Is Dallas Television Host Amy Kushnir The Daughter Of Scamvangelist Robert Tilton?

It appears that anti-gay Dallas television host Amy Kushnir, who is so terribly outraged by Michael Sam's kiss, is the daughter of legendarily disgraced scamvangelist Rev. Robert Tilton, whose multi-million dollar grifting empire first crumbled in the early 90s following an exposé by ABC News. Christian Nightmares points us to this 2011 post on the televangelists watchdog blog Snake Oil, which refers to Kushnir as "Amy Tilton Kushnir." 

None of available bios on Kushnir list the names of her parents so I did a little digging. 

Rev. Robert Tilton's first wife, to whom he was married during the ABC-spawned scandal, is named Martha and goes by the unusually spelled nickname Marte. Two weeks ago Kushnir posted a Facebook photo of her mother's birthday party and in the comments a friend of Kushnir's writes, "Happy birthday, Marte!"

Robert Tilton's mother, Margaret Ruth Tilton, died in 2006 and her obituary lists the scamvangelist and his current third wife among her survivors. Also listed is an Amy Tilton Kushnir and her husband Bill. The husband of the television host Amy Kushnir is indeed named Bill and his Facebook profile lists that he attended Oral Roberts University.

Fourteen years ago Charisma Magazine interviewed Marte Tilton and noted that she had four children with Robert Tilton, including a daughter named Amy, then aged 30. According toExplore Talent site, Dallas television host Amy Kushnir is 44 today. In a 2001 interview with the Dallas Morning News, Marte asked that paper not say where her children live, saying that they have "suffered a lot because of their last name." Marte and Rev. Tilton divorced in 1993, when the television host Amy Kushnir would have been 23.

That's an awful lot of possible coincidences, but if I've connected the dots properly, it's certainly understandable that Amy Kushnir wouldn't want the world to know about her infamous father. But it's rather illuminating if she indeed grew up in lavish mansions that were paid for by the then-estimated $80M conned annually out of old ladies by Rev. Robert Tilton, who is still in the scamvangelism game and was raking in $24M a year as recently as a few years ago.

VIDEO: I won't go into all the ways that Rev. Robert Tilton scammed his followers, there's plenty about that on hisWikipedia page. Let's just close this post with one of the dozens of truly infantile and utterly hilarious YouTube clips that mock him. Maybe an Amy Kushnir remix is called for.

Activists Outraged Over New Dress Code For Dallas Pride Barring Public Nudity

Controversy has erupted over a new dress code being enforced at this year's Dallas Pride, The Dallas Voice reports. The move towards a dress code is intended to prevent "lewdness" and public nudity. Though Michael Doughman, executive director of the Dallas Tavern Guild, the group that puts on the pride parade, has attempted to downplay the controversy, insisting the dress code was not being imposed by the Guild but rather the city and reflects existing laws and ordinances governing lewdness and public nudity, others remain concerned. In a Facebook post rebuking the "new rules," activist Daniel Cates addressed head on why such restrictive regulations are troublesome in the context of a pride parade:

“The ‘queer’ is effectively being erased from our Pride celebration in favor of the most polished, heteronormative representation of our community as possible,” Cates wrote. “It should be noted that the rioters at the Stonewall Inn fought to break OUT of the damn closet! Our movement was built of sex positivity and our desire to BE WHO WE ARE! I urge you ALL to openly DEFY the Tavern Guild!”

The police for their part are taking the dress code seriously:

Jeremy Liebbe, a detective sergeant at Dallas Independent School District, will oversee 95 officers from DPD and DISD as co-commander of security for the parade and festival. Liebbe, who’s gay, said any floats in violation of indecency standards will be warned in the lineup on Wycliff Avenue prior to the parade. If they fail to comply before reaching the parade route, they will be removed from the parade and individuals may be charged with class-B misdemeanor indecent exposure. But Liebbe added: “If there’s an erection and a child is present that could see it, it is a felony, and we don’t want to see that happen.”

“My goal at all of these events is to have zero enforcement action taken,” Liebbe said. “But there are some people over the years who’ve tried to push that line to see just how far we could go.”

Dallas Pride will be celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.