Category: MAGA / Republican

Book bans in Texas spread as new state law takes effect

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/10/11/texas-library-book-bans/

The hate and misinformation continues and spreads.  The over the top rush to return to a regressive past of strict gender roles, censorship, and an enforced social acceptance of only what is acceptable to the leading churches in the area.  Think of the time these people want desperately to return to, and ask why.  It did not fix anything, it did not solve any problems.  Gay kids were still born, they just had miserable lives.  Trans people were still born, they just had to suffer with no social acceptance or relief.  These people hate civil rights for anyone but themselves.  They are demanding a return to a time when it was not only legal but acceptable to discriminate against anyone who was not a straight cis white person.  That is what they want so badly, the right to insult, shame, targeting for bullying and harming people who are different.  I have to ask why, what makes that time so attractive for these people.   I think it is the right to abuse others, to feel superior to them!  Again I repeat that a lot of this hate and bigotry is driven by fundmentlist religious sects.   Below is are two quote.   Hugs

The ALA said book challenges nearly doubled nationally in 2022 and are “evidence of a growing, well-organized, conservative political movement, the goals of which include removing books about race, history, gender identity, sexuality, and reproductive health from America’s public and school libraries that do not meet their approval.”

“The book fair is one of our biggest fundraisers, but unfortunately, we have seen more and more books that promote and support LBGTQ+ views,” the school wrote. “We’re at a crossroads where we share different values and beliefs, especially when it comes to exposing young children to adult topics. Friendswood Christian School is a private institution devoted to creating a complete learning environment for children by incorporating Christian principles into the academic framework. We want to provide an environment where children can hang on to their innocence as long as possible.”

As Texas enters its third straight school year of coordinated book banning activity, a growing number of districts are targeting library books. Caught in the dragnet: books featuring a “naked” crayon and one with a cartoon butt.

BY JEREMY SCHWARTZ, THE TEXAS TRIBUNE AND PROPUBLICA
 
A reflection of an American flag is visible as a Little Free Library, which was designed to look like a prison, invites residents to take books that the library says have been challenged by schools across the state of Texas, in Houston, Texas, U.S. May 3, 2023. REUTERS/Callaghan O'Hare - RC25R0AT2JN3
The American flag reflects off a Houston Little Free Library designed to look like a prison filled with banned books. Credit: Callaghan O’Hare/Reuters
 

This article is co-published with ProPublica, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up for ProPublica’s Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox as soon as they are published. Also, sign up for The Brief, our daily newsletter that keeps readers up to speed on the most essential Texas news.

As a new Texas law further restricting what books students can check out of school libraries takes effect, local bans are gaining steam in districts across the state — in some cases going in startling directions.

In Katy, a growing Houston suburb, school officials recently bought $93,000 worth of new library books and promptly put them in storage so an internal committee could review them. The district then banned 14 titles (bringing its total since 2021 to 30), including popular books by Dr. Seuss and Judy Blume, as well as “No, David!” an award-winning children’s book featuring a mischievous cartoon character who at one point jumps out of a bathtub, exposing a cartoon backside. (This wasn’t the district’s first foray into regulating cartoon nudity; over the summer, a book about a crayon that lost its wrapper, becoming “naked” in the process, was flagged for review but ultimately retained.)

Following the latest removals, the Katy school board decided that cartoon butts would be exempted from a district policy that called for removing books showing nudity. “Explicit frontal nudity,” on the other hand, would not be allowed.

“The board’s intent was never to remove well-known cartoon-like children’s books just because they showed a little drawing of a little boy’s rear-end,” its president, Victor Perez, said, according to the Houston Chronicle.

 

One hundred miles to the east, a school district near Beaumont made headlines last month after removing a substitute middle school teacher who had read students portions of an illustrated adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary, which detailed her hiding from the Nazis and was published after her death in the Holocaust.

The graphic novel version includes descriptions of Frank’s attraction to other girls as well as her clinical descriptions of her private parts.

The book, which had not been approved as part of the district’s curriculum, had been included on a reading list sent to parents at the start of the school year, according to television station KFDM.

The district is investigating whether administrators knew the book was being used in the class, according to news reports.

And just south of Houston, the private Friendswood Christian School announced it was canceling its Scholastic Book Fair, barring the nation’s largest children’s book publisher, which has put on book fairs at schools around the country for decades.

In a letter to parents, obtained by ABC13 in Houston, the school made clear the decision was aimed at books featuring LGBTQ+ themes and characters.

