VP Candidate JD Vance Appears at Lance Wallnau's Courage Tour in Monroeville, PA, Framing Immigration Restriction as Christian Duty

On September 28, 2024, Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance appeared at the Monroeville Convention Center in Monroeville, Pennsylvania, as the headlining guest at Lance Wallnau’s “Courage Tour” stop — a multi-day charismatic revival and political mobilization event aimed at swing-state evangelical and Pentecostal voters. Vance sat for a town hall-style interview with Pastor Jason Howard, making the Courage Tour appearance his most direct public alignment with the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) and Seven Mountains Dominionism movement during the 2024 campaign.

What Happened / Key Facts

Vance used the platform to frame the Trump-Vance immigration agenda in explicitly Christian terms. Seated before an evangelical audience at Wallnau’s revival, he invoked a “Christian idea that you owe the strongest duty to your family” to justify restrictionist immigration policy, arguing that Christian leaders should be concerned first with protecting their own country’s citizens before those of other nations. The remarks wove theological duty into border policy in terms calibrated for Wallnau’s audience.

Wallnau’s Courage Tour — co-led with charismatic evangelist Mario Murillo — described itself as “a celebration of Jesus Christ’s courage and triumph” but operated as a swing-state political mobilization apparatus. The tour targeted suburban Christians in seven battleground states, recruiting them as local election workers, poll watchers, and precinct-level operatives. Wallnau claimed the tour had recruited 2,500 churches “to stand with an America First Agenda.” Rolling Stone identified Vance as the tour’s “biggest get to-date.”

Wallnau is one of the most prominent American proponents of Seven Mountains Dominionism, the NAR-adjacent theology holding that right-wing Christians must “occupy” seven cultural spheres — government, education, media, arts and entertainment, family, religion, and business — in preparation for what he frames as the coming Third Great Awakening. He publicly declared himself a Christian nationalist and has characterized Vice President Harris as embodying “the Jezebel spirit.” The Courage Tour explicitly trained attendees to “occupy territory now” as preparation for post-election governance.

The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) — the policy shop staffed by former Trump administration officials and serving as a key institutional spine of the Christian nationalist cabinet faction — partnered with Wallnau on the Courage Tour, creating a direct link between the policy pipeline and the charismatic dominionist mobilization network.

Why This Event Matters

The Monroeville appearance functions as a key coalition-sealing event. Vance, a Catholic convert with documented ties to the Reformed/postliberal theological lane (NatCon, American Moment, Doug Wilson adjacency), here stepped explicitly into the Pentecostal/NAR lane — confirming that his religious-political coalition building crosses theological traditions that do not naturally overlap. The event documents his willingness to deliver theological legitimation for restrictionist policy directly to a dominionist audience rather than at arm’s length.

AFPI’s organizational partnership with the Courage Tour is the structural mechanism connecting the theological mobilization layer to the policy infrastructure layer. Wallnau provided the revival energy and the church-recruitment network; AFPI provided the policy substance and access to the VP candidate. The arrangement is a textbook capture-cascade integration: grassroots theological movement + think-tank policy shop + candidate access, all aimed at swing-state turnout in a constitutional election.

Broader Context

The Courage Tour was part of a broader NAR-aligned electoral infrastructure visible in 2024: Wallnau had predicted Trump’s 2016 election as a prophetic act and spent the intervening years building an explicit America First mobilization network through his charismatic media platform. The September 28 Pennsylvania stop came roughly six weeks before Election Day, in a state both campaigns treated as decisive.

Research Gaps

• Confirm whether AFPI’s Richard Rogers appeared at this specific Monroeville stop or at a different tour stop
• Determine crowd size and any video/audio primary source from Wallnau’s own social media feed
• Identify other elected officials who appeared at other Courage Tour stops in 2024

Related Entries

• cn-wn-cabinet-faction
• christian-nationalism-coalition-treaty-vance-as-integrating-bridge
• seven-mountains-dominionism
• project-2025-as-cn-wn-bridging-instrument
• vance-reformed-evangelical-bridge