The left-wing advocacy group Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has added a parental rights organization to its “Hate Map,” which purports to track groups that threaten minorities and members of the LGBTQ communities.
Moms For Liberty, an activist organization that fights for transparency in education, holding leaders accountable, engaging community leaders, and limited government, has been labeled a hate group by the SPLC after the parents organization led an effort to be more active in education policy following the pandemic.
“Thanks in part to its grand disruptions at school board meetings, political alliances and extremist ties, Moms for Liberty has quickly become one of the most recognized names in the anti-student inclusion movement,” the SPLC states in a scathing report condemning the organization as an anti-student inclusion group.
SPLC also claims that Moms For Liberty is “antigovernment,” and therefore part of an antidemocratic hard-right movement.
Despite lawfully petitioning school officials, SPLC added, “Since the group’s 2021 founding, Moms for Liberty members across the nation have been making waves for intimidating and harassing teachers and school officials.”
“They have publicly battled teachers’ unions, labeling them as ‘cartels’ and ‘terrorist organizations.’ They condemn corporations, like The Walt Disney Co., that are supportive of the LGBTQ community,” SPLC stated. “They lobby for parental rights bills, such as the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ law and advocate for anti-critical race theory bills. These groups offer rewards for identifying teachers who violate newly enacted anti-critical race theory (CRT) laws and file complaints after passage of these bills.”
In a statement provided to Timcast, Moms For Liberty co-founders Tiffany Justice and Tina Descovich dismissed the SPLC report, reiterating the need to continue pushing for more transparency in education.
“Two-thirds of Americans think the public education system is on the wrong track today. That is why our organization is devoted to empowering parents to be a part of their child’s public school education,” Justice and Descovich said.
The pair added:
That is our fundamental goal, which began just two years ago when teacher’s unions locked students out of schools during the pandemic.
Empowering parents continues to be our mission today and that has fueled our organization’s growth – like wildfire to now 45 states in the country.
Name-calling parents who want to be a part of their child’s education as “hate groups” or “bigoted” just further exposes what this battle is all about: Who fundamentally gets to decide what is taught to our kids in school – parents or government employees? We believe that parental rights do not stop at the classroom door and no amount of hate from groups like this is going to stop that.
SPLC claims to be a catalyst for racial justice that seeks to advance human rights. It also vows to expose to the media and law enforcement those it self-defines as extremists.
Over the years, reports from various news publications — including the left-leaning New York Times, POLITICO, and NPR — have presented SPLC as a corrupt, scandal-tinged organization that abuses terms like “hate” and “extremist” to smear others for the purpose of fundraising.
The SPLC has also been recorded as the source of domestic terrorism within the U.S.
Floyd Lee Corkins II, a shooter who pleaded guilty to three charges, including committing an act of terrorism, was arrested after plotting a mass shooting attack against the conservative Family Research Council, where he planned to kill as many people as he could.
Corkins said he chose his target from the same SPLC “hate map” on which the organization just listed Moms For Liberty.
“The day after Floyd Corkins came into the FRC headquarter and opened fire wounding one of our team members, I stated that while Corkins was responsible for the shooting, he had been given a license to perpetrate this act of violence by groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center which has systematically and recklessly labeled every organization with which they disagree as a ‘hate group,'” Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said.
The move by SPLC to list Moms For Liberty on its “hate map” was met with mixed reactions from opposing sides of the political aisle.
The SPLC is a left-wing activist organization that manipulates historical guilt in order to smear its political opponents. The women who lead Moms for Liberty and Parents Defending Education are good-hearted patriots who should file suit against the SPLC.https://t.co/1ZkQOMUtfO
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) June 6, 2023
Moms for Liberty, the racist, homophobic, transphobic group that has pushed to bully trans kids, cancel critical race theory (CRT), and ban books about MLK and Ruby Bridges, has been labeled an extremist hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. https://t.co/8aEqOPEwKw
— Keith Boykin (@keithboykin) June 7, 2023
