The Daily Signal - #450: This Mom Is Fighting Her Kids’ School District’s LGBT Indoctrination

Episode Date: April 28, 2019

Maria Keffler is a former teacher herself. But when she recently found out, by accident, about new LGBT policies her children's school district was considering instituting, Keffler was shocked. Now she's speaking out--and urging other parents to do the same.We also cover these stories:•President Donald Trump isn't happy New York State is investigating the NRA.•Top Democrats want any infrastructure deal to include climate-change elements. •Kim Foxx, the Chicago prosecutor who let Jussie Smollett off the hook, has been subpoenaed for her handling of the case.The Daily Signal podcast is available on Ricochet, iTunes, SoundCloud, Google Play, or Stitcher. All of our podcasts can be found at DailySignal.com/podcasts. If you like what you hear, please leave a review. You can also leave us a message at 202-608-6205 or write us at [e-mail]. Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Tuesday, April 30th. I'm Kate Trinco. And I'm Daniel Davis. Well, many parents these days are being kept in the dark about what their kids are learning on some controversial subjects, like, for instance, sex ed and gender. Maria Keffler is a former teacher and a mom in Arlington, Virginia, where a local school district is pushing the envelope with LGBT curriculum. Now she's leading a group of parents to lobby against the curriculum. She'll join us in studio. Plus, Fred Lucas shares about his time at the White House Correspondence Dinner last weekend.

By the way, if you're enjoying this podcast, please consider leaving a review or a five-star rating on iTunes, and please subscribe. That will help us grow. Now on to our top news. Well, infrastructure was supposed to be that issue where President Trump and Democrats could find some agreement, but that's looking more and more doubtful. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer say they want climate change policies and tax-harmes. hikes included in an infrastructure deal. Trump is set to host both leaders at the White House on Tuesday to discuss infrastructure. Ahead of that meeting, the two Democrats said in a statement, quote, a big and bold infrastructure package must be comprehensive and include clean energy and resiliency priorities. To truly be a game changer for the American people, we should go

beyond transportation and into broadband, water, energy, schools, housing, and other initiatives. We must also invest in resiliency and risk mitigation of our current infrastructure to deal with climate change, end quote. Well, earlier this month, Pelosi said she wanted the package to include between $1 and $2 trillion, but the White House proposal is more scaled back and relies more on public-private partnerships. President Trump isn't happy that New York is looking into the finances of the National Rifle Association. On Monday, the president tweeted, the NRA is under siege by Cuomo and the New York state AG, who are illegally using the state's legal apparatus to take down and destroy this very important organization and others. It must get its act together quickly, stop the internal

fighting, and get back to greatness fast. Cuomo, of course, refers to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. New York Attorney General Lettasha James office said in a statement, Attorney General Lettasha James is focused on enforcing the rule of law. In any case, we've pursue, we will follow the facts wherever they may lead. We wish the president would share our respect for the law. Currently, the NRA is being investigated by New York's Attorney General amid infighting among top figures in the group and accusations of inappropriate financial dealings. Well, ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has appeared in a new video for the first time in five years. The video was released by ISIS's propaganda arm Al-Furkan and shows Baghdadi

in apparently good health. He had long been rumored to be injured if not killed. The video references events within the last week, so it's definitely been recorded recently. In it, Baghdadi said the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka were retaliation for ISIS being defeated in Syria. Sabah al-Naman, a spokesman for Iraq's counterintelligence agency, said, per Fox News, that Baghdadi was likely still in the Syrian desert. He remains the world's most wanted man. The U.S. is offering $25 million for information.

leading to his location. The former State Department Special Representative for North Korea, Joseph Young, told CNN that he did say the U.S. would pay $2 million for the medical costs of Otto Wormbeer, the American college student captured by North Korea, who returned ultimately to the U.S. in a vegetative state. Yon claims his understanding was President Trump had signed off on Yon saying the U.S. would pay $2 million. Trump tweeted recently, No money was paid to North Korea for Otto Wormbear, not $2 million, not anything else.

Well, Kim Fox, the Chicago prosecutor who let Jesse Smollett off the hook, has been subpoenaed for her handling of the case. She'll have to appear in court after Sheila O'Brien, a retired judge, filed a petition last week for a special prosecutor to investigate what happened in the case. According to the Chicago Sun Times, Fox's top deputy and Smollett himself will have to appear in court as well. The Sun-Times reports that they've been asked to produce original documents from the case to assure the public that, quote, they have not been altered or destroyed and will not be destroyed throughout this case, end quote. The Smollett case became a national controversy when Fox dropped all 16 charges against Smollett, who had been indicted for faking a hate crime against himself. His case documents were then sealed from the public eye.

