For decades, McLean Bible Church has served as the place of worship for many of DC’s Republican elite. The sprawling evangelical megachurch in Vienna, Virginia, boasts a roster of former parishioners that includes everyone from Ken Starr to Mike Pence. It’s where Donald Trump once dropped in for a brief prayer after a round of golf.

McLean Bible is also where, in November 2017, a senior pastor named Dale Sutherland formed a nonprofit called Act2Impact. In those days, the organization was described in state records as an “auxiliary” of the church, with a mission to “preach the gospel” and “conduct evangelistic and humanitarian outreach.”

But that mission was short-lived.

Two years later, Sutherland—who had once been an undercover narcotics officer in DC—left McLean Bible and filed papers to rename Act2Impact. It became the Constitutional Defense Fund (CDF), which would “promote and secure” constitutional rights. “We aim to defend and strengthen those rights through methods that will include litigation and other means,” […]