Gender

A federal judge in Texas known for a ruling that attempted to ban a widely-used abortion drug is citing an extremist anti-LGBTQ group in his ruling allowing a ban on drag shows to stay in place.

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a former attorney for an anti-LGBTQ conservative Christian legal organization, and a member of the Federalist Society, in his 26-page ruling dated Thursday cited the “About” page of Gays Against Groomers to claim, “it’s unclear how drag shows unmistakably communicate advocacy for LGBT rights.”

Judge Kacsmaryk, appointed by Donald Trump twice before finally assuming office in 2019, suggests the First Amendment does not provide for freedom of expression for drag shows, calls drag “sexualized conduct,” and says it is “more regulable” because “children are in the audience.”

READ MORE: ‘The Public Deserves to Know’: Abortion Pill Banning Judge Redacted Details About Millions of Dollars in His Stock Portfolio

Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern adds, “Kacsmaryk’s conclusion that drag is probably NOT protected by the First Amendment conflicts with decisions from Texas, Florida, Tennessee, and Montana which held that drag is constitutionally protected expression. It also bristles with undisguised hostility toward LGBTQ people.”

Calling the judge “a proud Christian nationalist who flatly refuses to apply binding Supreme Court precedent when it conflicts with his extremist far-right beliefs,” Stern at Slate writes that Kacsmaryk ruled drag “may be outlawed to protect ‘the sexual exploitation and abuse of children.’ In short, he concluded that drag fails to convey a message, while explaining all the reasons why he’s offended by the message it conveys.”

Stern does not let Kacsmaryk off the hook there.

“From almost any other judge, the ruling in Spectrum WT v. Wendler would be a shocking rejection of basic free speech principles; from Kacsmaryk, it’s par for the course. This is, after all, the judge who sought to ban medication abortion nationwide, restricted minors’ access to birth control, seize control over border policy to exclude asylum-seekers, and flouted recent precedent protecting LGBTQ+ equality,” Stern says.

READ MORE: Far-Right Judge Under Fire for Failing to Disclose Interviews on Civil Rights – but LGBTQ Community Had Warned Senators

“He is also poised to bankrupt Planned Parenthood by compelling them to pay a $1.8 billion penalty on truly ludicrous grounds. And he is not the only Trump-appointed judge substituting his reactionary beliefs for legal analysis. We have reached a point where these lawless decisions are not only predictable but inevitable, and they show no sign of stopping: Their authors are still just settling into a decadeslong service in the federal judiciary.”

West Texas A&M University President Walter V. Wendler penned the letter that sparked the lawsuit.

Titled, “A Harmless Drag Show? No Such Thing,” Wendler wrote: “I believe every human being is created in the image of God and, therefore, a person of dignity. Being created in God’s image is the basis of Natural Law. James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, prisoners of the culture of their time as are we, declared the Creator’s origin as the foundational fiber in the fabric of our nation as they breathed life into it. Does a drag show preserve a single thread of human dignity? I think not.”

Journalist Chris Geidner concludes, “It’s an extremely biased ruling by a judge who has established that he does not care about being overturned — even by the most conservative appeals court in the nation.”

READ MORE: ‘Corruption of the Highest Order’: Experts ‘Sickened’ at ‘Definitely Bought’ Clarence Thomas and His ‘Pay to Play’ Lifestyle

Back in 1914, the ultimate capitalist CEO, Henry Ford, made an argument that liberals, progressives and union leaders are still echoing in 2023. Ford said, in essence, that workers needed a living wage in order to afford the products he was producing.

Ford's argument still rings true at a time when a wide variety of workers fear that artificial intelligence (AI) will make them unemployed.

In an article published by Business Insider on September 11, reporter Ed Zitron argues that if AI should put anyone out of work, it's CEOs.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

"From writers and teachers to bankers and lawyers, most jobs seem ripe to be replaced by artificial intelligence — with one notable exception," Zitron explains. "The only job that seems to be safe from the rise of ChatGPT and other AI tech is, oddly enough, the most expensive and easily automated role: CEO."