“The book fair is one of our biggest fundraisers, but unfortunately, we have seen more and more books that promote and support LBGTQ+ views,” the school wrote. “We’re at a crossroads where we share different values and beliefs, especially when it comes to exposing young children to adult topics. Friendswood Christian School is a private institution devoted to creating a complete learning environment for children by incorporating Christian principles into the academic framework. We want to provide an environment where children can hang on to their innocence as long as possible.”

Kasey Meehan, the Freedom to Read program director for the New York-based free speech organization PEN America, said that as Texas enters what is essentially its third consecutive school year of book banning activity, efforts have taken some troubling directions.

 

“Even after that first removal of books, what we see is a continued chilling effect that happens across schools,” she said in an interview. “There are these ripples that are going to extend beyond simply removing a book to just read, erring on the side of caution and bringing a bit more scrutiny to any availability of books and any opportunities that students can have to access books.”

The local censorship efforts come as courts wrestle with a new Texas law that requires booksellers to rate public school library books based on their depictions of or references to sex. Books in which such references are deemed “patently offensive” by the vendors will be issued a “sexually explicit” rating and can’t be sold to schools and must be removed from shelves of school libraries. Books that reference or depict sex generally will be rated “sexually relevant” and require parental permission to read.

Texas schools would be barred from buying books from vendors who don’t use the ratings.

On Sept. 18, a U.S. district judge in Austin issued a written order blocking the law, which was passed this spring, from taking effect. Judge Alan D. Albright, a Trump appointee, ruled the law would impose “unconstitutionally vague requirements” on booksellers and “misses the mark on obscenity.”

 

“And the state,” he wrote, “in abdicating its responsibility to protect children, forces private individuals and corporations into compliance with an unconstitutional law that violates the First Amendment.”

A week later, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the judge’s ruling, temporarily allowing the law to go into effect while the court considers the case, which it is expected to take up this month.

Book bannings have increased precipitously in the state since ProPublica and The Texas Tribune started reporting on the issue in rural Hood County two years ago, where a fight over library books foreshadowed the intense partisanship that has come to mark many Texas school board races. The U.S. Department of Education launched an investigation into the Granbury Independent School District after the superintendent was secretly recorded ordering librarians to remove library books with LGBTQ+ themes.

The federal probe, which followed a ProPublica-Tribune investigation with NBC News, remains open, according to the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights. Last year, in response to the outlets’ investigation, the district said it was committed to supporting students of all backgrounds.

 

The issue continues to roil Granbury, as some community members and trustees don’t believe the district has gone far enough to remove books. Last month, the school board censured a trustee who wants additional titles removed after she was accused of sneaking into a school library to examine books with a cellphone flashlight.

According to a report from the American Library Association, Texas was home to the most attempts to ban or restrict books in 2022.

Of the 1,269 documented attempts to remove books from school or public libraries across the nation in 2022, 93 took place in Texas, affecting over 2,300 titles, the association’s Office of Intellectual Freedom found. The ALA said book challenges nearly doubled nationally in 2022 and are “evidence of a growing, well-organized, conservative political movement, the goals of which include removing books about race, history, gender identity, sexuality, and reproductive health from America’s public and school libraries that do not meet their approval.”

The American Library Association itself has come under fire among conservative circles in Texas. In August, Midland County commissioners voted to withdraw from the association. Days later, the Texas State Library and Archives Commission pulled out.

 

A similar report by PEN America found 3,362 instances of book banning at K-12 schools during the 2022-23 school year, up 33% from the previous year. According to the organization, Florida schools accounted for the most removals, 1,406, followed by Texas with 625.

What’s been your experience with school library book bans in Texas? Email Austin-based reporter Jeremy Schwartz at jeremy.schwartz@propublica.org to let him know.

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Information about the authors

Jeremy Schwartz’s staff photo

Jeremy Schwartz

REPORTER, PROPUBLICA/TEXAS TRIBUNE INVESTIGATIVE UNIT

jeremy.schwartz@propublica.org

@JinATX

MEDIA STILL QUESTION WHETHER TRUMP’S CHRISTIANS ARE ‘REAL’ CHRISTIANS

Media Still Question Whether Trump’s Christians are ‘Real’ Christians

I can not remember who sent me this one, but thank you.   It is in one of my old windows of open tabs.  Hugs.

The criminal former president is so far ahead of his closest GOP rival that the Washington press corps is already reviving themes from the 2016 and 2020 elections. Here’s the AP on Friday: “Some critics see Trump’s behavior as un-Christian. His conservative Christian backers see a hero.”

How can a lying, thieving, philandering sadist like Donald Trump continue to hold the overwhelming approval of “conservative Christians”? Since he first ran for president, reporters have tried explaining this apparent contradiction. They’re going to keep trying.

