David Barton in the News: Remember His Earned Doctorate and Division One Basketball Stardom?

Self-styled historian David Barton is in the news calling State Department officials “clowns” while he and Glenn Beck claim to rescue people in Afghanistan. Ministry Watch issued an appropriate “close look” at Beck and Barton’s charity — the Nazarene Fund — since it is unclear what they are doing in the midst of this disaster.

I am not an apologist for the Biden Administration’s handling of the end of the American military presence in Afghanistan. However, if David Barton makes a claim, my experience is that it should be checked out. Here are at least two reasons why.

Unearned Doctorate

Almost 5 years ago now, David Barton released the following video on his Facebook and Youtube accounts:

In this video, Barton very clearly claims to have an earned doctorate while, at the same time, he covers it up and fails to say where he got it. THe day after I saw the video, I discovered the “degree” came from church based LIfe Christian University. The school doesn’t offer history or education degrees and isn’t accredited by any recognized agency. It is registered with the IRS as a church and has no campus. Furthermore, Barton never attended any classes nor did he do any specific work for the so-called “earned” degree.” The president of the school just gave him a degree, perhaps for a fee, although that much was not revealed.

When I posted this information, Barton removed the video from his websites and stopped referring to himself as “doctor.” He never mentioned it again and has refused to ever explain or apologize for the deception. To their discredit, no Christian news outlet has ever pursued him and demanded answers about why he castigated progressives for making up stories, when he spun the yarn.

There are so many more reasons to be skeptical but here is just one more.

David Barton’s Division One Airball

IN 2015, David Barton told a seminar audience that he played basketball with the Oral Robert University Division One basketball squad when he attended the school as a student:

The main claim was:

I remember when I was playing basketball, the college stuff that we did. We started every day with a five mile run, then we lifted weights, then we had an hour of racquetball, then we had two hours of full-court basketball, then we came back for another run. It wasn’t particularly enjoyable, but in those years, our college team set the NCAA record for two years in a row for most points scored. We averaged 105, 104, 103 points a game, I forget what it was. But you had to run a lot, it wasn’t a lot of fun, but you get the results.

As it turns out, Barton did not play for the D-1 team at Oral Roberts.

This was confirmed by the NCAA and school records, calls to the university, and the testimonies of the head trainer and a sports reporter for the school paper at the time. He simply didn’t play on the team but told a story that made it sound like he did.

If a man can weave together those kind of stories about himself, shouldn’t we demand a much higher level of verification before we accept what he says about other things?

A Year Ago Today David Barton Claimed to Have an Earned PhD

A year ago today, religious right activist and member of Evangelicals for Biblical Immigration David Barton posted the following video on his Facebook and YouTube accounts.

In the video, Barton chastises progressives for questioning his claim to have an earned doctorate. He said he has an earned doctorate but that he has chosen not to talk about it. However, the next day Barton chose to take the video off of both websites and chose not to talk about the reasons why.
Barton’s haughty claim to have an earned doctorate gave way to silence after it was revealed that the degree came from Life Christian University, a

Life Christian University diploma reflection
Life Christian University diploma reflection

diploma mill. According to the president of Life Christian University, Douglas Wingate, Barton didn’t attend the school but was given credit for his historical writings. Even though one cannot meaningfully call a degree earned when you don’t take any classes, that is exactly what LCU does with famous preachers and religious leaders.

The state of Missouri advised fellow LCU degree recipient Joyce Meyer that her claim of an earned PhD from the school was against state law. Meyer’s lawyer responded that Meyer had already decided that describing the LCU PhD as earned was false. Meyer now describes her LCU degree as honorary. Although that description is legal in Missouri, LCU’s is not accredited by a Department of Education recognized accrediting body and the status as a university is unusual since the school is registered with the IRS as a church.
Barton called his degree earned but sarcastically dismissed the honest reporting of what he called progressives. Barton has never explained or apologized for his demeaning and misleading statements. Yet, he still claims to be “America’s premier historian.” Would “America’s premier historian” try to pass off what can only be called an honorary degree as an earned one?

As of now, America’s premier historian has chosen not to talk about it.