The journalist continues, "Chief executives have recently spent a lot of time threatening to replace their lazy, entitled and unproductive workers with AI, but they never seem to face the same level of scrutiny other employees do. Look a little closer, though, and it becomes clear that the role of the modern CEO is not only broken, as I've pointed out before, but it could easily be done by the technology we have now."

Zitron goes on to note that CEOs typically "make over 300 times more than the average worker" despite not being an "actual contributor to a company's bottom line." CEOs, he writes, operate based on "spreadsheets" that are "fed to them by consultants" yet lack a "real understanding of the business."

"The solution is fairly simple: We must hold CEOs accountable in the same way that we do their employees or dissolve the role entirely," Zitron emphasizes. "A chief executive must meaningfully contribute in a way that is measurable and delivers clear value for the company. Failing that, I would argue that the opaque role of the CEO should be the first one to be replaced by artificial intelligence."

READ MORE: Waves of strikes rippling across the US seem big, but the total number of Americans walking off the job remains historically low

Read Business Insider's full article at this link.

A Texas judge on Friday temporarily blocked state Republican-backed legislation that was set to ban "gender-affirming care for most minors" beginning September 1, CNN reports.

"We are invigorated by the court's decision to protect and uphold the rights of trans youth, their families, and health care providers in Texas," Alex Sheldon, executive director at the LGBTQ+ health advocacy group GLMA said, according to the report.

CNN reports:

Senate Bill 14, signed in to law by Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in June, bars health care providers from providing gender transition surgeries, puberty blocking medication or hormone therapies to those under 18 in Texas, with violators at risk of losing their licenses.

The law makes minor exceptions for children who had begun receiving non-surgical gender-affirming care before June 1 and underwent 12 or more sessions of mental health counseling or psychotherapy six months prior to beginning prescription drug care. Transgender youth to whom those exceptions apply can continue their care but must 'wean' off from the treatment with the help of their doctor.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

According to the report, District Judge Maria Cantú Hexsel said the law "'likely violates' three different sections of the Texas Constitution, including 'the fundamental right of parents to make decisions concerning the care, custody, and control of their children."

Furthermore, Hexsel "wrote in the temporary injunction issued Friday that the law would result in 'the loss of access to safe, effective, and medically necessary treatment for transgender adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria.'

READ MORE: Texas AG’s probe into trans care is based on illegal release of kids’ medical records: report

CNN's full report is available at this link.

Republican Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron hopes to unseat Democrat Andy Bashear as the Bluegrass State's next governor, but "his office is fielding serious employee complaints describing 'hostile,' 'cruel,' 'threatening,' and 'demeaning' treatment from senior officials" that contains "allegations that one unit director took 'zoomed in' photos of a detective's breast," The Daily Beast's Roger Sollenberger reports.

Despite "multiple resignations" amongst staff, "Cameron's office has taken little if any action in response to the complaints, which The Daily Beast received from a public records request," Sollenberger writes.

"The one outlier appears to have been the case of the inappropriate photos, in which an investigation found in February that the woman’s supervisor 'should be reprimanded' for public intoxication. The office investigated her claims, but appears to have taken no action on her other six allegations," Sollenberger continues. "The woman who brought that complaint—an active-duty detective employed in the office of the attorney general (OAG)—is suing Cameron and his office for employment discrimination, hostile work conditions, and workers' compensation retaliation, according to filings in Franklin County district court."

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

Beyond that, Sollenberger reveals a pattern of "relentless" abusive behavior occurring under Cameron's watch, including accounts that "two top Cameron officials—Deputy AG Vic Maddox and deputy solicitor general for criminal appeals Jeffrey A. Cross—are accused of routine mistreatment."

Legal briefs describe "an office out of control, streaked with fear and suspicion, where workers are routinely degraded and supervisors not only ignore the complaints but are often at the center of them," Sollenberger says. "One complaint, submitted by an attorney in Cameron's office, noted that Cross treated workers in a 'demeaning, unprofessional manner' and would 'pit employees against each other,' sowing internal mistrust. Cross' tactics, this attorney claimed, had caused 'numerous attorneys and administrative staff members' to resign or retire. A separate complaint, which the OAG's then-communications director filed against Maddox this spring, cites gender discrimination against women, conflict with another top official, 'sabotage' of official duties, and 'threatening/intimidating/humiliating behavior.'"