But all this rests on an assumption—two assumptions, actually. Once we drop them, a greater truth stands before us in plain sight: For Donald Trump’s Christians, there is no difference between religion and politics. They’re not pretending otherwise. The rest of us shouldn’t either.

What assumptions? 

The first is that Christianity is just one thing—the particular teachings of Jesus regarding God’s universal love, let’s say. The second, based on the first, is that there’s a contradiction between Trump and Christianity. How could supporters believe in God’s universal love while backing a man whose campaign has become explicitly a vengeance movement?

There is no contradiction, however, if we concede the obvious—that there’s more than one kind of Christianity, that there’s always been more than one kind, and that there are varieties of Christianity.

Once you concede this, you see a relationship that’s not at all based on a contradiction. It’s based on common interests. They aren’t drawn to him in spite of the fact that he’s a lying, thieving, philandering sadist. They’re drawn to him because he’s a lying, thieving, philandering sadist.

The implication here is one that few want to talk about, including religion reporters and their religious sources. If a variety of religion makes common cause with a bad man (for instance, with a lying, thieving, philandering sadist), isn’t that religion, well, a bad religion?

Reporters don’t want to be seen as adjudicators of faith. So they pretend that politics and religion are separate. Their religious sources don’t want the reputations of their respective religions to be irreparably harmed by Trump and his Christians so they pretend that religious faith isn’t what’s pushing them together. It’s politics, they say. 

For instance, the AP cited retired Catholic priest, the Rev. Peter Daly. 

In 2017, Daly wrote “Donald Trump’s gospel is not the Gospel of Jesus” in which he “depicted Trump as an uncharitable bully, prone to lying, lacking in empathy and tolerance.”

“He sees every opponent as someone to be shouted down or roughed up,” Daly wrote. “He is not a peacemaker.”

Six years later, the AP reported, Daly still can’t fully explain “why so many conservative Christians remain in Trump’s camp despite behavior and rhetoric ‘that are antithetical to everything they stand for.’”

It must be politics, not religion, he says. According to the AP:

“Some pro-Trump pastors have relished the proximity to power afforded during White House visits or special political events, Daly said. And some rural, white Christians ‘feel like nobody speaks for them,’ Daly added. ‘They think, “Here’s Donald Trump. He’ll be our champion.” It has nothing to do with being Christian. It’s the politics of grievance.’” 

Oh, but it has everything to do with being a Christian!

This is evident by Christian supporters explaining themselves in Christian terms:

“Some evangelicals, since early in Trump’s presidency, have likened him to Cyrus the Great, the Persian king who, according to the Bible, enabled Jews to return to Israel from their exile in Babylon.” [The Jews here are metaphors for God’s chosen people.]

They explain themselves in explicitly political terms, too. 

Megachurch Pastor Robert Jeffries told the AP: “In many ways, Christians feel like they are in an existential cultural war between good and evil, and they want a warrior like Donald Trump who can win.” 

There’s no difference between religion and politics.

I don’t know why there’s so much resistance to stating the obvious. Any religion that supports Donald Trump, and does so in explicitly religious terms, is not a religion that anyone, especially religious people, should be defending. Christianity isn’t just one thing. There are many Christianities. What’s so bad about calling one of them bad?

Most people, especially religious people, prefer to say that the Christians who support Trump aren’t “true” or “real” Christians—as if all Christianities privilege the Bible’s more peaceful and inclusive teachings. This is not (and never has been) the case.

God’s universal love, for many Christianities, is secondary to God’s particular (non-universal) punishment of God’s enemies—of the people who stand against Donald Trump. Politics and religion are not separate. They are one. Trump’s Christians don’t pretend otherwise. 

The rest of us shouldn’t either. 

North Carolina Republicans Are Creating a ‘Secret Police Force’

https://www.thedailybeast.com/north-carolina-republicans-are-creating-a-secret-police-force

How deep are these red states willing to go in the authoritarian fascist rabbit hole?  They are fast rushing into single party only allowed rule.  They seem to hate democracy, free press, transparency, and government responsibility.   They do not want to represent the people but to rule them.  The scarcest part to me is anyone investigated can’t say anything, can not complain about constitutional violations.  Yes they put it that way, they plan to violate the constitution and the target of their abuse can not even publican complain about it.   You can not even get a lawyer or legal counsel if they come after you.   WTF!   Below is a quote from the article.  Hugs

Any way you slice it, Gov Ops seems like a recipe for government overreach and abuse. If you find yourself under investigation by Gov Ops, you won’t be allowed to publicly discuss any alleged constitutional violations or misconduct by the investigators. All communications with committee personnel would be treated as “confidential.” Shockingly, you’d also be denied the right to seek legal counsel regarding your rights if Gov Ops were to search your property without a warrant, irrespective of whether it’s in a public or private space.

