As of about 1:42 a.m. EDT Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026, Jim Bakker, the televangelist who built “The PTL Club” with his first wife, Tammy Faye, and was later convicted of fraud and conspiracy, has died at 86, according to a statement from his wife, Lori Bakker.
What is known about his death
CBS News, in a report from The Associated Press updated at 1:05 a.m. EDT Tuesday with a Branson, Missouri, dateline, says Bakker died Monday and that Lori Bakker, his second wife, said so in a statement. CBS/AP reports that his cause of death “was not immediately clear.”
Charisma Magazine reported on Oct. 5 that The Jim Bakker Show announced his death Monday evening, sharing the statement from Lori Bakker. Oct. 5, 2026, was a Monday. Charisma added that “additional details surrounding Bakker’s death were not immediately announced.”
Lori Bakker’s statement, as published by Charisma, reads in part: “It is with a broken heart that I share that my beloved husband, Jim Bakker, went home to be with the Lord this evening. For 66 years, Jim gave his life to preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He was a pioneer of Christian television, but to me, he was my husband, my best friend, and the man I was honored to walk beside through so many seasons of life and ministry.”
She also wrote: “Our family is grieving and we ask for your prayers and privacy during this time.”
How he rose, according to CBS/AP
CBS/AP’s account of his career runs as follows:
- Bakker was born in Muskegon, Michigan, and attended North Central Bible College in Minneapolis, where he met Tammy Faye. They married in 1961 and left college to start a traveling ministry.
- In 1965 the couple launched a children’s show on Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network. By 1966 he was hosting “The 700 Club.”
- He left CBN in 1972 and, two years later, formed the PTL Satellite Network. “The PTL Club” (“PTL stands for ‘Praise the Lord,'” CBS/AP notes) became its signature show.
- At its peak in the mid-1980s, the Bakkers’ ministry included the TV show, which CBS/AP says “drew up to 13 million nightly viewers,” and the Heritage USA theme park and hotel in Fort Mill, South Carolina.
CBS/AP also notes that the couple were often parodied in the 1980s and 1990s, including on “Saturday Night Live,” and that a film about their lives, “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” was released in September 2021.
The 1987 resignation and the 1989 verdict
CBS/AP reports that in March 1987 Bakker “admitted to a sexual encounter with church clerk Jessica Hahn” and was forced to resign, turning over operations to pastor and broadcaster Jerry Falwell. In 1988, it says, he was indicted for mail fraud, wire fraud and conspiracy after an investigation of PTL’s finances.
The Deseret News, in a report dated Oct. 5, 1989, said in its lead that Bakker “was convicted Thursday of fleecing his followers of $3.7 million.” The report said a federal jury deliberated a day and a half before convicting him on all 24 counts of fraud and conspiracy for overselling time shares, or “partnerships,” at the ministry’s resort hotels. It reported he faced up to 120 years in prison and $5 million in fines. It also reported that his wife, Tammy, was not charged.
What prosecutors said, as the Deseret News reported it:
- Prosecutors contended Bakker raised $158 million by selling “lifetime partnerships” at Heritage USA but used the money for projects other than the lodging he promised. Partners typically paid $1,000 for the promise of three nights’ lodging annually.
- Prosecutor Deborah Smith told the jury: “You can’t lie to people to send you money – it’s that simple.”
The $158 million and the $3.7 million are two different figures in that report. The first is what prosecutors contended the partnership sales raised. The second is the figure in the paper’s lead wording.
The paper also reported Bakker’s attorneys saying he was a devout man of God. “The government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant had specific intent to commit fraud,” said attorney George Davis. “He was conducting a ministry. He was doing what he thought was vital to the survival of his ministry.”
“The prosecution did an excellent job. We kept looking for something from the defense, and we never saw it,” said jury foreman Ricky Hill.
The 1991 appeal and the sentence
CBS/AP says Bakker was sentenced to 45 years in federal prison, “though the sentence was later reduced to eight years.” The Deseret News, in a report dated Feb. 12, 1991, documents why the first sentence did not stand.
A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the fraud and conspiracy convictions but threw out the 45-year sentence, which also carried a $500,000 fine, because of remarks by the trial judge. The panel said U.S. District Judge Robert D. Potter abused his discretion and violated Bakker’s due process rights at sentencing. According to the paper, Potter had said Bakker “had no thought whatever about his victims and those of us who do have a religion are ridiculed as being saps (for) money-grubbing preachers or priests.”
Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, writing for the panel, said: “Whether or not the trial judge has a religion is irrelevant for purposes of sentencing.” He added: “Regrettably, we are left with the apprehension that the imposition of a lengthy prison term here may have reflected the fact that the court’s own sense of religious propriety had somehow been betrayed.” The court ordered resentencing by a different judge.
The Deseret News report does not cover the later sentence. CBS/AP states only that it was reduced to eight years and that Bakker was released on parole in 1994.
Marriages and family
Per CBS/AP, Tammy Faye divorced Bakker in 1992, just short of their 31st anniversary, while he was still in prison. She died of colon cancer in 2007. He married Lori in 1998. CBS/AP says the couple launched “The Jim Bakker Show” on the PTL Satellite Network five years later. Bakker and Tammy Faye had two children, and he and Lori adopted five children in 2002.
Later years and the 2021 settlement
CBS/AP reports that Bakker and Lori lived near Branson and have filmed “The Jim Bakker Show” there since it launched in 2003. It also reports that Bakker suffered a stroke in 2020.
In June 2021, Bakker and his company, Morningside Church Productions Inc., settled a lawsuit filed by the Missouri attorney general over the health supplement Silver Solution. The Associated Press reported at the time that the lawsuit said Bakker and a guest made a claim that the product could cure COVID-19 during 11 episodes in February and March of 2020. The settlement called for $156,000 in restitution and prohibits Bakker and the company from advertising or selling Silver Solution “to diagnose, prevent, mitigate, treat or cure any disease or illness.”
AP reported that Bakker, in the agreement, did not admit wrongdoing. It also reported that Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt said in a news release that Bakker had already made restitution to many consumers and must pay back another $90,000 to others. AP did not say how that sum relates to the $156,000.
AP also reported that in March 2020, U.S. regulators warned Bakker’s company and six others to stop selling items using what the government called false claims that they could treat the coronavirus or keep people from catching it.
Bakker’s attorney, former Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon, had previously claimed, AP reported, that Bakker was being unfairly targeted “by those who want to crush his ministry and force his Christian television program off the air.” AP reported that Nixon said Bakker did not claim that Silver Solution was a cure for COVID-19, and that Bakker complied immediately after warning letters from the FDA and FTC in March 2020. The cure claim is the lawsuit’s allegation, not a finding.
What is not known
CBS/AP’s report updated at 1:05 a.m. EDT and Charisma’s account of Oct. 5 do not say:
- the cause of death or where he died;
- when or where a funeral or memorial will be held;
- whether “The Jim Bakker Show” will continue.
Neither report quotes tributes or reactions from other named people. Lori Bakker’s statement asks for prayers and privacy for the family.