Celebrity lawyer Michael Avanani pleaded Monday not guilty to a series of federal charges. He is accused of not paying taxes as well as stealing millions from his clients. Avanotti, who formerly represented porn star Stormy Daniels in her fight against President Donald Trump, became a mainstay on cable news in recent years. Avanotti said in a statement, we don't convict someone in America based on a one-sided argument in a press conference, even when he is one of the biggest enemies of the president and his son. Well, Measel's cases continue racking up as the country face.

is the largest measles outbreak in 25 years. The Wall Street Journal reports, per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, that there have been 704 recorded cases so far this year, with 78 new cases in the past week. Out of all the cases, 9% have resulted in hospitalization, though none have resulted in death. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said most of the cases owed to a failure to get vaccinated. He said on Monday, per the Wall Street Journal,

the suffering we are seeing today is completely avoidable. We know vaccines are safe because they're among some of the most studied medical products we have. Next up, we'll talk to Maria Keffler, a former teacher who was astonished when she found out what her kids were learning in school. Do you have an opinion that you'd like to share? Leave us a voicemail at 202-608-6205 or email us at letters at dailysignal.com. Yours could be featured on the Daily Signal podcast. We're joined by Maria Kephler. She's a former middle school and high school teacher.

And she's also the parent of three kids now. And a parent who is concerned about the sex ed in transgender policies, she is worried her local school district in Northern Virginia is promoting to her kids and others. Maria, thanks for joining us. Hi, thanks for having me on. Okay. So recently in The Washington Post, you wrote an op-ed about how transgender activists are trying to change the curriculum. taught to elementary students in northern Virginia.

So how did you become aware of this happening and what motivated you to take action? Well, a friend was looking around the Arlington Public Schools website, looking for some summer school information, and she stumbled across a link for a meeting about transgender non-gender-conforming student policy that was happening that evening. And she called me and said,

hey, I saw this. I don't know what this is. Do you want to come with me? So we went that night. It was a school board working meeting where they had a group of interested community members sitting around a table discussing what should be involved in this policy. We were not allowed to talk or to contribute. We were just non-participating observers because we weren't on the agenda, but we were really shocked by what we heard. There were a lot of people around the table from Aegea, the Arlington Gender Identity Allies,

who are a local group who are working to get policies that are supposedly anti-discrimination policies for transgender students, which sounds great. We all agree no one should be discriminated against. Everyone should have a fair education. Everyone should be treated well. Everyone should be comfortable in their surroundings. But these policies go way beyond anti-discrimination. One of the things that we heard around the table that disturbed us,

most was this feeling or this idea that parents are a threat and these kids need to be shielded and hidden from their parents. So if the kids come out as gay or transgender and don't want their parents to know, they need to help keep this from parents and hide it. And that was really troubling for us. And did they say what ages? I mean, could theoretically a five-year-old say they felt like the opposite gender and the school would hide it from the parents? Yeah, if the child doesn't want to know. These policies are to be applied K through 12 in the Arlington Public School system. A principal who is at the meeting, an elementary school principal, said elementary school principals are working hard to get transgender materials into the libraries and into the classrooms.

And this was the principal at my daughter's school. And I know that the topic of transgenderism came up in her class. She's in fifth grade. And she was the only person in the class, including the teacher, who expressed any concern and said, my family doesn't really think this is a great thing. And she was told that everyone else did not agree with her. Wow, really brave of her to say anything. Yeah, I was really proud of her, but I don't want her in that position at the age of 11.

So you mentioned the curriculum and material. What kinds of stuff are being taught? Well, on February 28th, just three days after this meeting that I sat in on, Ashland Elementary School invited a transgender activist in. And they did a reading of the storybook, I Am Jazz, which is a transgender storybook. It's geared for kids ages four and up about a boy who transitioned to being a girl. medically and surgically. And this activist read this story to two classes of kindergartners. The parents were told via a letter that came home just a few days ahead of the event.

It was a very long celebratory kind of disingenuous letter that just expressed, we've got this great event, this great experience for your kids. We're so excited about these special speakers coming in. and the word transgender was in the letter once, buried in the middle of the center paragraph. And anyone who's a parent who has kids in the schools knows you get a lot of paperwork home. And on Friday afternoon, you're just not reading all of it.

And this event happened the next week, and most parents had no idea that it was happening. It was very strategic. That was on February 28th. The meeting that I attended on February 25th, three days prior, the AGEA parents around the table had said, we are going to make a story reading of I Am Jazz happen. And it was planned and it was done.