After the communications director alleged that Maddox "'had been threatening, demeaning, intimidating, humiliating, and highly disrespectful' to her, and displayed 'favoritism' by 'promoting men over roles assigned to women,'" Cameron "called her personally," Sollenberger explains.

Although Cameron "apologized on behalf of Vic and urged" her "not to quit," Sollenberger notes, "It's unclear if Cameron took any disciplinary action against Maddox" because "Maddox remains the deputy AG."

READ MORE: 'Taxation without full representation': Kentucky journalist questions McConnell’s 'mental fortitude'

View Sollenberger's article at this link (subscription required).

Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, currently polling 40 points behind GOP 2024 presidential frontrunner Donald Trump, in a rare TIME magazine interview refused to answer a reporter’s question about what he would do if one of his three children were LGBTQ – but he did spend time promoting his parents’ rights platform.

“I think we were viewed, really from Day One, as the candidate that had the strong record on the issues important to parents,” the Florida Republican told TIME’s national political correspondent Molly Ball in a 30-minute interview at the Iowa State Fair published Wednesday.

Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, currently polling 40 points behind GOP 2024 presidential frontrunner Donald Trump, in a rare TIME magazine interview refused to answer a reporter’s question about what he would do if one of his three children were LGBTQ – but he did spend time promoting his parents’ rights platform.

“I think we were viewed, really from Day One, as the candidate that had the strong record on the issues important to parents,” the Florida Republican told TIME’s national political correspondent Molly Ball in a 30-minute interview at the Iowa State Fair published Wednesday,

“’It has been an issue, really, from the beginning,’ he says of the ‘parents’ rights’ agenda that has been central to his struggling presidential candidacy. ‘And so I do think we’ve tapped into that, and we’ll continue to do it.'”

Parents’ rights is the latest conservative code word for “family values,” as TIME’s national political correspondent Molly Ball notes.

READ MORE: ‘We’re Gonna Start Slitting Throats on Day One’: DeSantis Makes New Deep State Pledge in Campaign Reboot

But it really was really a platform the Florida governor grabbed after it proved to be a winning issue for Virginia Republican Glenn Youngkin in what had been a “long-shot” gubernatorial battle. Democrat Terry McAuliffe’s infamous gaffe on parents’ rights gave new life to the Republican political novice’s campaign in September of 2021, just weeks before the election and just weeks after DeSantis announced he would run for re-election.

“As governor of Florida, DeSantis says, education policy is part of his purview, but it’s also personal,” Ball writes in her TIME interview.

DeSantis told her, “I also just see it through the lens of a dad of a six, five and three-year-old.”

“We understand some of the things that parents are concerned about and that parents are going through. And that impacts how we view these policies, particularly when it goes to things like parents’ rights to be involved in the education.”

Ball writes, “Framing it all a crusade for ‘parents’ rights’ is a neat trick politically, highlighting a throwback, traditionalist view of what used to be termed ‘family values,’ but with a very 2023 culture-war spin.”

READ MORE: DeSantis Boots Campaign Manager, Replaces With Conservative Aide Behind Governor’s Top Far-Right Policies

“Kids should be kids—there shouldn’t be an agenda,” DeSantis told Ball. “I didn’t feel like there was an agenda when I was growing up.”

Despite DeSantis’ claim that kids should be allowed to be kids, he and his wife Casey DeSantis have very publicly included their children in the campaign.

Ball reports, “I ask DeSantis about the rights of parents of trans children, who are being prevented by the state from accessing the medical care they may believe is in their kids’ best interest. He points to the ongoing debate over transgender treatment in Europe, where some experts have recently been moving away from a purely affirmative approach, arguing that the state has an interest in preventing ‘sterilizing children at age 13 or 14′ or performing sex-change surgery on minors.”

DeSantis’ remarks do not appear to be representative of heath care options for minors in the U.S., based on a May report from The Annenberg Public Policy Center’s Factcheck.org.

DeSantis continued his remarks against appropriate medical support of transgender youth.

