47 lawyers, 19 firms: The latest on legal troubles facing Gateway Church founder
Gateway Church founder Robert Morris was released Tuesday from an Oklahoma prison after pleading guilty last October in a child sexual abuse case from the 1980s.
Morris’ legal troubles aren’t over yet, though: The former spiritual adviser to President Donald Trump and the North Texas megachurch he founded are still involved in civil litigation in at least three cases filed after he resigned from Gateway in June 2024.
Claims in the ongoing cases include defamation, dishonesty about the usage of tithe funds, and a dispute about Morris and his wife’s retirement pay from the Southlake-based church.
Clemishires allege Morris, church elders defamed them
Cindy Clemishire, who revealed in 2024 that Morris sexually abused her for four years beginning when she was 12 and he was 21, filed the defamation lawsuit with her father in June 2025.
The central allegation in the Dallas County case is that Morris and Gateway Church benefitted financially from concealing the abuse of Clemishire, and that the church deliberately issued false statements about the circumstances after Clemishire came forward with the allegations.
Taken together, the actions of Morris, his family and the church’s elders constitute a civil conspiracy aimed at covering up the sexual abuse of Clemishire, according to the lawsuit.
In October 2025, Dallas County district Judge Emily Tobolowsky ruled the suit could continue after attorneys for Morris argued the case should be thrown out under a legal principle known as the “ecclesiastical abstention doctrine.”
The doctrine holds that civil courts are prohibited from weighing in on disputes that are “strictly and purely ecclesiastical in character,” according to the Cardozo Law Review.
In February, Tobolowsky heard an hour of arguments before denying the motions to dismiss that were filed by two Gateway elders, according to the Texas Lawbook. Tobolowsky previously rejected motions from other Gateway elders, ruling that the suit was not a religious issue and could be handled in secular court.
Tobolowsky confirmed in a March 17 order that her decision to deny the motions also applied to a similar motion filed by Morris.
Morris’ attorneys requested that order to clarify Tobolowsky’s point because they are appealing the ecclesiastical abstention doctrine issue, the Dallas Morning News reported.
The case was originally set for trial this summer, but the trial is on hold until the appeals are complete.
Gateway Church officials argue Morris isn’t owed retirement pay
Last May, Gateway Church officials rejected Morris’ demands for millions of dollars in retirement pay for him and his wife.
Specifically, Morris asked Gateway for a one-time payment of $1 million and an annual retirement package of $600,000 to $800,000 for the rest of the couple’s lives, according to Tarrant County court documents filed by the church.
The church declined, citing contract terms and a “defiantly unapologetic” posture by Morris in relation to the claims against him.
Morris argued that Gateway was using the allegations of his sexual misconduct to get out of paying him the retirement package. Lawyers for the church argue that Morris’ agreements with the church preclude him from those benefits if he was fired or resigned because of immoral behavior.
The former pastor then filed a demand for arbitration in which he claimed that elders of the church forced him to resign and that he was not given a chance to consult with an attorney before his resignation, according to court documents.
Since then, the case has been tied up in court as Morris and the church attempt to agree on an arbitrator.
Morris wants to use a “Christian arbitrator” from the religious group International Christian Concern, according to court documents filed in May. The group bills itself on its website as a ministry that exists to “bandage the wounds of persecuted Christians.”
The Southlake megachurch and its attorneys want to use someone from the American Arbitration Association or a district judge to settle the matter. Attorneys for Gateway argued in May 2025 that the church should not be compelled to arbitrate before the ICC because the group that previously owned it had ceased to exist, according to court documents. An attorney for Morris said at a July 2025 hearing that the parties have a “snowball’s chance in heck” of reaching an agreement with each other.
Part of what contributes to the slim odds is the fact that Morris is seeking to move the process forward using Christian arbitration, while Gateway wants to use a standard legal approach, Morris’ attorney Bill Mateja told the Star-Telegram last July.
Christian arbitration is distinct from other forms of arbitration because it relies on the Bible as the authoritative guideline and focuses on reconciliation as an end goal, Mateja said, adding that Christian arbitrators are sometimes called “conciliators.”
An October 2025 hearing on the arbitration issue was postponed after Morris pleaded guilty in the criminal case.
Members allege church misappropriated tithe funds
Four members of the church alleged in an October 2024 federal lawsuit that Gateway and its leaders purposely misled the congregation in an attempt to get them to donate money, or tithe, to the church.
Elders promised that roughly $15 million of the church’s $100 million annual revenue would be allocated to international missionary work, according to the lawsuit. An unnamed church member who served as its accountant said that only $3 million was actually used for that purpose and that it’s unclear where the rest of the money went.
“Attempts to seek transparency and [prove] that money did in fact go to global missions and Jewish ministry partners have been rebuffed by Gateway elders,” wrote Micah Dortch and Lu Pham, the attorneys who represent the plaintiffs. “This lawsuit is a means of last resort and being pursued with a heavy heart.”
Morris and other Gateway leaders are named as defendants in that lawsuit, which is playing out in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.
Though there were only four named plaintiffs, the lawsuit seeks court approval for a class of tens of thousands of people who were current or former members of the church. A federal judge in September 2025 denied Morris’ and the other defendants’ request to be dismissed from the suit and instead granted a request to add more plaintiffs, according to KERA News.
Morris asked the court in November to strike the class-action allegation from the suit because, his attorneys argued in court filings, it could not be proven that every Gateway member donated to the church specifically because of the claims about the money’s purpose.
That motion is pending a ruling.
Altogether, Morris’ lawsuits involve at least 47 lawyers and 19 law firms, according to the Texas Lawbook.