The euphemistically named “Gov Ops” is a civil liberties disaster waiting to happen.

Rotimi Adeoye

Rotimi Adeoye

Children’s picture book flagged at Alabama library because author’s last name is ‘Gay’

https://www.al.com/news/2023/10/childrens-picture-book-was-on-library-list-to-be-moved-to-adult-section-because-authors-last-name-is-gay.html

How far will these racist bigots take their crusade to take the US society back to the 1950s?  Books banned not for sexual content but for the fact that the last name of the author being gay and another for the fact that an unarmed black teenager is shot.  Only white cis straight morally Christian sanitized stuff is fit for people to read.   Banning adult magazines for adult people is coming next.  Below is a quote from the article.   Hugs

“This proves, as always, that censorship is never about limiting access to this book or that one. It is about sending the message to children that certain ideas—or even certain people—are not worthy of discussion or acknowledgement or consideration,” Brassard said. “This is a hateful message in a place like a public library, where all children are meant to feel safe, and where their curiosity about the world is meant to be nurtured.”

"Read Me A Story, Stella"

“Read Me A Story, Stella” was added to a book list of potentially sexually explicit books at the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library because the author’s last name is Gay.

By 

“Read Me a Story, Stella” is a children’s picture book about a pair of siblings reading books together and building a doghouse. However, because the author’s name is Marie-Louise Gay, the book was added to a list of potentially “sexually explicit” books to be moved from the children’s section of the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library (HCPL) system.

 

Gay’s book has never been “mistakenly censored,” according to Kirsten Brassard, Gay’s publicist at Groundwood Books.

 
 

“Although it is obviously laughable that our picture book shows up on their list of censored books simply because the author’s last name is Gay, the ridiculousness of that fact should not detract from the seriousness of the situation,” Brassard said in a statement.

 
 

Brassard mentioned other books on the list, including Angie Thomas’ “The Hate U Give,” which has no LGBTQ themes or sexual content but does depict the shooting of an unarmed Black teenager at the hands of police.

 
 

“This proves, as always, that censorship is never about limiting access to this book or that one. It is about sending the message to children that certain ideas—or even certain people—are not worthy of discussion or acknowledgement or consideration,” Brassard said. “This is a hateful message in a place like a public library, where all children are meant to feel safe, and where their curiosity about the world is meant to be nurtured.”

 
 

HCPL executive director Cindy Hewitt admitted “Read Me a Story, Stella” should not have been put on the list and was added because of the keyword “gay.”

 
 

“Obviously, we’re not going to touch that book for any reason,” Hewitt said. She’s also read “The Hate U Give” and said it’s an excellent book that no librarian should remove from the young adult section. Hewitt insists there was never any intention to target the LGBTQ community. Instead, she was hoping to be “proactive instead of reactive.”

 
 

“Read Me a Story, Stella” was one of 233 titles slated to be reviewed and potentially moved. However, after internal and public criticism that the list targeted the LGBTQ community, the process was halted. Librarians moved some of the books to the adult section, and some have not been re-catalogued.

 
 

“We wanted to be proactive and allow our library staff to look at our collection and make decisions about moving material to an older age group and not have someone from outside dictating that for us,” Hewitt said. She added that HCPL considers public opinion, but “our librarians are trained in collection development, and it should be their responsibility to examine the collection and make those changes.”

 
 

Hewitt said the review was based on a list of 102 books compiled by Clean Up Alabama. Clean Up Alabama has been targeting “sexually explicit” books in libraries around the state this year. “Read Me A Story, Stella” is not on this list. She said the library was gearing up for “unprecedented” book challenges by using this list as a starting point.

 
 

AL.com received a copy of the book review list for the Madison branch and found that 91% of 233 titles had the words lesbian, gay, transgender, gender identity, or gender non-conforming in the subject header, which lists numerous themes for each book. Hewitt said the keywords she asked the 10 branch managers at HCPL to use were “sexuality, gender, sex, and dating.”

 
 

Hewitt insisted this was a miscommunication problem and there was confusion about the process. “We understand and appreciate our community, and the needs of our collection to reflect our community,” Hewitt said. “We were never eliminating any book. We were just looking at it as a whole.”

 
 

Alyx Kim-Yohn is a circulation manager at the Madison branch of the library and said it’s “cosmically ironic” that the situation escalated during Banned Books Week. Kim-Yohn was frustrated because the directive wasn’t simply a review of the books. They said this was a mandate to review and move the books based on a list from the Alabama Public Library Service, which Hewitt confirmed doesn’t exist yet.