“As a parent right now, I can’t take my six-year-old daughter and get her a tattoo, even if I want to do that,” he told Ball. “You don’t have the right to do things that are going to be destructive to kids. I think that some of these parents are being told by physicians who are making a lot of money off this that you have to do this, otherwise your kid can end up doing something like commit suicide. I think that they get bullied into thinking this is the right decision.”

READ MORE: Ron DeSantis: I Would Have Loved to Hang Out With Jesus and His Disciples – America Needs More God

LGBTQ youth suffer far higher rates of suicide ideation and suicide attempts than their non-LGBTQ counterparts.

A May, 2022 NPR report titled, “Nearly half of LGBTQ youth seriously considered suicide, survey finds,” specifically mentions DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” legislation.

Ball also reports DeSantis shut down her question about the possibility of his children being LGBTQ and what he would do.

She writes, “when I ask how he’ll respond if one of his children turns out to be gay or trans, his eyes flash momentarily, and he swiftly shuts down the question. ‘Well, my children are my children,’ DeSantis says. ‘We’ll leave that—we’ll leave that between my wife and I.'”

U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) is promoting legislation he says would codify the right to pray in public schools, which already exists, in the hope of drawing “people into more empathy and kindness.”

In an interview with local Florida ABC affiliate WEAR on Monday the Florida Republican warned the “far-left gender ideology and divisive race ideology that we’ve seen in other parts of the country has really permeated the school system.”

“I think that more space for prayer for students in schools is probably better than creating more space for, you know, the next pansexual poetry hour in Portland,” he added, warning about “degenerate content.”

Gaetz, who is under a House Ethics Committee investigation “focused on allegations that he may have engaged in sexual misconduct, illicit drug use or other misconduct,” said from personal experience he believes in the power of prayer.

“I think that in my own experiences and the experiences I’ve observed, prayer creates a sense that there is something bigger than one’s self and it draws people into more empathy and kindness,” he told WEAR.

READ MORE: Trump Next Week: ‘Major’ News Conference, GOP Debate, Arraignment on 13 Felony Charges Including RICO

The pro-Trump Florida Republican announced his intent to file the legislation in July at the far-right Turning Point Action conference in July.

“God’s reach does not stop at the schoolhouse gates,” he said, co-opting a famous 1969 Supreme Court decision that found students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

He promised, “in the coming days, I will introduce a national prayer in school law so that in every classroom in America, there will be time for students to pray if they choose. And you know what? This beautiful new Supreme Court that Trump gave us just might uphold a constitutional law like that, based on the values that this country was built on.”

During that same speech Gaetz also denigrated “the left” and transgender people.

“Are you ready not just to endure the left but to confront them in the battle space of discourse? The left’s ideas, their platforms, their candidates, heck, even some of their women just grow more sterile with every self-loathing iteration,” Congressman Gaetz told supporters before attacking transgender people. “Everything right now is so dead and boring and lame and trans – heck, even the trans want to change.”

Last week, as the Pensacola News Journal reported, Gaetz also claimed, “Our country’s education policy forbids students and faculty from praying while endlessly promoting degenerate LGBT and anti-white propaganda.”

Watch Gaetz’s remarks below or at this link.

Many of the state laws that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis touts as major policy wins are being challenged in the courts, Axios reported.

The lawsuits target DeSantis' policies on abortion, trans rights, drag shows, and gender and race discussions in classrooms.

"Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has cast himself as a Trump-likeconservative who's better at getting things done, but many of the state laws DeSantis touts as his biggest accomplishments are on hold, mired in court challenges," the outlet reported. "The big picture: DeSantis and his state are facing a swarm of lawsuits challenging his policies aimed at abortion, trans rights, drag shows, voting by felons, discussion of racial issues in schools and more."

The court challenges come as DeSantis' struggles in the polls against Donald Trump has him rebooting his campaign."

DeSantis' presidential campaign dismissed the court challenges, saying that "activists seek to use the court system to enact their agenda by judicial fiat because their agenda did not succeed at the ballot box."

"Ron DeSantis has the most accomplished conservative record of any candidate in the race," the campaign said in a statement.

