Noted conservative activist speaks at packed California church, defying COVID-19 rules

A large Pentecostal church in Northern California with a history of defying state and local coronavirus restrictions did so again this past weekend in a big way, holding a trio of packed indoor services Sunday with prominent conservative activist Charlie Kirk as a guest.

Kirk, co-founder of the right-wing organization Turning Point USA, joined Pastor Greg Fairrington for hour-long discussions in three morning services at the Destiny Christian Church campus in Rocklin.

The two largely focused their on-stage discussion on the topic of California’s stay-at-home order, which has been in place statewide since Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered it in March.

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Fairrington and Kirk both consider the order to be a violation of religious freedoms and constitutional liberties. During the talk, Kirk called churches closing their doors in response to the pandemic an “incredible epidemic of cowardice.”

“I ask this question: If a pastor hasn’t opened their church, why are you a pastor?” he said. Fairrington chimed in: “Exactly.”

Sunday’s services were streamed live online but also attended in-person by large crowds. Photos and video clips posted as Instagram stories by Kirk, of the applauding audience greeting him, showed almost no mask use and minimal social distancing.

The church responded Monday morning to questions about the services and health protocols with a brief statement about Destiny’s precautionary measures, not addressing that these measures fall well short of complying with the state’s health order.

“We continue to take temperatures of every individual attending, we require registration beforehand to keep our capacity at a lowered threshold, and we do space households out for distancing,” Destiny Church spokesman Tanner Di Bella wrote in an emailed response to The Sacramento Bee. “As always, we encourage those at-risk to stay home and watch online.”

But Kirk’s photos and videos from the services refute the claims that thresholds were lowered to any significant degree or households spaced out on Sunday. At least a few hundred people attended, and the images appear to show buffer spaces of two seats between groups of people in the same row, but no space being maintained in front of or behind seats.

Kirk even acknowledged that the parishioners were risking catching the virus by attending.

“No one is being forced to be here today,” he said in one service. “You come knowing the risk of this virus, knowing your own health situation. You know that there’s a chance that you might interact with someone that’s a carrier and you’re willing to take that responsibility. That’s what liberty is all about.”

The services flew in the face of health restrictions issued by California in response to the pandemic as the state is weeks into its worst COVID-19 surge yet. The rate of new daily coronavirus cases has more than doubled in the past two weeks, and state leaders early last week rolled back business and church reopenings across a vast majority of the state.

The “emergency brake” to economic opening came in a dire effort to clamp down on the rampant spread of the virus. Otherwise, health officials say, hospital systems throughout the state could be overrun with patients.

The state health department and Newsom’s office have prohibited indoor services at places of worship, along with indoor restaurant dining and a few other types of businesses and activities, in counties classified within the “purple” tier of the state’s reopening framework. The purple tier denotes “widespread” COVID-19 activity.

Rocklin is in Placer County, which moved into the purple tier one week ago after several weeks of looser restrictions due to rapidly increasing virus activity.

In the orange and red tiers, churches like Destiny were allowed to operate indoors but with hard capacity limits and masks required, according to the California Department of Public Health guidelines. In the purple tier, they may still operate outdoors and can still hold services virtually.

In California’s requirements for the red tier, a church as large as Destiny would be capped at 100 attendees. Even in the orange tier, from which Placer was demoted two weeks ago, it could be no higher than 200, with social distancing between different households required. Destiny says it has about 1,500 seats.

Who is Charlie Kirk?

Kirk, 27, has a massive conservative following in the U.S.

In 2012, he co-founded Turning Point USA, which advocates for conservatism at high school and college campuses, with entrepreneur Bill Montgomery.

Montgomery died this July, at age 80, from complications of COVID-19.

Hours after speaking in Rocklin, Kirk tweeted to his nearly 2 million followers: “Lockdown orders should be ignored. All businesses, schools, and churches must immediately open.

“It is time for the largest act of civil disobedience in American history.”

Who is Greg Fairrington?

Fairrington, lead pastor at Destiny Christian, has been an outspoken critic of Newsom and the restrictions on businesses and churches his administration has imposed due to the pandemic.

In the state’s first attempt at gradual reopening in the spring, churches that had been shuttered for in-person activities in the earliest weeks of the stay-at-home order were allowed to reopen in many parts of the state from late May through June.

Then, the state rolled back reopenings in July in response to surging coronavirus numbers, telling places of worship that indoor services were once again not allowed. That remained the case until Sept. 1, when three of the four tiers in the new, color-coded reopening system allowed for indoor worship with capacity limits.

Throughout July, though, Destiny held services that were either entirely or partially indoors in direct defiance of the order.

Fairrington in one service said the church’s refusal to close for indoor worship represented “a spiritual battle between good and evil.”

At another point during summer, Fairrington floated the idea that he himself may run for governor in 2022.

On Sunday, he suggested Destiny Christian has no plans of closing its doors any time soon, even — or especially — for the winter holidays.

“They took Easter away from us,” Fairrington said in Sunday’s 9:45 a.m. service. “They’re trying to take Thanksgiving away from us ... We are going to have Christmas here, in person, at Destiny.”

Placer County dealing with major surge

Placer is shaping up as one of Northern California’s hardest-hit counties in the current autumn surge, and local health leaders say in-person gatherings appear to be a driving factor, especially those in people’s households.

In a monthly report for October, Placer County’s local health office reported that 20% of people with positive cases interviewed by contact tracers said they had recently attended a large gathering, the highest percentage for any month in the pandemic.

Within that group, religious gatherings were linked to 25 cases — 18% of those who attended a gathering of any kind. It’s unknown how many of those 25 may have also attended other types of large gatherings.

Placer County hospitals have seen patient totals with confirmed virus cases skyrocket from 31 on Nov. 1 to 97 as of Sunday, state data shows. In the summer surge, Placer peaked at 68 concurrently hospitalized. All nearby neighboring counties are also seeing their COVID-19 hospital rates spike dramatically.

Reached for comment about Destiny Christian Church during its summer defiance, Placer County officials redirected questions to the city of Rocklin. A city manager said at the time that Rocklin was working collaboratively with the church in hopes of reaching a solution.

In terms of enforcement action, Placer County has been on the lax side. Its own distinct stay-at-home order was allowed to expire in early May. While officials made it clear that the statewide stay-at-home order is still in effect and applies to Placer residents, the state only has authority to act directly against a handful of types of businesses: those that are licensed through the state. For example, the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control can levy fines, and suspend or pull liquor licenses from restaurants.

When the state downgraded Placer from the orange tier to red earlier this month, county Supervisor Kirk Uhler — another vocal opponent of the statewide restrictions — quickly said Placer would not be enforcing any of the new mandates.

Law enforcement agencies throughout the capital region have also repeatedly stated that they will not be enforcing the statewide health order, opting instead for an education-based approach.

Placer County also declared the end of its local health emergency for coronavirus in early September, due to what were then comparatively low case numbers for the disease. That decision prompted the county’s public health officer to resign in protest.

At least 67 residents have died and nearly 5,700 have tested positive for COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic in Placer County, where about 400,000 people live.

The Bee’s Sawsan Morrar contributed to this story.

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