Newsboys Sue MercyMe, Christian Tour Promoter, Journalist, World Vision

The lawsuit does not address the original article about Tait’s alleged aggressive sexual behavior toward men, published by the Roys Report in June 2025. The singer then made a brief confession about drug use and touching men “in an unwanted, sensual way.” (He resigned from the group without explanation months before the Roys Report exclusively broke ground.) Instead, the lawsuit focuses primarily on follow-up articles in the same publication. The headline reads: “Woman accuses Michael Tait of drugging her and watching while she was raped; Says Newsboys tour manager covered it up.” The legal action said the rape allegations were not only untrue, but also led to a $50 million contract with a Scotch competitor that ultimately destroyed Campbell’s travel-related business.

According to the sprawling, highly detailed 265-page lawsuit, the sexual encounter between “Nicole” and Michael Brewer, a lighting technician who worked for Newsboy, was as follows: did It happened in a Fargo hotel room in 2014 and was actually witnessed by Tait as a spectator, but it was consensual. Regarding Tait’s participation, the lawsuit states: “His only involvement was watching two adults having sex, which is something many people watch every day on the internet. It was certainly not a crime.”

The lawsuit repeatedly calls the rape allegations a “fabrication.” Brewer’s sexual encounter with “Nicole” became a rape story when the woman was fired by the Newsboys and put to work for a company that was trying to steal business from Campbell’s main business, Thriving Children Advocates, Campbell’s lawsuit claims. The TCA served as a liaison between touring Christian artists and the charities promoted during their performances, providing a significant portion of their income while on the road.

The lawsuit alleges: “Nicole’s ‘non-story’ of a consensual liaison in 2014 degenerated into a rape story 11 years later. It cannot be understood in isolation from the anti-competitive fight that was going on between Wes Campbell and his companies on the one hand and Dutch venture capital hedge fund Waterland on the other. Solving the mystery begins and ends there.”

MercyMe, the band behind the song and movie “I Can Only Imagine,” is mentioned in the action as a top act in the Christian touring business. The group had maintained a lucrative relationship with Campbell’s TCA for years before reneging on a newly renegotiated contract in 2025, according to the lawsuit. The argument was that the band sought to cut out TCA as a middleman and ensure that relationships with sponsoring charities such as World Vision were routed directly through Waterland. According to the lawsuit, Waterland and its subsidiaries Transparent Productions, Premier Productions Holdings and Rush Concerts “together promoted nearly 80 percent of Christian music concerts in the United States” and sought to turn previously outsourced relationships with charities into their own businesses.

The suit says Newsboy is being “illegally boycotted” and “in violation of the Sherman Act” as part of a “concerted plan to eliminate its competitor, TCA.”

According to the lawsuit, most other artists abandoned TCA and followed MercyMe after news reports about Newsboys and Campbell. In the lawsuit’s version, the Roys Report was a pawn used by Waterland to spread a false rape story and fatally undermine all of Campbell’s businesses. (The lawsuit only makes a passing reference to Tait’s earliest stories of male sexual assault, and does not appear to take issue with those claims, though many of them may have also affected Newsboys and its founder’s business.)

Asked for comment, Julie Roys, founder and publisher of Roys Report, said: “We have not received the complaint, but are aware of it. As per our policy, we do not comment on ongoing litigation. Roys Report stands by the report and will resolve the allegations through appropriate legal processes.”

Roys Report is a Christian website that specializes in serving as a watchdog exposing the misdeeds of prominent Christian pastors and leaders. Julie Roys won earlier this week. 1st place award In honor of her coverage of the Tait/Newsboys scandal, she was selected for the Religion News Association’s Religion Reporter of the Year Award.

manifold There was communication between Roys Reports attorneys and Campbell’s attorneys before the lawsuit was filed, and Roys’ attorneys said that if legal action were to be taken, Roys Report would seek to have the case dismissed under Texas’ anti-SLAPP statute.

Newsboys and Campbell posted the lawsuit on their social accounts and said they had no intention of commenting further to the media. You can read the full lawsuit here. here.

For observers of the music business, the most interesting aspect of the lawsuit may lie in its detailed allegations about how much the Christian music (CCM) touring industry relies on partnerships with charities to achieve its profits. Major Christian tours often include promotional interludes for charities, and not all attendees may be aware that performers receive pledges during the show.

“Artists in the CCM Touring Market rely on non-profit charities to solicit donors during CCM concerts with the consent of the artists,” says the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. “Nonprofit charities that have used artists’ ‘public platforms’ to generate donors or ‘sponsors’ have historically paid artists based on the number of sponsors generated at each concert,” it said, adding that the past standard rate was estimated to be about $200 per fan who registered as a sponsor.

In the story, Waterland approached Campbell about acquiring TCA as a nonprofit sponsor and offered TCA $50 million, an offer that was accepted. But Campbell’s attorney said Waterland had asked for a few days to secure financing to close the deal. According to the suit, Waterland realized during that time that it could “create its own platform to sell sponsorships to nonprofits” because the monopoly already existed, and denied the need to pay $50 million to an outside company. TCA argued that Waterland had already disclosed all confidential information about how it conducted its business before withdrawing from the deal.

Moreover, TCA alleged in its lawsuit that Waterland “entered into a secret agreement with World Vision, the world’s largest charity… to pay Waterland $500 for each sponsorship in return for exclusive or near-exclusive rights.” This is an average of over $200 per fan who signs up. (The lawsuit states that TCA and World Vision “unamicably terminated” their own contracts in 2019.) When MercyMe, which was renegotiating with TCA, raised an offer of $500 per sponsor, Campbell’s attorney said Campbell agreed to meet that amount toward a new contract. But eventually MercyMe separated from TCA. (It names individual members of MercyMe and the entire group as defendants.)

“MercyMe knowingly participated in the antitrust violations perpetrated by Defendants Waterland and World Vision…,” the lawsuit states. It also states that Christian music artists Tauren Wells and Danny Gokey (often spelled “Goyke” in legal filings) “have both breached their contracts and are touring with LiveCo/TPR and World Vision.” But Gokey and Wells were not among the 33 defendants in the lawsuit.

manifold Representatives for Waterland, LiveCo/TPR and MercyMe have been contacted for comment on being named as defendants in the lawsuit.

The suit seeks recovery of $50 million that Campbell claims he lost in his dealings with Watermark, as well as unspecified compensatory and punitive damages and retraction of defamatory statements. The lawsuit was filed in a Tennessee court by Ben C. Broocks of the Broocks Law Firm in Austin, Texas, and G. Kline Preston IV of the Kline Preston Law Group in Nashville.

None of the three remaining members of the Newsboys are specifically named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit, and the group as a whole and Campbell are named only as co-founders, so it’s unclear whether the musicians are participating individually or supporting the action. Nonetheless, this is being presented as a lawsuit on their behalf, with a post on the group’s social media titled “Newboys Break Their Silence – in Federal Court.” The group’s social accounts have stopped responding.