WASHINGTON, Oct. 14 (UPI) -- The president of the Fellowship Foundation denies a claim the Washington-area religious group received money from a reputed terrorist group for its own use.
A group of mainline Protestant ministers in Columbus, Ohio, has asked the Internal Revenue Service to suspend the foundation's tax exemption. Clergy VOICE charges that funds contributed by the Islamic American Relief Agency may have been used to pay for congressional trips overseas.
Fellowship Foundation President Richard Carver told The Columbus Dispatch the foundation received $50,000 from IARA. But he said all the money was paid out to former Rep. Mark Siljander, R-Mich., a lobbyist who pleaded guilty in July to charges related to the agency.
Siljander operated a ministry that routed income and payments through the foundation, Carver said. Carver said the foundation believed the $50,000 was a contribution to Siljander's religious work and not a payment for lobbying to get IARA removed from the U.S. list of terrorist organizations.
"We didn't know it was a terrorist organization, and we didn't think he would do something like that," Carver said.
The Fellowship Foundation sponsors the National Prayer Breakfast but otherwise maintains a low profile.