Editor's note: This story has been changed to include additional clarifying language.

Thrice-indicted former President Donald Trump's domination of the 2024 Republican presidential primary field remains, and new polling suggests that a key reason is increased displeasure among GOP voters toward right-wing culture wars. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for example, has championed limits on what can be taught in public schools, opposed to LGBTQ+ equality, and engaged in an economic spat with The Walt Disney Company as principal rallying cries of his White House campaign. But according to New York Times correspondent Jonathan Weisman, that approach is failing.

"Attacks on 'wokeness' may be losing their punch," Weisman reported on Sunday. "The term has become a quick way for candidates to flash their conservative credentials, but battling 'woke' may have less political potency than they think. Though conservative voters might be irked at modern liberalism, successive New York Times/Siena College polls of Republican voters nationally and then in Iowa found that candidates were unlikely to win votes by narrowly focusing on rooting out left-wing ideology in schools, media, culture and business."

Rather, Weisman explained that "Republican voters are showing a 'hands off' libertarian streak in economics, and a clear preference for messages about 'law and order' in the nation's cities and at its borders."

READ MORE: 'What a joke': Newsom spox pans DeSantis’ debate proposal as evidence of 'insecurity and ineptitude'

Weisman recalled that in June, Trump said in Iowa that 'I don't like the term 'woke'" and that 'it's just a term they use — half the people can't even define it, they don't know what it is.'"

Weisman found that "the Times' polls suggest Mr. Trump may be right. Social issues like gay rights and once-obscure jargon like 'woke' may not be having the effect many Republicans had hoped."

Weisman noted that "when presented with the choice between two hypothetical Republican candidates" in the Times/Sienna College survey, "only 24 percent of national Republican voters opted for 'a candidate who focuses on defeating radical ‘woke’ ideology in our schools, media and culture' over 'a candidate who focuses on restoring law and order in our streets and at the border.'"

Furthermore, Weisman continued, "around 65 percent said they would choose the law and order candidate," while "among those 65 and older, often the most likely age bracket to vote, only 17 percent signed on to the 'anti-woke' crusade. Those numbers were nearly identical in Iowa, where the first ballots for the Republican nominee will be cast on Jan. 15."

READ MORE: DeSantis’ 'hostile' laws have 'been absolutely devastating' to Florida’s convention business: report

View Weisman's analysis at this link (subscription required).

The Texas drag ban is the subject of a new lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Texas on Wednesday. The ban is due to take effect next month.

Senate Bill 12 was passed by the state Senate and House on May 29, and signed into law by Republican Governor Greg Abbott on June 18. The law bans “sexually oriented performances” on public property or in the presence of anyone under 18 years old. However, the bill’s definition of “sexually oriented performances” includes “the exhibition of sexual gesticulations using accessories or prosthetics that exaggerate male or female sexual characteristics.” Those who violate the law could be sentenced to a year in jail and fined as much as $10,000.

An earlier draft of the bill contained language directly referring to drag, including explicitly banning “state funding to municipal libraries that host drag story hours or otherwise host events where persons presenting as the opposite sex read books to children for entertainment,” according to KUT-FM.

Read More: Drag Queen Story Hour Interrupted by Neo-Nazis Seen in Terrifying Video

Though the explicit anti-drag language was removed, the suit says the law “unconstitutionally singles out drag performances as a disfavored form of expression.”

“In its zeal to target drag, the Legislature also passed a bill so yawning in scope that it criminalizes and restricts an enormous swath of constitutionally protected activity, including theater, ballet, comedy, and even cheerleading,” the lawsuit reads.

The ACLU filed the lawsuit on behalf of two LGBTQ non-profit organizations, The Woodlands Pride, Inc. and Abilene Pride Alliance; two drag entertainment production companies, Extragrams, LLC and 360 Queen Entertainment LLC; and a drag queen, Brigitte Bandit. The suit names Interim Attorney General Angela Colmenero, as well as a number of local officials. Governor Abbott is not named.

