majority oppose gov't COVID mandates

Quarterly Poll Reveals Oklahoma Voters are More Concerned About COVID, More Negative About State Trajectory

OKLAHOMA CITY – The Oklahoma-based public affairs firm Amber Integrated has released a recent survey measuring voter attitudes about elected leaders and other political issues and current events. The topline results are available here and the crosstabs are available here. This survey was conducted from September 29-October 3, 2021, and included a pool of 500 registered voters in Oklahoma. This survey has a margin of error of 4.38% at a 95% confidence interval. 

Key findings include: 

State Sen. Nathan Dahm to make "huge campaign announcement" on Tuesday

State Senator Nathan Dahm (R-Broken Arrow) is pushing into the news by teasing a "huge campaign announcement" set for a rally on this coming Tuesday. The veteran legislator is in the middle of his final term, having been reelected without opposition in 2020. 

Dahm has been rumored to be considering an attempt at a higher office for several years, having placed fourth in a close (and crowded) field in the 2018 1st Congressional District primary. His name has been floated for a variety of offices, not the least of which is U.S. Senate. Incumbent U.S. Senator James Lankford is on the ballot in 2022, having already drawn a challenger in Jackson Lahmeyer, whose primary hype seems to be an endorsement by former Trump administration member General Michael Flynn and other QAnon friendly jokers characters.

Well known as the most conservative sitting member of the State Senate, Dahm is also a flagrant self-promoter and headline chaser, having filed some legislation (here, here, here, plus others that I declined to post) that I, quite frankly, found to be legislative clickbait, more meme than meaningful, and groveling attention-grabbers.

Anyway, here's the press release from Dahm:

Nathan Dahm, Oklahoma State Senator, is making a special campaign announcement on Tuesday, September 28th

Trump Secretary of State Pompeo endorses Sen. James Lankford for reelection

We are just under a year out from the 2022 primary election here in Oklahoma, and the race for U.S. Senate is starting to take shape. Incumbent Republican James Lankford is running for a second full in the upper chamber, after winning a special election in 2014 to fulfill the last two years of Dr. Tom Coburn's second term. Tulsa pastor Jackson Lahmeyer is challenging Lankford from the right, with the support of QAnon-friendly crackpot and former Trump administration member Gen. Michael Flynn.

Former Secretary of State Latest to Endorse Lankford

OKLAHOMA CITY, OK (July 5th) – James Lankford’s campaign for U.S. Senate announced today that former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is the latest to endorse his re-election bid. Secretary Pompeo also served in President Trump’s administration as the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. He previously served as a member of Congress from Kansas.

Here’s what Mike had to say about supporting James: