WhistlePig founder Raj Peter Bhakta offers Vermont college campus to Christian groups
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The founder of a Vermont-based whiskey brand wants to give away the college campus he bought during the pandemic, on the condition that the new owner shares his vision of “the revitalization of our country and civilization.”
Raj Peter Bhakta is proposing to gift the campus of the 185-year-old defunct Green Mountain College in Poultney, Vermont — an asset he estimates will cost $200 million to rebuild — to a Catholic or Christian institution that shares his belief that the return to Western civilization is “based on a spiritual revival.”
The 50-year-old founder of WhistlePig and Bhakta Spirits credits her entry into the industry to President Donald Trump, who fired Bhakta when she was a contestant on the second season of “The Apprentice.”
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“I got into the whiskey business after being fired by the sitting president of the United States,” Bhakta told Fox News Digital.
After a failed congressional run that involved an elephant and a mariachi band, he found himself “completely broke and alone” on a run-down farm in Vermont during the 2008 recession. He founded WhistlePig by identifying a gap in the high-end American whiskey market.
Raj Peter Bhakta, founder of Bhakta Spirits, is giving away the former Green Mountain College campus, which he purchased in 2020. (Bhakta Spirits)
Despite the brand’s rise, Bhakta’s tenure at WhistlePig ended with a high-profile corporate showdown.
Following a dispute with the company’s board of directors, Bhakta sold his stake in WhistlePig in 2019 and “took a sabbatical to seek new discoveries in the spirit world,” according to his website.
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Armed with the proceeds from his departure, Bhakta launched his eponymous spirits company in 2020.
Bhakta then turned his attention to what he described as the “epic, large-scale” disaster of American higher education. In the summer of 2020, amid the uncertainty of COVID quarantines, he purchased the shuttered Green Mountain College campus at auction for $4.5 million. This was much lower than the original selling price of $20 million.
“There is a deeper, more fundamental need in this country, and that is to return to our Christian roots.”
“I bought the place and quickly learned that starting a university, especially when starting a new spirit initiative, was a little more complicated than I had first imagined,” he said.
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His vision for the campus is based on his belief that the nation’s values have been eroded and that technical or secular fixes are not enough.
“There is a deeper, more fundamental need in this country, and that is to return to our Christian roots,” Bhakta said.
A partial view of the campus of Green Mountain College in Vermont is shown. Bhakta bought it a year after the school closed. (Bhakta Spirits)
Bhakta, who initially planned to personally run the new institution, is now vetting “credible potential beneficiaries” who have the “implementation capacity” to realize his vision.
Her first choice is a Catholic institution, followed by a Christian group.
“And if I can’t find one of these, I’ll sell it,” he added. “But I don’t suspect I’ll have to sell it.”
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Green Mountain College closed in 2019 due to declining enrollment. In Vermont, Southern Vermont College and College of St. It was one of three private colleges, along with St. Joseph’s, to close that year.
Sarah Pelkey, former community development director for the town of Poultney, told The Associated Press in 2020 that Green Mountain College was “a beautiful area, a beautiful campus, and someone definitely stole it.”
Green Mountain College closed in 2019 due to declining enrollment. (Bhakta Spirits)
Fox News Digital reached out to Pelkey, who recently left his position to join the Rutland Area Chamber and Economic Development, for additional comment.
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Bhakta is strict about his beliefs.
“We have had two great awakenings before in this country, and I think we are at the dawn of the third great awakening, God willing,” Bhakta said.
“And we hope that this, by God’s grace, will lead to the revival of this great country and this great civilization.”
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“This is worth fighting for, by the way,” he added.
Its website states, among other things, “We know that humanity’s greatest achievements flow from humility and service, and that humility and service lie at the heart of our destiny.”
