After assault allegations, Christian music icon Michael Tait admits preying on multiple men
The former Newsboys and DC Talk frontman admitted to predatory behavior, decades of deceit, and a "double life"
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More than a decade after its release, God’s Not Dead is still finding new ways to disappoint everyone.
It turns out that Michael Tait, the lead singer of Newsboys, the group that sings the title song in the film, has been accused of grooming and sexually assaulting multiple people—including minors—throughout his decades-long career.
The initial victims were 22-year-old men who told The Roys Report that Tait had used alcohol and drugs before attacking them:
Two men stated that they were drinking alcohol with Tait and later woke to him fondling their genitals. One alleged Tait also offered him cocaine while on the Newsboys tour bus. The third told TRR that Tait gave him a back massage while skinny dipping and later invited him to share his king-size bed. There, Tait allegedly non-consensually massaged his anal region.
Tait isn’t just the frontman for one popular Christian band. A graduate of Liberty University, he was also a founding member of DC Talk, a group that won multiple Grammys in the 1990s. There are very few people in the Christian music world with a larger footprint and crossover appeal.
That also gave him connections in the conservative bubble. He called Jerry Falwell his “white daddy.” He co-authored a book called “Under God” (affiliate link) in which he argued that America was “suffering a collapse of moral values because of the secularization of government and public schools,” according to the Guardian. He endorsed Ted Cruz for president in 2016, before later switching to Donald Trump at the insistence of preacher Paula White. He later performed in the White House. He also released this video thanking Trump for who the hell knows what.
The rumors about his misconduct began to surface earlier this year when a popular TikTok personality outed Tait as gay… as if there was something wrong with that. The accusation was a big deal in his industry, though, and the very next day, Tait announced he was stepping down from Newsboys. He didn’t acknowledge the rumor at the time. From the way his announcement read, it just appeared to be a huge coincidence.
But after he stepped back, there was reason to believe there was more to the story than anyone was letting on.
While the misconduct allegations are bad enough, what’s also disturbing is how many people downplayed them because they believed Tait was simply trying to hide his sexual orientation. They didn’t say anything at the time because they knew revealing he was into men could ruin his career. Being gay appeared to be far more damning than being a predator. Or at least that’s how many of the victims felt at the time. That’s a huge indictment of the conservative Christian world.
After the survivors’ stories were made public earlier this months, the fallout was swift. The other members of the band posted a note saying their “hearts were shattered” by the survivors’ accounts. They added: “When he left the band in January, Michael confessed to us and our management that he ‘had been living a double-life’ but we never imagined that it could be this bad.” Some critics weren’t satisfied by that statement, though, because it was hard to imagine how they didn’t know this was happening given that they all toured together and some of the incidents happened on their bus.
Christian radio stations also dropped the group from rotation:
For David Wonders, Program Director at 104.3 The Pulse in Minnesota, the decision to pull all Newsboys music from the station came immediately after he read the report in solidarity with the survivors.
“I pulled all of my Newsboys music from The Pulse (the morning of June 5),” Wonders told TRR. “Beyond Tait’s crimes, the band is complicit if they were aware of what he was up to, or suspected what he was up to, and were covering for him.’
“As someone who has hosted Newsboys in concert, played them on the air, and helped them build their platform, I feel deeply betrayed. I am ashamed that I played a part in helping build the celebrity that Tait exploited to prey on others,” he said.
Last week, Tait finally issued a statement of his own—his first in response to the accusations against him. In it, he admitted the reports were true—in substance if not in every detail—and that he was living “two distinctly different lives” over the past several years.
Recent reports of my reckless and destructive behavior, including drug and alcohol abuse and sexual activity are sadly, largely true. For some two decades I used and abused cocaine, consumed for too much alcohol, and, at times, touched men in an unwanted sensual way. I am ashamed of my life choices and actions, and make no excuses for them. I will simply call it what God calls it-sin. I don't blame anyone or anything but myself. While I might dispute certain details in the accusations against me, I do not dispute the substance of them.
When I abruptly left Newsboys in January I did so to get help. I was not healthy, physically or spiritually, and was tired of leading a double life. I spent six weeks at a treatment center in Utah, receiving help that may have saved my life from ultimate destruction. I have been clean and sober since, though I still have lots of hard work ahead of me.
I'm ashamed to admit that for years I have lied and deceived my family, friends, fans, and even misled my bandmates about aspects of my life. I was, for the most part, living two distinctly different lives. I was not the same person on stage Sunday night that I was at home on Monday. I was violating everything I was raised to believe by my God-fearing Dad and Mom, about walking with Jesus and was grieving the very God I loved and sang about for most of my life. By His grace, I can say that for the past six months, I have lived a singular life-one of utter brokenness and tole dependance on a loving and merciful God.