 
 

“The decision had been made,” Kim-Yohn said. “There was no debate. There’s no conversation. This is what was happening.”

 
 

Kim-Yohn refused to participate because they said it violated their professional ethics. They said even if they weren’t queer, they wouldn’t participate.

 
 

“Why are we just unilaterally moving all of this before anyone’s even complained about these books yet?” Kim-Yohn wondered.

 
 

Hewitt said she didn’t know how many books librarians moved and returned because she took a “hands-off approach” to the process. Community members with the group Read Freely Alabama, which is against the book challenges, visited several branches and compiled a list of 40 books moved into the adult section from various branches in Madison County.

 
 

AL.com obtained this list and determined that at the time of publication, several books are designated as “adult” in the online catalog at the North Huntsville branch but “young adult” in other branches, including “A Quick and Easy Guide to They/Them Pronouns,” “What’s The T: The Guide to All Things Trans and/or Nonbinary,” and “We Deserve Monuments” a mystery novel about an LGBTQ biracial teen.

 
 

Kim-Yohn hopes Hewitt apologizes and hopes this never happens again. They also want to encourage the public to visit libraries and utilize staff despite this incident.

 
 

“If you’re mad, what we need you to do is to come check these books out, come to story times, put in purchase requests for books that you want to see,” Kim-Yohn said. “We need you to keep supporting the library.”

 
 

The books in question were checked out or renewed more than 8,000 times. The full list of books slated for review and potential relocation is below.

 
 
Flourish logoA Flourish table
Book Flagged Because Author’s Last Name Is “Gay”

 

omi-palone3 hours ago

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Sarah 3 hours ago

Sounds like a headline from The Onion, but I don’t think anything they can come up with can quite match the current absurdity of reality.

Uncle Mark back in IL 3 hours ago

Can books about the Hiroshima bombing be far behind, because of the B-29 bomber Enola Gay?

weshlovrcm3 hours ago

The absurdity and irrationality of the fascists’ goal to silence, cancel and eradicate the lgbt community from America. Where are the protests?

Houndentenor  weshlovrcman hour ago

Most people don’t care, a good portion think it’s isolated and not really that bad and the rest are too far away from where they things are happening.

 

Data Shows 95% Of Recipients Of Arkansas School Vouchers Already Attend Private Christian Schools

Data Shows 95% Of Recipients Of Arkansas School Vouchers Already Attend Private Christian Schools

As Joe wrote, “Free money for Christian families who could already afford private Christian schools while draining public schools of desperately needed funds”.  More Christian churches taking over the public secular government / public schools.  This steals much needed money from public schools to create a Christian theocracy.  Hugs

The Arkansas Advocate reports:

Roughly 4,800 students are participating in the first semester of Arkansas’ new K-12 voucher program. A bulk of those kids are attending the largest, mostly-religious private schools in the state. Of the 94 participating private schools, there are also a number focused on students with special needs.

The new data was reported in the Arkansas Department of Education’s first annual Education Freedom Account report to the state Legislature. Less than 5% of students in the program were previously enrolled in a public school. The report brought continued criticism from those opposed to vouchers and the LEARNS Act and praise from those who supported it.

Arkansas Education Association President April Reisma, a special education teacher in the Pulaski County Special School District, said the report should be “deeply disturbing to the tax-paying residents of Arkansas.”

Read the full article.

 

 

 

JoeMyGod Mod20 hours ago edited

Free money for Christian families who could already afford private Christian schools while draining public schools of desperately needed funds.

Nic Peterson  JoeMyGod16 hours ago

That was always the plan. Subsidize the church and the wealthy on the backs of the poor who will never benefit from this, ever.

another_steve 20 hours ago

Think, for a moment, what a religious school in Arkansas is like. What the kids there are taught — about themselves and about others.

Are you trembling?

TexasBoy  another_steve20 hours ago

Schools? Indoctrination centers? Hate filled activists training facilities?

another_steve  TexasBoy20 hours ago

“Pumping out the next generation of low-info MAGAts. In Jesus’ name.”

Flora DeMann  another_steve20 hours ago

An Arkansas madrassa.

San_Ban  Flora DeMann20 hours ago

“Madrassa” is just the Arabic word for “school (/college/university/seminary)”. Even religious madrassas may teach “secular” subjects such as science and mathematics, literature and art and history. But yes, they are usually indoctrination centres, much like any other religious school.