The law is similar to other drag bans that have passed in other states, which have also faced similar legal challenges. However, critics say the Texas drag ban goes even further, potentially banning artwork depicting the nude form, according to the Austin American-Statesman. For example, Sandro Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus, in which the titular goddess is depicted nude upon a clamshell, could hypothetically be challenged.

A federal judge ruled Tennessee’s drag ban violated the First Amendment, calling the ordinance “unconstitutionally vague and substantially overbroad.” In Florida, another federal judge blocked a similar law, saying it would likely run counter to the right to freedom of speech.

Travis County Attorney Delia Garza, one of the named defendants, told KUT-FM she appreciated the lawsuit, and hopes it will “bring some clarity to a law that has constitutional concerns.”

“I continue to hope that in the name of true public safety, our state leaders will one day focus on actual public safety threats, like gun violence, instead of legislation like SB12 which will have little to no effect on the day to day operations of a community and its public safety needs,” Garza continued.

Federal Judge Brian Morris has placed a temporary hold on a Montana law he said "likely will disproportionately harm not only drag performers, but any person who falls outside traditional gender and identity norms," CNN reports.

Per CNN, the law passed by Montana Republican Governor Greg Gianforte earlier this year bans minors "from attending 'sexually oriented shows,' including "so-called drag story hours, which the law defines as events hosted 'by a drag queen or drag king who reads children's books and engages in other learning activities with minor children present.'"

House Bill 359 "also bans public 'sexually oriented performances' – including any involving 'removal or simulated removal of clothing in a sexual manner' – seen by people under the age of 18," according to the report.

READ MORE: 'Let her speak!' 7 arrested in protest over Montana GOP’s silencing of trans lawmaker

The judge's decision comes after "Montana Pride asked the judge earlier this month for an immediate order because the city of Helena had denied its request for a permit for its events, some of which include drag performers, that are scheduled to start Sunday."

Backing the organization, Morris contends "nothing in the record currently before the Court indicates that speech and expression associated with Montana Pride has harmed minors or any other community members."

CNN reports the ruling will prevent "Montana's Republican Attorney General Austin Knudsen from enforcing the measure, which is among other restrictive laws targeting drag performers enacted in GOP-led states, while the court considers whether to issue a longer lasting preliminary injunction."

Furthermore, according to the report, "other plaintiffs in the case include a transgender indigenous author, Adria Jawort, who said a talk she was scheduled to give at a public library in Butte-Silver Bow last month was canceled because the librarian informed her, 'It is too much of a legal risk to have a transgendered person in the library.'"

READ MORE: 'The worst anti-trans bill I have ever seen': GOP-led state houses are ramping up efforts to gut LGBTQ+ rights

State Republican lawmakers have spent much of their time this year passing anti-transgender laws, which the state's only trans lawmaker, Rep. Zooey Zephyr (D) says have resulted in suicide.

In an April hearing regarding Republican-backed anti-trans legislation, the Democratic lawmaker told her GOP colleagues, "When I rose up and said, 'There is blood on your hands,' I was not being hyperbolic.'"

READ MORE: 'Not being hyperbolic': Montana Democrat says GOP-backed anti-trans bills have led to suicide

CNN's full report is available at this link.

Right-wing group Moms for Liberty was recently hit with an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) complaint probing "whether Moms for Liberty is a political educational organization," The Guardian reports.

Per The Guardian, the eight-page complaint filed against the "extremist" group by a Michigan attorney "alleges that the rightwing organization is in violation of its 501(c)4 non-profit status," and also questions "if Moms for Liberty is an action organization, raising questions about its participation in political campaigns and active recruitment of school board candidates."

University of Pittsburgh Associate Professor of Law Phillip Hackney told the news outlet he doesn't believe the complaint will go far, but "said he does think the complaint is correct in bringing up the group's intervention in political campaigns."

READ MORE: Top Democrats ignorant of 'extremist' Moms for Liberty despite warnings the group is dangerous

The Guardian reports:

IRS investigations into a 501(c)4 like Moms for Liberty would be 'heavily fact intensive', Hackney said, with an agent reviewing materials and going back and forth with attorneys for 18 months. The IRS has a statute of limitations to complete an investigation within three years, he said. If the group's status is revoked after that time, it probably would not owe back taxes but would reorganize as a taxable, private organization with even less transparency and no prohibitions on political campaigning.

