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Gordon Robertson, son of the late televangelist Pat Robertson, succeeded his father this week as chancellor of Virginia Beach-based Regent University, a nationally prominent Christian conservative private university founded by the elder Robertson.
Robertson will continue to serve as president and CEO of CBN and president of Operation Blessing, according to the university’s announcement Monday. Pat Robertson died in June at the age of 93.
Pat Robertson started Christian Broadcasting Network from Virginia Beach in 1960, revolutionizing religious broadcasting with its flagship program, “The 700 Club,” a syndicated evangelical news magazine show he hosted for 60 years. During his tenure at CBN, Robertson, who had vied unsuccessfully for the GOP presidential nomination in 1988, occasionally made headlines for making controversial and provocative pronouncements about LGBTQ+ people, Muslims and Democrats. In October 2021, he stepped down as host of “The 700 Club’ on its 60th anniversary show, passing the hosting baton to his son Gordon, who became CBN’s president and CEO in 2007.
Gordon Robertson ran CBN’s Asian operations in the Philippines in the 1990s, before returning to Virginia Beach to work at the CBN headquarters. Regent University, which was known originally as CBN University, was founded in 1977 and has about 11,000 students, 80% of whom are enrolled online. It has more than 150 areas of study, and among its alumni are Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, former Gov. Bob McDonnell, Virginia Beach Mayor Bobby Dyer, 53 sitting judges and 14 university presidents.
Gordon Robertson is a graduate of Yale University and Washington & Lee School of Law, and practiced law at the then-Vandeventer Black law firm for 10 years before joining CBN.