William  GayOldLady20 hours ago

At my Texas high school, the choir class was all the under 18 members of the Baptist Church choir. They practiced hymns they would be performing on Sunday

GayOldLady20 hours ago

They knew the demographics of their private school student body BEFORE the voucher legislation passed. If they thought, for even a minute, that lower income children, particularly brown & black children, would enroll, it wouldn’t have passed

Friday20 hours ago

Shoveling money to the rich and scammy Christians and their ignocation programs.

Jean-Marc Canada – ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ20 hours ago

And that’s why Arkansas will continue to remain one of the poorest performing states on education.

 

Shut up, SPEAKER! | Armageddon Update | Christopher Titus

Voter rolls are becoming the new battleground over secure elections as amateur sleuths hunt fraud

https://apnews.com/article/elections-voter-rolls-access-trump-fraud-claims-7bf841f66cf6e0731ca6322e08de737c?taid=651de08fce2bfe00013a2ba9

It is terrifying how self entitled these maga white Christians are.  They only accord rights and freedom to themselves, and deny them to everyone else.  They see the world where ignorance and selfish denial of anything they do not agree with as the way it should be.  They believe everyone must live as they live, do as they do, and no one has a right to a difference of opinion or a different lifestyle.  They are the US republican Christian Taliban.   Hugs

A group has been impersonating government officials, harassing New York residents at their homes and falsely accusing them of breaking the law, state officials have warned.

But what sounds like a scam aimed at people’s pocketbooks is actually part of a shakedown with a much different target: voters.

State prosecutors have sent a cease-and-desist order to a group called New York Citizens Audit demanding that it halt any “unlawful voter deception” and “intimidation efforts.”

It’s the type of tactic that concerns many state election officials across the country as conservative groups, some with ties to allies of former President Donald Trump and motivated by false claims of widespread fraud in 2020, push to access and sometimes publish state voter registration rolls, which list names, home addresses and in some cases party registration. One goal is to create free online databases for groups and individuals who want to take it upon themselves to try to find potential fraud.

The lists could find their way into the hands of malicious actors and individual efforts to inspect the rolls could disenfranchise voters through intimidation or canceled registrations, state election officials and privacy advocates warned. They worry that local election offices may be flooded with challenges to voter registration listings as those agencies prepare for the 2024 elections.

 

John Davisson, director of litigation at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the concern reflects the competing interests over voter data – a need to protect voter rolls from cybersecurity attacks against the desire to make them accessible so elections are transparent.

“It’s not surprising that this is a battleground right now,” he said.

Baseless claims of widespread voter fraud are part of what’s driving the efforts to obtain the rolls, leading to lawsuits over whether to hand over the data in several states, including Maine, New Mexico and Pennsylvania.

In New York, a warning from the state elections board preceded the cease-and-desist letter from the state attorney general’s office. Voters in 13 counties had been approached at their homes in recent weeks in an apparently coordinated effort by people impersonating election officials, in some cases wielding phony IDs, the board said. Residents were confronted about their voter registration status and accused of misconduct.

In one instance, people wearing identification badges accused a woman at her Glens Falls home of committing a crime by apparently being registered to vote in two counties, said Warren County spokesman Don Lehman. But the woman had already filed to change her registration and canvassers were apparently using out-of-date information, he said.

“She was quite shaken by the whole thing,” Lehman said. “She did nothing nefarious at all. Either these people don’t understand that or understand how the process works, but it seems like they were quite accusatory.”

State prosecutors found no evidence that any of the those contacted had committed voter fraud or any other type of crime, they said in their warning letter.

NY Citizens Audit emailed a statement that dismissed as “absurd” concerns that its canvassers might have impersonated an official or harassed anyone. Instead, the group urged election officials to investigate “each of these millions of suspected illegal registrations.”

“We train our people to do legal canvassing, and if ever verified, voter intimidation would be completely unacceptable and against our policy,” NY Citizens Audit Director Kim Hermance said in the statement.

One of the most ambitious groups, the Voter Reference Foundation, was founded after the 2020 presidential election by Republican Doug Truax of Illinois with a goal of posting online lists from every state. The VoteRef.com database so far includes information from 32 states and the District of Columbia and is run by Gina Swoboda, a former organizer of Trump’s 2020 campaign in Arizona.

A federal trial is scheduled to start later this month over the group’s fight to access and use New Mexico’s voter registration list.

The group also sued Pennsylvania, which refused to hand over the information and said that publishing it would put every registered voter at greater risk of identity theft or misuse of their information, said the state’s Office of Open Records.

Truax declined to speak to The Associated Press, but has said in a statement on the Pennsylvania case that, “We have a crisis of confidence in America when it comes to election results, and the answer is more transparency, not less.”