So in your Washington Post piece, you also wrote that California and Northern Virginia are serving as laboratories for these kinds of policies. How is that the case? Well, those aren't my words. Those were David Aponte's words. He was the co-chair of Glisson, the gay lesbian and straight education network. He was the co-chair of the local chapter. He was quoted saying that in a Washington Post interview last year, I think it was June 23rd, 2018, where he was talking about taking Gleason's policies.

Gleason has written a model district policy. This is what they would like to see in every school system in the United States. And they were applying that wherever they could to see what happened. What happens with kids when we apply these policies where we teach lesbian, gay, transgender issues as early as five years old. How does that work out? Laboratory was his word, and I'm pretty horrified about that. I didn't sign anything giving consent for my kids to be experimented on. So have you been talking to other parents about this? I mean, I know you mentioned you went with another parent at the initial meeting. Is there concern among parents, or do most of

them not care? There's a lot of concern. Most parents have no idea this is happening. We have formed the Arlington Parent Coalition, and it's growing. It's a growing group of parents. I'd say we have between 80 and 100 people involved right now who are calling us, writing to us saying, what can I do? What's going on? What is happening? We had a very hard time getting information from the school system about this.

We had to file a FOIA request before we were finally able to see the policy, which three days before I got. the fulfillment of that request, I was told that it hadn't even been written. But it has. And we put that on, we put that out to our parents so that they could see what's happening. But no, most parents don't know that it's happening. It's being done very surreptitiously. And so the Arlington Parent Coalition is trying to get the word out, trying to make it known, trying to get parents involved, because they're trying to finalize this by June and implement it in the 2019-2020 school year. And tell us about the role of these larger national organizations like Human Rights Campaign. These are extremely well-funded groups.

What kind of role are they playing to try to get this stuff through at the local level? Well, this is very much a national strategic operation. They have written these policies at the national level. The amount of material that's out there is staggering. When I look at the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, GenderSpectrum.org, Glisten's website, they have got curriculum materials prepared for teachers to download. They're sending it out.

They're coming into schools and asking teachers, hey, can I put a safe space sticker on your room? Are you a safe space for homosexual kids? What's a teacher going to say to that? you see these stickers everywhere, posters up, the gender bred person, the gender unicorn, all of this material that they've generated to make it very easy to push it out into the school systems. The genderspectrum.org actually has, it looks like a war room chart where they call it entry points. There's four entry points to get transgender theory into schools.

there's the interpersonal, instructional, instructional, and there's a fourth eye that I can't remember out the top of my head. But it's very strategic, very detailed, and they call them entry points. And to me, entry points are what a thief uses to break into your house. It feels very much the same way to me. So House Democrats are currently pushing the Equality Act, legislation that if enacted, could have ramifications for how public schools teach about gender identity and sexual orientation. What do you think about this legislation?

I think it's a terrible idea. I think it has a nice name, Equality Act, who doesn't like equality, but it's really not equal at all. We're talking about a very, very small subset of people. 0.7% of the population identifies transgender. That's 7 in 1,000 people. 52% of the population are female. If this Equality Act passes, the preferences that are given to transgender people, and again, I want to reiterate, nobody wants to see transgender people treated badly. Nobody wants to see anyone discriminated or harmed. But giving those preferences, changing the language so that gender identity takes the place of biological sex, that completely obliterates the category of female. Already in our schools, kids who identify as the opposite sex are allowed to use whatever bathroom they want. A boy who says, hey, I feel like a girl gets to go into the girl's restroom, gets to go into the girls' locker rooms. An early draft that I saw of the Arlington policy put forth by Aegea, this was their wish list, said that if kids go on overnight trips and they're staying in hotels,

The child who has changed their gender, say a boy decides that he is actually a girl, gets to sleep in the girl's room, as long as the girls agree to it, but the parents can't step in and say no. So that puts a child in the position of having to stand up and say, I'm not comfortable with this, and the parents can't say anything about it. Now, that is not currently in the policy that's on the table, but that is what AGEO was hoping to get into the policy. That takes parental protections completely away. Good parents tell their kids, hey, if you're in a position where someone's asking you to do something you don't want to do, you can tell them, my mom will kill me if I do that. My dad will not let me do that. This takes that away. Children can't stand behind their parents anymore if this sort of thing.

