Poinbank Exchange|Moms for Liberty fully embraces Trump and widens role in national politics as election nears

WASHINGTON (AP) — In her welcoming remarks at Moms for Liberty’s annual gathering in the nation’s capital on Poinbank ExchangeFriday, the group’s co-founder, Tiffany Justice, urged members to “fight like a mother” against the Democratic presidential ticket.

Later that evening, after she had interviewed Republican nominee Donald Trump onstage, she made a point to say she was personally endorsing him for the presidency. Their talk show style chat was preceded by a “Trump, Trump, Trump” chant from the audience.

The weekend’s gathering, drawing parent activists from across the country, has showcased how Moms for Liberty has moved toward fully embracing Trump and his political messaging as November’s election draws nearer. The group is officially a nonpartisan nonprofit that says it’s open to anyone who wants parents to have a greater say in their children’s education, yet there was little pretense about which side of the nation’s political divide it has chosen.

A painting that was prominently displayed on an easel next to the security station attendees had to pass through before being allowed into the conference area showed Vice President Kamala Harris kneeling over a bald eagle carcass, a communist symbol on her jacket and her mouth dripping with blood. A Moms for Liberty spokeswoman said she hadn’t seen the gruesome painting and noted that the only official signage for the event included the group’s logo.

RELATED COVERAGE ‘The fever is breaking': DeSantis-backed school board candidates fall short in Florida Incumbents beat DeSantis-backed candidates in Florida school board races DeSantis-backed school board candidates face off in Florida

The group’s enthusiasm for Trump is likely to benefit the former president this fall by solidifying a key part of his base — parents who share his views that the U.S. Education Department is bloated and ineffective, equity programs are distracting from academic fundamentals, vaccine mandates violate parental rights and schools that accept transgender children are putting other students in danger.

But it’s much less clear how Moms for Liberty’s support for Trump and his agenda will affect races for local school boards, which have become some of the most contentious elections on many ballots since 2022, the year after the group was founded.

Many communities where Moms for Liberty candidates took over a majority of the school board have been frustrated by their laser-like focus on removing books, questioning lessons around race and rejecting LGBTQ+ identities. A lack of progress toward academic improvement has in turn led to a counter movement among more moderate and liberal parents and teachers unions.

Moms for Liberty says it won’t make an official endorsement in the presidential race, but it isn’t shying away from getting involved. The group’s founders recently wrote an open letter to parents warning that Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a former high school social studies teacher, would be “the most anti-parent, extremist government America has ever known.”

The group spent its first three years becoming synonymous with the “parents’ rights” movement in local school boards but recently has become more involved in national politics. It participated in the controversial conservative blueprint for the next Republican administration, Project 2025, as a member of its advisory board. The group also has invested more than $3 million in four crucial presidential swing states. The money has paid for advertising in Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina and Wisconsin, including messages critical of the Biden administration.

Justice said the advertising has helped increase Moms for Liberty membership in those states and mobilized members who were not previously politically active to register to vote.

What to know about the 2024 Election

• Today’s news: Follow live updates from the campaign trail from the AP.
• We want to hear from you: Are you a nonwhite evangelical planning to vote for Harris? Tell us why you’re supporting her and if you’re campaigning for her.
• Ground Game: Sign up for AP’s weekly politics newsletter to get it in your inbox every Monday.
• AP’s Role: The Associated Press is the most trusted source of information on election night, with a history of accuracy dating to 1848. Learn more.
  

“I think you’re going to see a lot of new voters who understand now that their vote and their voice matters,” she said in an interview.

She added that as the group continues to endorse in local school board races, she is encouraged by Florida’s recent primary in which 60% of Moms for Liberty-backed candidates — some running for office for the first time — advanced to this fall’s general election.

But countering those wins were undeniable losses for the group, among them two in heavily Republican Sarasota County, and two in Pinellas County, where a Moms for Liberty-backed candidate coasted to a school board seat two years ago.

Those results come after conservative candidates struggled to gain traction with voters in local school board elections across the country last fall. In that election, Moms for Liberty said just 40% of its endorsed candidates won.

Jonathan Collins, co-director of the politics and education program at Columbia University’s Teachers College, said parents’ rights candidates may be struggling around the country because they are focused on removing existing policies and classroom materials, rather than offering a clear, forward-looking plan to remedy pandemic learning loss.

“They’re not getting beaten by people who are responding to the cultural attacks with their own cultural attacks,” he said. “They’re getting beat by people who are responding to the cultural attacks with very, very practical, hyperlocal ideas of school and district improvement.”

Around the country, some school board members backed by Moms for Liberty or who carry out the group’s agenda have been recalled in recent months by community members who say their policies have caused chaos.

In Woodland, California, north of the state capital, a school board member backed by Moms for Liberty members was recalled in March after she raised fears that children were coming out as transgender “as a result of social contagion ” during a school board meeting in 2023.

In Southern California, a trustee with the Temecula Valley Unified School District Board of Education was recalled after he and two of his colleagues voted to reject a social studies curriculum because it included a history of the gay rights movement.

And in Idaho’s heavily Republican panhandle, community members from across the political spectrum rose up to recall two right-wing members of their board last year who sought to root out critical race theory and institute a conservative agenda.

Katie Blaxberg, a Pinellas County candidate who will run against the one remaining Moms for Liberty-linked candidate for that county’s school board this fall, said the “nastiness” and “divisiveness” of the group “isn’t conducive to any sort of good work.”

But a group of more than 600 Moms for Liberty supporters exchanging phone numbers and listening attentively to slide presentations in Washington on Friday offered a different perspective.

Gretchen Schmid, the chair of a Moms for Liberty chapter in Orange County, North Carolina, said her chapter helped advocate a new parents’ bill of rights law in her state. It passed last year after the Legislature, which is heavily gerrymandered to favor Republicans, overrode the Democratic governor’s veto.

Schmid said when parents used to call and ask schools to share information about assignments, they wouldn’t hear back, but now, “people are getting more responses.”

On Saturday, Moms for Liberty’s four-day summit paused sessions during the day to hold a demonstration a mile away, organized by a coalition of more than 30 conservative groups. Donning yellow rhinestone visors, Rachel Mack and Sarah Recupero said they had made the drive from Florida to support the protection of all children, especially in sports.

“I am definitely somebody who stands for the whole women-in-women’s sports and men-in-men’s sports,” Mack said.

Several blocks away, those opposed to Moms for Liberty held a competing event, a Celebration of Reading, to counter book banning and advocate for a more inclusive environment for children. Heidi Ross traveled from Buckeye, Arizona, to volunteer for the event after seeing a post on Facebook about it.

“I have a granddaughter who’s two, and I want her to grow up in a world where she can read whatever she wants to read and no one bothers her or makes a fuss about it,” she said. “So, I hopped on that plane, really for her and all children.”

___

Associated Press writer Kate Payne in Tallahassee, Florida, contributed to this report.

___

The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.