The head of elections in New Mexico, Democratic Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver, fears many voters might withdraw from registration lists as personal data is posted online. Her office cites email inquiries about how to cancel voter registrations during a short-lived canvassing effort by election activists last year in southern New Mexico.

“Voters can and should expect a reasonable amount of privacy,” said Toulouse Oliver, a Democrat. “What Voter Reference is doing is saying, ‘If you have doubts about the election and who is registered to vote and who is voting, here is every voter’s information. Go out and figure it out for yourself whether these people are real.’”

The Voter Reference Foundation argues that federal law is on its side, citing public disclosure provisions of the National Voter Registration Act that require states to make a “reasonable” effort to keep the registration lists free of people who died or moved away. The foundation also invokes free speech and due-process rights.

Nearly every state prohibits the use or transfer of the lists for commercial purposes, while several confine access to political candidates, parties for campaign purposes and some government activities.

In March, New Mexico banned the transfer or publication of voter data online, with felony penalties and possible fines of $100 per voter.

Virginia data was removed from VoteRef.com after Republicans and Democrats united last year to ban online publication of registrations.

In Maine, an ongoing legal dispute over privacy and the use of voter lists is pitting state election regulators against a conservative-backed group that has been highlighting and litigating what it says are shortcomings in election systems for a decade. It has assembled voter rolls from multiple states.

The state historically provided voter registration lists to candidates and political parties before being sued in 2019 for failing to provide its voter list to the Public Interest Legal Foundation. In 2021, Maine’s governor signed a bill allowing the voter registration lists to be turned over to additional organizations, but with a stipulation that no voter names could be published in a way that compromises privacy.

The restrictions interfere with comparing lists across states, said the group’s president, J. Christian Adams, whose case against the state is scheduled for legal arguments Thursday at a Boston federal appeals court. Adams, a Republican, served on a commission Trump convened after his 2016 win to investigate voter fraud. The commission was disbanded without any finding of widespread fraud.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, said residents sharing details about voters, including addresses, is a bad idea.

“In an era of conspiracies and lies about our elections, integrity of voter information is hugely important,” she said. “We want to make sure that no voters are targeted or harassed or threatened because of their decision to register and cast a ballot.”

___

This story has been updated to correct the name of a law firm. It is the Public Interest Legal Foundation, not the Public Interest Law Foundation.

___

Associated Press writers David Sharp in Portland, Maine, and Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, also contributed to this report.

Let’s talk about Biden, walls, and laws….

White Supremacist ‘Active Club’ Provides Security for Moms for Liberty-Allied Mayoral Candidate

White Supremacist ‘Active Club’ Provides Security for Moms for Liberty-Allied Mayoral Candidate
By Peter Montgomery | October 4, 2023 11:38 am
Franklin, Tennessee Alderman Gabrielle Hanson (Image from Hanson for Mayor campaign video)
 

Members of the white supremacist Tennessee Active Club provided security for Gabrielle Hanson, a Moms for Liberty-backed alderman in Franklin, Tennessee, and current candidate for mayor, at a recent candidate forum, according to local reporter Phil Williams of News Channel 5.

The Tennessee Active Club is one of the “prominent cells” in a rapidly growing network of groups that promote violent white supremacist ideology and provide training in combat sports, according to a recent report by The Rolling Stone’s Tim Dickinson. Like other far-right groups, Active Clubs “recruit with narratives of white victimhood” and see themselves as militias in training for future violent conflict.

Earlier this year, SPLC reported that the Tennessee Active Club has been training above the Lewis Country Store in Nashville, whose owner Brad Lewis responded to the report by declaring on Telegram, “I’m not a cuckservative, I’m an actual literal Nazi.” This week, Lewis told reporter Williams that he is a friend of Hanson’s and that the Active Club members were on hand at the forum because Hanson had received credible threats.

Alderman Hanson was cheered on by the Williamson County Moms for Liberty chapter this year when she led an unsuccessful effort to prevent the city’s annual Pride celebration from being held. Robin Steenland, head of Williamson County Moms for Liberty chapter, portrayed the campaign to stop Pride as a battle between good and evil, a struggle against a “social change agenda” that seeks the “destruction” of family, Christianity, and America itself. The county M4L chapter has also complained about curricular materials that teach students about the civil rights movement and seahorses.

M4L chapter president Steenland is also founder and chair of Williamson Families PAC, which claims to support candidates “that reflect our family values and demonstrate integrity, wisdom, and service to the community.” Whatever the PAC means by family values or integrity did not prevent it from endorsing Hanson, who has, to be generous, a checkered relationship with telling the truth.

