One week later, on December 21, 2023, Donald Trump’s campaign bragged about another endorsement:

“Pastor Jamison Plank from Henry County, Iowa, stated,‘President Trump is the clear choice for people of faith in America. Unlike other politicians, when President Trump promises he will do something, he keeps his promises.  President Trump has an unmatched record of defending family values, promoting religious freedom, and championing moral clarity and biblical authority.’"

It doesn’t take a professor of linguistics to see that these statements, supposedly from two different Christian pastors, were in fact written by the same person.

Both statements contain the exact same long phrase: “record of defending family values, promoting religious freedom, and championing moral clarity and biblical authority.” In both statements, this phrase comes right after a sentence declaring that Donald Trump keeps his promises. The identical phrase “for people of faith in America” also appears in both short statements.

It seems obvious that someone working for the Trump for President campaign wrote a statement for these preachers, and then adjusted the statements afterwards, to try to make it appear as if the preachers had come up with the words themselves.

It seems that Pastor Eric Holdeman is allowing the political campaign of Donald Trump to put words in his mouth. Is that what a religious leader should be doing?

If Holdeman is truly an enthusiastic supporter of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, why couldn’t he be bothered to make his own statement of endorsement?

In the December 13th press release from the Trump for President campaign that brags about the growing size of Trump’s Iowa Faith Leader Coalition, one name appears right alongside Eric Holdeman’s: Jacob Paulson.

In this press release, the list of members of the Iowa Faith Leader Coalition are not in alphabetical order, or sorted by geographical location. So, it looks as if the list was presented in the order in which people signed up to join the Coalition. Jacob Paulson and Eric Holdeman signed up at the same time.

Donald Trump’s campaign lists Jacob Paulson as a pastor in Osceola County. In fact, Jacob Paulson is the only “faith leader” in Osceola County that Donald Trump was able to get an endorsement from.

Just a few weeks later, Donald Trump boasted that he had endorsements from Christian leaders in every one of Iowa’s 99 counties.

It looks, however, as if Jacob Paulson isn’t really living or working in Osceola County. On his Facebook page, Jacob Paulson lists himself as living in Spirit Lake, Iowa, which is in Dickinson County.

On the web site of Spirit Life Fellowship, Jacob Paulson is listed, not as a pastor, and not even as a youth pastor, but as a “youth leader”. There’s another person, the Children’s Director, who is given authority over younger kids.

Spirit Life Fellowship is in Spirit Lake, Iowa, in Dickinson County, not in Osceola County.

It looks as if Jacob Paulson allowed himself to be purposefully misrepresented by the Donald Trump for President campaign in order to make Trump’s base of Christian support in Iowa look more impressive than it really is.

In religious parlance, that’s called bearing false witness, and it’s listed in the Ten Commandments as a sin.

When religious leaders can’t be trusted to be honest with simple representations of fact, such as what they have said, and where they live, why should we listen to who they think we ought to vote for in the 2024 presidential election?

On December 13, 2023, Donald Trump’s campaign boasted about the endorsement of Eric Holdeman:

“Pastor Eric Holdeman of Spirit Life Fellowship Church in Dickinson County, Iowa, stated, ‘After assessing the presidential candidates, it is clear that President Trump has consistently fulfilled his promises to the people of faith in America. He has a proven track record of defending family values, promoting religious freedom, and championing moral clarity and biblical authority. Now, more than ever, President Trump is the indispensable leader that Christians and all people of faith truly need.’”