I have hurt so many people in so many ways, and I will live with that shameful reality the rest of my life. I can only dream and pray for human forgiveness, because I certainly don't deserve it. I have even accepted the thought that God may be the only One who ultimately and completely forgives me. Still, I want to say I'm sorry to everyone I have hurt. I am truly sorry. It is my hope and prayer that all those I have hurt will receive healing, mercy, and hope from the Merciful Healer and Hope-Giver.
Even before this recent news became public, I had started on a path to health, healing, and wholeness, thanks to a small circle of clinical health professionals, loving family, caring friends, and wise counselors—all of whom saw my brokenness and surrounded me with love, grace, and prayer. Sin is a terrible thing, taking us where we don't want to go; keeping us longer than we want to stay; and costing us more than we want to pay. I accept the consequences of my sin and am committed to continuing the hard work of repentance and healing—work I will do quietly and privately, away from the stage and the spotlight.
To the extent my sinful behavior has caused anyone to lose respect or faith or trust in me, I understand, deserve, and accept that. But it crushes me to think that someone would lose or choose not to pursue faith and trust in Jesus because I have been a horrible representative of Him—for He alone is ultimately the only hope for any of us.
King David's prayer of repentance in Psalm 51 has been my prayer this year: "Have mercy upon me, O God, according to Your lovingkindness...Blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me... Create in me a new heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me."
The problem with that statement is that it equates all the sins as if everything bad he’s ever done can be blamed on the Devil or something. It also leans waaaaay too heavily on the idea that everything is fine now because Jesus Jesus Jesus. He refers to the abuse as “sexual activity” and that the problem was that he “touched men in an unwanted sensual way.” (“Sensual” is a horrible word to use in this context.)
He says he repents of “sin” but what sins are we talking about here? Is homosexuality one of them? Does he believe that needs fixing? If he’s clean and sober now, great, but that also suggests it was the drugs and alcohol to blame for what he did to those victims. Not his own sober choices.
On Friday, all of this blew up even more after the Guardian published its own investigation into the matter. In addition to the three young men who spoke with The Roys Report, the Guardian found several other victims including two minors.
The Guardian has interviewed 25 people in the Christian music industry, most of whom say they had prior knowledge of allegations that Tait had engaged in abusive behavior. The men who have come forward and shared their alleged experiences – two agreeing to go on the record with their names, while the rest spoke on the condition of anonymity – were aged 13 to 29 at the time of their alleged experiences.
All grew up in evangelical churches where Tait’s music was the premier soundtrack of their youth groups, summer camps and mission trips. Having taken the message of Tait’s songs to heart, they were naive about sex and drugs throughout their youth. All were starstruck when meeting their childhood hero, but quickly saw their image of him as a role model of Christian piety dissolve as they were taken on a bumpy ride of rock’n’roll debauchery.
Shawn Davis, who was a lifelong fan and troubled youth who had immersed himself in Christian music, claims Tait pushed him to consume alcohol and cocaine on multiple occasions. He also says he believes Tait once secretly drugged him and then molested him in 2003, while he was still a minor.
“This man destroyed my life,” Davis now claims.
Another man said Tait “repeatedly groped his penis” while a different person, who was also 13 at the time, said Tait exposed himself at a bathroom urinal: “I thought he was putting his penis away, but then he was rubbing his penis, and making eye contact, while I was talking.”
It’s not clear if the survivors mentioned in the Guardian piece include anyone who spoke with The Roys Report, though given that some of them say they were minors at the time, the Guardian article must include additional names.
So what happens now?
It’s possible Tait will choose the path so many Christians in similar predicaments have gone down, where he disappears for a little while, only to announce a brand new (solo!) tour following a (very short) period of counseling and repentance and prayer. You can already see the seeds of that in his Instagram statement. Without first recognizing that the issues people are upset about are very different from the ones he’s publicly acknowledging, it’s hard to know how seriously to take any of his apologies.
There seems to be an inordinate number of sexual predators and flaming hypocrites hiding behind their bibles, clerical collars and performative religiosity. If there is any upside to stories like this it is that victims are being listened to, and perpetrators being prosecuted. It wasn't that long ago when the victims of these predators would be victimized all over by accusations of them besmirching the reputations of godly men. I expect he will fall back on the remorseful, and repenting Christian dodge. I just hope no one buys it.
"Sin is a terrible thing."
Sin is bullshit and utterly meaningless drivel that losers use to absolve themselves of responsibility.
You are responsible for your own actions, not your imaginary fiend.