The complaint obtained by the news outlet states, "The promotion of social welfare does not include direct or indirect participation or intervention in political campaigns on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office. However, a section 501(c)(4) social welfare organization may engage in some political activities, so long as that is not its primary activity."

The document also emphasizes, "It would be a permissible educational purpose if there were advocating to remove gender discussions from classrooms and schools if there was a balanced presentation of benefits and drawbacks of using a person's preferred pronouns, supporting LGBTQ youth, impacts on children of being 'exposed' to LGBTQ supportive environments. There is not."

During a segment of MSNBC's Inside with Jen Psaki earlier this month, Psaki exposed the group in a scathing report, noting, "As for their claim that they are just a group of concerned, nonpartisan moms who happen to care about liberty, consider this: One of the founders, who's name is notably emitted from its website, is a current Republican school board member, who is married to the now-chairman of the Florida Republican Party. In 2021, he told The Washington Post, "I have been trying for a dozen years to get 20- and 30-year old females involved with the Republican Party. But now Moms for Liberty has done it for me."

READ MORE: 'May not be what you think': Jen Psaki exposes 'unapologetically extreme' Moms for Liberty group

The Guardian's full report is available at this link (subscription required).

Former United States Labor Secretary and Carmel P. Friesen Professor of Public Policy at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley Robert Reich on Tuesday laid out the parallels between the anti-LGBTQ+ policies of Russian President Vladimir Putin and those of former President Donald Trump's Republican Party.

Putin signed a law on Monday banning gender-affirming care that also "annuls marriages in which one person has 'changed gender' and bars transgender people from becoming foster or adoptive parents," The Guardian reported.

In less than three minutes, Reich detailed how little daylight exists when Putin's legislation and GOP proposals are compared.

READ MORE: 'Horrifying': Oklahoma Republicans draft bill to criminalize gender-affirming care for individuals under 26

"Why do Putin and the Republican Party sound so much alike? Simple. Their culture wars have similar agendas. Both are trying to distract attention from the economic looting by their respective oligarchies," Reich began.

"Vladimir Putin has been blasting so-called cancel culture," Reich said. "This was his third cancel culture rant in recent months. It's the same imaginary crisis that Trump and the GOP have been ranting about for several years. The goal of cancel culture is to make decent Americans live in fear of being fired, expelled, shamed."

Reich noted that "Tucker Carlson, one of Fox News's most infamous personalities accuses liberals of trying to cancel all sorts of things because if it could happen to Dr. Seuss, it might happen to you. Dr. Seuss went from being a beloved childhood author to worse than Hitler in just a matter of days last fall."

Reich recalled that "Putin argued that teaching children about different gender identities was quote, 'On the verge of a crime against humanity.' Putin's fixation on LGBTQ people is also echoed on the American right. Republican state legislators are attacking trans people and restricting discussion of gender and sexual orientation in schools and in Texas."

READ MORE: 'This is about protecting children': Gun control foe Greg Abbott will sign ban on gender-affirming care

Reich continued, "While Putin's MO has been to fuel Russian ethnic pride and nationalism, America's right-wing has been fueling white nationalism. To conclude from all of this that authoritarians think alike misses a deeper truth. Putin, Trump, Carlson, and America's right-wing have been promoting the same narrative for the same reason. Manufacturing fears of 'the other' to distract from where all the wealth and power have gone — all the way to the top."

Reich added, "Remember, Putin was put into power by a Russian oligarchy, made fabulously rich by siphoning off and privatizing the wealth of the former Soviet Union. Likewise, Trump and the radical right in America have been bankrolled by an American oligarchy, Rupert Murdoch, Charles Koch, Rebecca Mercer, Peter Thiel, and other billionaires. Sowing racism, homophobia, and transphobia creates life-or-death dangers for many people in our society. For both Putin and the American right, it serves to divert attention from the economic plunder by the ultra-rich."

Watch below or at this link.

READ MORE: Tennessee appeals court allows gender-affirming care ban to take effect

View The Guardian's analysis here.