A few weeks ago, Hanson was exposed for using women’s social media posts to falsely portray them as supporters of her campaign—and then repeatedly lying about it. News Channel 5 also caught her lying about her previous use of an alias. Hanson supporters tried to prevent from reporter Phil Williams from attending a Sept. 25 forum.

Back in April, Hanson claimed to have “full knowledge” from an inside source that a shooting at a Nashville Christian school involved a scandalous “love triangle,” and she stood by her claims even when she was called out for lying about the shooting. Her statements led to an ethics investigation, but the city’s ethics commission concluded that her comments were protected by the First Amendment and did not violate city ordinances.

The mayoral election will be held on Oct. 24; early voting begins Wednesday, Oct. 4.

White Supremacists Provide Security For Anti-LGBTQ Tennessee Moms For Liberty-Backed Mayoral Candidate
Read the full article. Hanson recently appeared on JMG for her attempts to ban Franklin Pride, for being exposed for her history of arrests for facilitating prostitution, for using the photos of minority woman who don’t know her and claiming that they are her supporters, and for encouraging her husband to march in Chicago Pride wearing nothing but a Speedo.

Nic Peterson17 hours ago

Behind every man in a klan robe is a woman that washed and ironed it, fed and cleaned up after him, put up with his shitty sexual skills and raised his miserable spawn. It’s no wonder they are filled with nothing but hate, rage and christianity.

Wintercat  JoeMyGod17 hours ago

Just worried that what just happened to Josh Kruger in Philly could happen to another like him. Report on anti-LGBTQ+ violence, police violence and corruption, get shot in the chest seven times in your home.

Uncle Mark back in IL 17 hours ago

I’m reminded how we’ve gotten here:

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Darreth17 hours ago

Openly and ‘actively’ working to end the republic as it exists today.

Now, combine this being spread across 50 states in an age of accelerating climate change.

Get ready, folks. It’s going to get really bad.

StarGmom  Darreth17 hours ago

I’d say it’s really bad already. It’s getting worse. More blatant

April Smith 17 hours ago edited

You would think the Realtor organization wouldn’t appreciate an openly anti-LGBTQ white supremacist as a member.

Lots of gays buy houses.

Harveyrabbit 🐱17 hours ago

Hope they show their appreciation and invite them to their next BBQ.

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Ray Bluth 17 hours ago

Moms for Liberty, a vile hive of scum and villainy. Bigots should not be tolerated, ever.

SkokieDaddy – wiener dog dad17 hours ago edited

This week, Lewis told reporter Williams that he is a friend of Hanson’s and that the Active Club members were on hand at the forum because Hanson had received credible threats. Hanson is afraid of protestors who might tell supporters the truth about her.

NotMiguel17 hours ago

I’ve seen open Nazis since the 80s but mainstream politicians never associated with them this is a new thing. Its hardly a brain trust Tennesee has an economy less than half the size of major cities in the US.

JoeMyGod Mod18 hours ago
 

Wintercat  JoeMyGod17 hours ago edited

Once upon at time in America, they would leave carrying their teeth in a bag for that.

Now the white cops with high and tight haircuts protect them. Or are them.

JoeMyGod Mod18 hours ago

Ohbehr in Minnesota  JoeMyGod18 hours ago

I loathe how they hide themselves to intimate. It’s just the new Klan. Nothing transparent about these creatures.

William  Ohbehr in Minnesota17 hours ago

At least the brown shirts had the balls to show their faces, most of the time.

Name  JoeMyGod18 hours ago

How proud of being White can you be if you dress up with a mask, goggles, and hat like that?

Gregory In Seattle  Name17 hours ago

The point is intimidation, much like the Klan hide their identities when engaging in acts of terrorism.

Buford  Name17 hours ago

It’s just idiots wanting ‘cred’ for bravely sacrificing for their belief in white supremacy, but without actually risking losing their jobs or being excluded from polite society if they were doxxed.

Ohbehr in Minnesota18 hours ago

There’s another Dominionist racist loser. I didn’t know she was a prostitute (I actually don’t care if people are sex workers). Yet it’s rather hypocritical of her as the MAGAts will lap it up. Plus, she somehow will claim she’s being persecuted for being thought of poorly, just like Jesus and Trampy Trump.

JoeMyGod Mod Ohbehr in Minnesota18 hours ago

Technically, her arrests were for *booking* the hookers.

Gregory In Seattle  JoeMyGod17 hours ago

So a sex trafficker rather than a sex worker?

Ninja098017 hours ago

But these are just concerned parents right?

Liberal Redneck – McCarthy Ousted

Kevin McCarthy is shocked to find that the “ruin everything” contingent of his own part has ruined everything for him. Weird.