North Carolina ? The Internal Revenue Service should reconsider the tax-exempt status of a Baptist church where nine members say they were expelled in a political dispute with their pastor, an advocacy group said Monday.

The Rev. Barry Lynn, director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, sent a letter to the IRS in response to reports that the Rev. Chan Chandler led an effort to expel members of East Waynesville Baptist Church in western North Carolina because they did not support President Bush.

Lynn’s group released the letter one day before a planned church meeting between Chandler and the members who say they were kicked out.

Congregants have said Chandler endorsed Bush from the pulpit during last year’s presidential campaign and announced that anyone who planned to vote for Democratic nominee John Kerry needed to “repent or resign.”

He continued to preach about politics after Bush won re-election, culminating with a church gathering last week in which the nine members said they were ousted.