Arkansas’ education boss to speak at Moms for Liberty convention

Arkansas Education Secretary Jacob Oliva is speaking this summer at the national convention of Moms for Liberty, a group recently identified as an “extremist” group by the Southern Poverty Law Center for its racist and homophobic ideas and partnering with militia groups.

Florida-based Moms for Liberty was founded in early 2021 primarily to push back against mask and vaccine mandates in public schools. The group has quickly grown its membership and political reach, and is now active in pushing schools and libraries to ban LGBTQ+ books, blocking discussions of the gay and transgender community in schools, working to block education about race history, and partnering with militia groups like the Proud Boys to pressure school boards and other political bodies. The group is also active in working to elect members and supporters on public school boards.

Moms for Liberty organizers said at their first national convention in July 2022 that they had almost 200 chapters in 37 states with around 100,000 members.

The Montgomery, Ala.-based Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) recently labeled Moms for Liberty as an “extremist” group in its “The Year in Hate & Extremism 2022” report. The SPLC likened the nascent organization as being similar to many of those created after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown V. Board of Education decision in 1954 that required integration of U.S. public schools.

“Segregationist parents did not relent and side-stepped Brown v. Board through self-titled ‘school choice’ that made it possible for parents who were allowed to maintain their racist values by sending their children to private Christian academies. Some 3,500 white, racially discriminatory church-based schools sprung up in the wake of Brown v Board,” according to the SPLC. “Today’s so-called parental rights activists have also copied and pasted from the scripts of past groups, adapting old racist and homophobic ideas, as well as conspiracy theories asserting Marxist indoctrination. They are now adding a dash of QAnon rhetoric, accusing progressives of attempting to groom and sexualize children.”

The SPLC said Moms for Liberty has helped support the rise of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, noting that 84 anti-student inclusion bills were pre-filed or introduced in 26 states by the end of 2022.

Moms for Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler dismissed the SPLC label.

“Outside of it being a leftist attack, political hit job, there’s no credibility behind it. It’s truly laughable,” Ziegler said in a story posted by USA Today.

Kimberly Mundell, director of communications for the Arkansas Department of Education, said Oliva’s purpose at the convention is to simply share what Arkansas is doing through the recently approved LEARNS Act.

“The education transformation we are embracing in Arkansas serves as a blueprint for the nation, not only for its emphasis on early literacy and improving learning for all students, but also for empowering parents with educational choice options for their child. We welcome this opportunity to share our efforts with stakeholders around the country,” noted the ADE statement.

The LEARNS Act is Gov. Sarah Sanders’ signature education legislation. Implementation of the new law has been blocked with a temporary restraining order based on a legal challenge alleging the legislation was not properly approved by the Arkansas Legislature.

Among its many provisions, the LEARNS Act creates “education freedom accounts” giving families access to about $7,000 for non-public school options that otherwise would have gone to the public schools where their children would have attended. It also increases the minimum teacher salary from $36,000 to $50,000 and provides every teacher a $2,000 raise.

When the office of Gov. Sarah Sanders was asked to comment about Oliva’s participation at the convention, her spokeswoman Alexa Henning referred Talk Business & Politics to the following Sanders tweet: “Nothing scares Joe Biden more than parents defending their kids. His allies just labeled concerned moms and dads ‘anti-government extremists.’ He can smear parents all he likes but we are not giving up the fight for our kids’ future.”

Other speakers at the Moms for Liberty national convention in Philadelphia include former President Donald Trump, Florida Governor and U.S. presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, and former South Carolina Governor and U.S. presidential candidate Nikki Haley.