Robertson declined to be interviewed for this article. It is unclear what impact he will have on the Miers nomination.
A Senate Republican source burst out laughing when told of Robertson's threat on the Miers nomination. "I don't know anybody on the Hill who's going to quake in their boots when Pat Robertson issues some sort of a threat or a decree," said the source, who requested anonymity to protect his boss.
Robertson's clout stems from his founding in 1989 of the Christian Coalition, which succeeded in inserting the power of evangelicalism into the political arena -- a force shaping the nation's politics to this day, as the Miers battle shows. And Robertson's 1988 run for the White House, though it failed, painted him as the go-to leader on Christian conservatism.
But the Christian Coalition today is a shadow of its former self politically. And some analysts say Robertson's credibility has suffered, in part, from his rhetoric.
It is notable, though, that the American Center for Law and Justice, another institution Robertson founded, is headed by Jay Sekulow, one of the White House's advisers on judicial nominations. Sekulow says he is not a Robertson conduit to the Oval Office.
"Pat Robertson's an influential conservative leader," says Sekulow. "He's quite capable of picking up the phone himself."
A poll conducted for the Public Broadcasting Service last year found that half of white evangelicals viewed Robertson favorably, while James Dobson of Focus on the Family, another Christian conservative group, received favorable ratings from 75 percent.
Robertson, in his "700 Club" statement Thursday, listed some of the conservative leaders supporting Miers. In addition to himself, they were Dobson, Falwell, Sekulow and Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. Dobson declined to comment on Robertson.
Land, who said he is on friendly terms with Robertson, said he did not agree with Robertson's tactic of "making threats to senators" and called Robertson's comments suggesting Chavez should be assassinated "inappropriate," "foolish" and "counterproductive."
In August on "The 700 Club," Robertson said of Chavez: "We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don't need another 200-billion-dollar war to get rid of one strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with." Robertson later apologized.
Last month, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Robertson said, "We have killed over 40 million unborn babies in America." Then he mused about American society being "unable somehow to defend ourselves against some of the attacks that are coming against us, either by terrorists or now by natural disaster? Could they be connected in some way?"
Robertson's style is that of the demagogue, some critics say, who profits from the sense of marginalization felt by many conservative Christians -- the us-vs.-them mentality that courses through the evangelical Christian movement.