Gospel Coalition: David Barton is Doing it Wrong

Writing for the Gospel Coalition, Justin Taylor gets right to the point: David Barton does history wrong. And Taylor recommends my book (with Michael Coulter) Getting Jefferson Right.
That right there is a great post.
The reason for the post is to point readers toward well researched and written sources on America’s founding. For the most part, I think Taylor put together a great list of resources on the religious dimensions of the founding era.
I do take issue with two sentences Taylor wrote:

In fairness to Barton, he has gotten better in recent years in not circulating as many bogus quotes, labeling some of them as “unconfirmed.” However, the source mining and the problematic historiography, where the evidence is forced to fit the predetermined thesis, continue.

In fairness to Taylor, it is hard to keep up with Barton’s shenanigans. However, Barton hasn’t gotten better. For instance, there is the Jefferson quote Barton essentially made up using Jefferson’s words but with a rearranged meaning. Then, there is the Lincoln quote which Barton claimed for Lincoln but did not come from honest Abe. In a WND article, Barton goes for two questionable quotes which can’t be found in original source material. These problems all occurred in 2017.
One more thing Taylor could have mentioned is Barton’s fraudulent doctorate degree. Back in late 2016, Barton blasted progressives for saying he didn’t have an earned degree. Then, when it was discovered that Barton’s earned degree came from a diploma mill, Barton went quiet. Not only does Barton do history wrong, he does academia wrong as well.
I hope Taylor’s post gets distributed widely.

Joyce Meyer Ministries: Life Christian University’s Description of Earned Doctorate Does Not "Accurately Reflect the Information Correctly"

LCUS.Edu
LCUS.Edu

On October 7, I reported that evangelist Joyce Meyer claimed to have an earned PhD in theology from Life Christian University. She claimed to be a graduate on a promotional video still housed on the LCU website (this video has been removedMeyer’s picture remains) and said the degree was earned on her website. On October 11, I filed a complaint with the Missouri Attorney General’s office in keeping with MO law which forbids the use of false and misleading degrees in connection with one’s business or profession.

Sometime after the initial post and the AG complaint was filed, Joyce Meyer Ministries changed the designation of the LCU degree from “earned” to “honorary.” I know the change happened after the complaint was filed because the degree was described as “earned” on October 15, 2016 (from the Wayback Machine on Oct. 15). I discovered the change in November.

Until recently, I did not know why Joyce Meyer Ministries changed the designation from “earned” to the more accurate “honorary.” A few days ago, I received an email from the MO AG office indicating that action had been taken on my complaint. Attached to email was a March 29, 2017 letter from an attorney for Joyce Meyer Ministries to the MO AG’s office indicating that the designation had been changed on the website because the description was inaccurate. About LCU’s description of an earned degree, the spokesman for Joyce Meyer Ministry wrote:

While we are aware that this is the verbiage that Life Christian University uses on their own website and literature, we simply felt it did not accurately reflect the information correctly. Because of this we took the initiative to change the wording on our website and literature from “earned” to “honorary” before this complaint was filed.

While it is a small point, the initial post was public and the complaint was filed before the change was made. Nevertheless, I commend Joyce Meyer Ministries for this change and for acknowledging the truth about the situation. This is much more than David Barton or other so-called “earned degree” holders have done. I now call on her to remove her endorsement of LCU which she has acknowledged incorrectly reflects information about the degrees given to LCU’s “distinguished degree holders.”

Missouri’s law is one of the toughest in the nation on false and misleading degrees. Other LCU “distinguished degree holders” from MO include Billye Brim and Larry Ollison.

Six Months Later David Barton Still Hasn’t Explained His Earned Doctorate

In early September of 2016, self-styled historian David Barton posted the following video:

The day after he posted the video, he removed it from his Wallbuilders website and Facebook page. He has never addressed why the video was up for a day and then gone.
Barton Life University Seal

Barton ridiculed progressives for disbelieving his claim to have an earned doctorate. Then all of a sudden the video was removed and he stopped talking about his doctorate. None of the people who rely on his work apparently care that he claimed to have an earned doctorate when in fact it came from diploma mill Life Christian University. The claim just vanished as if it never happened.

Will Barton ever address his claims?

For the rest of the story, see these posts.