PHILADELPHIA — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican hopeful in the 2024 presidential election, spoke Friday at the annual gathering of Moms For Liberty, a group that has fiercely opposed instruction related to race and gender identity in our nation's classrooms.
The governor's address came just hours before his main rival in next year's election, former President Donald Trump, is scheduled to appear at the event.
In his 25-minute address on Friday, DeSantis focused on his educational priorities including restricting instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in public schools, banning the teaching of critical race theory, preventing transgender student-athletes from participating in sports that don't align with their biological sex, and giving parents and guardians the power to challenge reading and instructional materials in schools.
"Parents in Florida have had to blow the whistle on inappropriate materials in our schools," DeSantis said. "To use tax dollars to bring in that type of garbage into our schools is fundamentally wrong and has no place."
WATCH: Gov. DeSantis speaks at Moms For Liberty summit
SPECIAL COVERAGE: Education
The two-year-old group, which has quickly become a force in conservative politics, advocates parental rights in education, but an anti-hate watchdog has labeled it “extremist” for allegedly harassing community members, advancing anti-LGBTQ+ misinformation and fighting to scrub diverse and inclusive material from lesson plans.
Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and DeSantis' wife, Casey DeSantis, also are slated to address the group Friday at the downtown Philadelphia hotel hosting the conference. Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy are set to give remarks on Saturday.
Their attendance underscores the influence of the group, which has made connections with powerful GOP organizations, politicians and donors to become a major player in 2024.
The group has transformed from three Florida moms opposing COVID-19 mandates in 2021 to claiming 285 chapters across 45 states. Along the way, it has found a close ally in DeSantis, who was presented with a "liberty sword" at the group's first annual meeting last year and has signed multiple bills that Moms for Liberty supported.
Beyond remarks from the candidates and other speakers, the summit will feature strategy sessions on such topics as "protecting kids from gender ideology" and "comprehensive sex education: sex ed or sexualization."
Parent activists and LGBTQ+ advocacy organizations gathered Friday to protest outside the conference, citing the Southern Poverty Law Center’s designation of the group as an “anti-government extremist” organization.
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Others mentioned recent incidents, including an Indiana Moms for Liberty chapter publishing an Adolf Hitler quote in its newsletter before apologizing and removing it, and a Tennessee chapter complaining about lessons on Black civil rights figures Martin Luther King Jr. and Ruby Bridges.
"We are going to be loud and we are going to be loving and we are going to be full of positive energy," People for the American Way national field director Alana Byrd said outside the hotel, ahead of DeSantis' morning address. "All we want is the freedom to learn and the freedom to read for children and grandchildren in this country."
In the days before the conference, several historical associations, state senators, activists and employees at Philadelphia's Museum of the American Revolution had pleaded unsuccessfully with the museum to cancel a welcome event for the conference planned for Thursday night.
“The very history that we're presenting within the walls of the museum is a more diverse and therefore more accurate telling of history," said Trish Norman, an assistant curator at the museum who protested the event. "And Moms for Liberty is notorious for erasing LGBTQ voices and Black voices from history."
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The museum told The Associated Press that “because fostering understanding within a democratic society is so central to our mission, rejecting visitors on the basis of ideology would in fact be antithetical to our purpose."
People for the American Way was among several groups planning to rally against the gathering. Its "Grandparents for Truth" campaign was mobilizing grandparents and other supporters "who are fighting for the next generation’s freedom to learn."
One such grandparent, Maureen Carreño, said she wasn't taught a diverse history as a child and wants something different for her five grandkids.
"I would hope that we teach the totality of history," she said. "And, yes, it might make you feel a little bad or sad or something, but that's part of history."
Moms for Liberty co-founder Tiffany Justice said the protesters "obviously don't know very much about our organization," and if they wanted to, “they could have come to the summit instead of standing on the street."
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Though Moms for Liberty says it is nonpartisan, it has largely drawn conservative support. The group also has fought to elect conservative candidates to school boards around the country.
While the group's status as a 501(c)4 nonprofit means it doesn’t have to disclose its funders, its public donors include conservative powerhouses such as the Heritage Foundation and the Leadership Institute, a national political training organization.
Patriot Mobile, a far-right Christian cellphone company paying to sponsor Trump’s remarks at the conference, has a political action committee that has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in an effort to take charge of Texas school boards.
Mom for Liberty's Florida-based PAC also has received a $50,000 donation from Julie Fancelli, a Republican donor whose family owns Publix grocery stores and who helped fund Trump’s Jan. 6 "Stop the Steal" rally, according to House Jan. 6 committee findings. Fancelli didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is running in the Democratic presidential primary, had been scheduled to speak at the group's summit, but his "campaign told us his schedule changed," Justice said.
Kennedy's press team said he dropped out "for family reasons." Hours later, Kennedy said during a town hall with NewsNation that he "made a mistake by accepting that invitation” and that once he learned of Moms for Liberty's positions on LGBTQ+ issues, he "declined to go."
Jennifer Pippin leads the Indian River County Moms for Liberty chapter and is attending the convention in Philadelphia.
"We're just really excited to hear what all these candidates are saying and to have our own governor from our own state is pretty amazing," she said.
She said education is a big issue but not the only one important to the group.
"It's not just education and reading, writing and arithmetic that needs improvement in America," she said.
Several groups have emerged to counter the Moms for Liberty message, such as the Florida Freedom to Read Project and Support our Schools in Sarasota.
Emmy Kenny is the president of the Democratic Public Education Caucus of Palm Beach County, formed to advocate and support public education.
"We advocate at the school board level, at the state level but there's only so much we can do when we have a governor who is pushing through hateful bill after bill," Kenny said. "In addition to our political advocacy, we are trying to strengthen our community and create opportunities for learning outside of public school."