Trump is the only candidate that has talked about this since it was implemented by the Johnson administration. No one, talk show host, media, conservative think tank, etc etc has EVER brought this up. I was not even aware of this subtle muzzling of the voice of Christianity until Trump brought it to light. (and I have worked for several churches for decades)
To be honest, I have no idea why small churches and para-church organizations even bother with 501c3 status because there is NO profit anyway. I don’t know of actual wealthy churches, some probably exist, but who are they?
Most of the ones that I’ve come to know are very small, maybe 100 people, most of those people are on chokingly tight budgets.
The last I was aware after talking to pastors, only about 10% of their folks support the church. If they could count on everybody to pay their 10% bill, there would be a much better cash flow, but that’s not the case.
Churches that build new buildings, or purchase another building usually have a separate fund for that purpose, in addition to their general funds.
There are many pastors who must hold an outside job, because their little churches don’t take in enough money to pay a living wage to a pastor.
I worked for several years for a para church organization. There were 50+ churches in our area, and church donations accounted for less than $10.00 per month..no kidding! One church gave us $100/per year..average that out over the course of a year! Our total yearly donations were $7,000 per year or less. Of that, $350/mo was a private donation by the person who owned the building we rented space from. Yet, we were a 501c3 org? I have no idea why.
There was zero money for staff, the director was even volunteer. All of the rest of the money went to purchasing only materials needed for the work we were doing.
I don’t know how other organizations fare today, I only know what I personally dealt with and can speak about first hand. And sadly, we’re talking about several years ago before everything went south economically. At that time, I tried to get my church to start a pantry, because it was obvious to me that we were going to need it. a pantry happened, but not at my church.
What does the whole thing spell? We couldn’t save their lives, and we couldn’t feed them, either. Not enough money/resources to go with lack of vision.
Taxes? I’ll bet if many of these organizations really looked into it, there wouldn’t be any taxes anyway, and they’re relinquishing their freedom of speech for absolutely no good reason.