NEW YORK (AP) – To its members, it’s a grassroots army of “joyful warriors” who are “not co-relatives with the government.”
For anti-hate researchers, it is a well-connected extremist group that attacks inclusion in schools.
And for Republicans vying for the presidency, he has become a key potential partner in the 2024 nomination race.
Moms for Liberty didn’t exist during the last presidential campaign, but the Florida-based nonprofit that advocates for “parents’ rights” in education has quickly become a major player in 2024, fueled by in part by GOP operatives, politicians and donors.
The group that has been at the forefront of the conservative movement targeting books that reference race and gender identity and electing right-wing candidates to local school boards across the country is hosting one of the next major meetings for the candidates. Republican presidential primaries. At least four are listed as speakers at Moms for Liberty’s annual summit in Philadelphia later this month.
Former President Donald Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley and biotech entrepreneur and “anti-woke” activist Vivek Ramaswamy have all announced they will speak at the gathering in late June.
The group said it is in talks to bring others to the conference, including Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a fringe Democrat known for pushing anti-vaccine conspiracy theories.
The high interest in the event underscores how fights over gender and race have become central issues for Republican voters. It also highlights Republicans’ eagerness to embrace a group that has drawn backlash for spreading anti-LGBTQ+ ideas and ridding libraries and classrooms of diverse material.
The group was founded in 2021 by Tiffany Justice, Tina Descovich, and Bridget Ziegler, all current and former Florida school board members who were unhappy with student quarantine and mask policies during the pandemic.
In two years, the organization has grown to 285 chapters in 44 states, Justice said. The group claims 120,000 active members.
He has expanded his activism to local school districts to target books he says are inappropriate or “un-American,” ban instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity, require teachers to reveal students’ pronouns to parents and eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs. of schools
The group has also tried to elect like-minded candidates to school boards. In 2022, just over half of the 500 candidates he endorsed for school boards across the country won their races, Justice said.
Moms for Liberty is billed as a nonpartisan grassroots effort started by passionate parents who call themselves “joy warriors.” However, the group’s close ties to Republican organizations, donors and politicians raise questions about partisanship and doubts about how grassroots it really is.
Co-founder Ziegler, who stepped down from the board at the end of 2021 but continues to support the group, is married to the chairman of the Florida Republican Party. Still a member of the Sarasota County School Board, she is also the director of the Leadership Institute, a conservative organization that regularly trains members of Moms for Liberty.
Marie Rogerson, who took Ziegler’s place on the Moms for Liberty board, is an experienced political strategist who previously managed the 2018 campaign of Florida state Rep. Randy Fine, a Republican.
The group has also quickly gained a close ally in DeSantis. In 2021, he signed Florida’s “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” which identified parents’ rights to direct their children’s education and health care and was used to fight local student mask mandates. In 2022, he signed a law banning instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade, a ban that opponents had labeled the “Don’t Say Gay” bill and which has since been extended to 12th grade. Moms for Liberty had vociferously defended both laws.
Ziegler appeared behind DeSantis in photographs of the signing ceremony for the latter bill. When the group held its inaugural summit in Tampa last year, it hosted speeches by DeSantis and his wife, Casey, who presented the governor with a “sword of freedom.”
And while the group is a 501(c)4 nonprofit that doesn’t have to disclose its donors, there are other views of how powerful Republicans have helped fuel its rise.
Its summit sponsors, who paid tens of thousands of dollars for these spaces, include the Leadership Institute, the conservative Heritage Foundation and Patriot Mobile, a far-right Christian cell phone company, the PAC has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in an effort to take over. Texas School Boards.
Maurice Cunningham, a former political science professor at the University of Massachusetts-Boston who has tracked Moms for Liberty’s growth and relationships, said its ability to attract so many Republican candidates to its second annual summit is a testimony of their support to the establishment.
“Yes, there are definitely mothers who live in their communities and so forth who are active,” Cunningham said. “But this is a top-down, centrally controlled operation with big money people at the top and political professionals working for them.”
Justice said the group’s work with conservative organizations and DeSantis shows they care about the group’s cause, but doesn’t mean it’s not grassroots.
Although Moms for Liberty has aligned itself with establishment Republicans, researchers say its activism is part of a new wave of far-right efforts against student inclusion across the country.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate and extremism across the country, designated Moms for Liberty as an “anti-government extremist” group in its annual report released last week, along with 11 other groups who said they use parental rights as a vehicle. to attack public education and make schools less welcoming to minority and LGBTQ+ students.
The tag comes after some of the group’s leaders and chapter presidents have been accused of harassing community members and amplifying false claims related to gender controversies.
Justice said calling out extremists at Moms for Liberty’s activities is “alarming” and that the group’s efforts to fund and endorse school board races show it is not anti-government.
He said the group removes chapter presidents who violate its code of conduct and has gay members and leaders, including a member of its national leadership team.
A growing coalition of local organizations promoting inclusion in education has begun mobilizing against Moms for Liberty and calling on Marriott to stop the upcoming conference. Defense of Democracy, a New York organization founded in direct opposition to Moms for Liberty, plans to bring members to Philadelphia to protest in person.
“They’re so loud and so aggressive that people are scared into silence,” Defense for Democracy founder Karen Svoboda said of Moms for Liberty. “You know, if you see bigotry and homophobia, there’s a civic responsibility to speak out.”
Moms for Liberty, in turn, said it will increase security for its meeting. Marriott has not responded to the request, and the Southern Poverty Law Center’s “extremist” designation has not deterred any Republican candidates who plan to speak.
Haley responded by tweeting, “If @Moms4Liberty is a ‘hate group’ add me to the list.” Ramaswamy took the stage for a Thursday town hall with Justice and tweeted that SPLC stands for “Selling Political Lies to Corporations.”
Those responses aren’t surprising to Cunningham, who said that in today’s climate, the “extremist” label is “almost a badge of honor” within the GOP.
Moms for Liberty, meanwhile, is raising funds. After the SPLC report became public, Justice said the group quickly raised $45,000, an amount that a larger donor has agreed to match.
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