becomes policy. It's a terrible idea. So you mentioned your one child having or feeling that they needed to speak up in fifth grade. Have your children had other experiences where they felt, I guess sort of they had to defend their beliefs in these areas and these schools? My son told me that he has been called a homophob because he has expressed his belief in traditional marriage. And he said, I just don't talk about it anymore. He said, my friends don't really talk about it. And so we just don't talk about it. But he has been called a homophobic school. So you mentioned how, you know, this is really kind of under the table. Like most parents do not know about this. It's very strategically hidden. But you have, you said, you know, you've got a bunch

of parents, 80 to 100, I think you said, who are active. Eventually, I mean, all the parents will know about this because their kids will be coming home saying, you know, I think I want to go on puberty blockers or something. So if and when, you know, that time comes, are you optimistic that there will be a blowback that, that, you know, a majority or at least a large portion of parents will get involved because they just, you know, are concerned for their kids? I hope so. I really hope so.

But there's a lot of fear around this because the community advocating for this, the trans-activist community, is very aggressive, very intentionally suppressing. debate. Our arguments across the board have been worrying about parents' rights and about girls' protections. That is all we have argued so far from the Arlington Parent Coalition. And what we keep hearing is you're a hate group, you're homophobes, your bigots, your religious zealots. I've asked a number of people who have said that. Would you please, if you see that on our website or in any of our materials, will you point that out to me? Because we're concerned about parents' rights and girls' protections. But a lot of people are scared to bring it up. They're scared

to speak up. I talked to a middle school teacher just last night who is very concerned about those. He sees kids in his class who are expressing gender dysphoria. And he said, it breaks my heart, but I'm afraid to say anything because if I don't affirm it, I could lose my job. I could be that next teacher on the news that's being sued for not affirming it. That's a, That's a horrible position to be in to feel like you can't even care for the children who are in your circle for fear of what's going to happen to you if you do. So as a former teacher yourself, does it surprise you that the school districts are doing this? Yes and no. There's a lot of political and cultural pressure for this.

It's a business. It's a big business. The medical community, unfortunately, has a state. in it when it comes to, you know, pharmaceuticals that are being pushed. It's there's there's a business around this and there's a lot of cultural and political push for it. It doesn't surprise me that the school system is capitulating to political and cultural pressure. It makes me very sad as an educator to see them throwing psychology principles, educational principles out the window. children at the age of three, four, five, six, they're role playing. They're trying on different, you know, a boy will

wear a dress to, you know, because he's best friend is a girl and she's wearing a dress. Now, if a boy does that, he's told, oh, you're actually a girl, you need to transition. In adolescence, for heaven's sake, at puberty, you're trying to figure out who you are. I told my kids when I was going through middle school, I thought maybe I'm an athlete, so I tried out for basketball, all three of them laughed at me. Like, you thought you might, I know. I'm like, I know. Now you know me. I'm not an athlete, but I didn't know. They're trying on these different roles, finding out, where am I in the world? And as soon as they strike upon, I wonder if maybe I'm gay. I wonder if maybe I'm transgender. Yes, yes, you are. And anyone who tells you differently is a homophobic

a bigot. And that's not okay. Marguerette Kaffler, really appreciate you coming in and taking the time. If there are other parents listening who maybe live in your area who want to get involved, how would they do that? Send us an email, Arlington Parent Coalition at gmail.com, and we'll get more information out to you. Great. Thank you so much. Thanks a lot. Do conversations about the Supreme Court leave you scratching your head? If you want to understand what's happening at the court, subscribe to SCOTUS 101, a Heritage Foundation podcast, breaking down the cases, personalities, and gossip at the Supreme Court. Last year, comedian Michelle Wolfe's mean remarks towards Sarah Huckabee Sanders and others caused such an uproar,

though the White House correspondent's dinner broke with years of precedent and opted not to do a talk by a comedian this year. Joining us today is Fred Lucas, White House correspondent for the Daily Signal and an attendee at this year's dinner. Thanks for having me on. Okay, so Fred, you went to the Michelle Wolf one, and you went to the one this year, which featured historian and author Ron Cherno. what was sort of the difference and what did you think of Cherno at this dinner? I thought he was great, actually. It's best White House correspondent this dinner ever, actually. And you've been to a bunch, right?

Yeah, I've been to a few. And, yeah, this was Michelle Wolf, she was a train wreck from the beginning, so I guess she can't make the comparison. But I would even say in a lot of ways I thought Ron Chernow was better, was more funny, actually, more humorous than the previous comedians. even before Michelle Wolf, which again a train wreck, but that they were not necessarily stellar comedians in previous years.

So Ron Chernal, he talked about the presidency, the press, how there's been a natural clash. It was clear where he came from politically. He was not a fan of President Trump, but he didn't go ridiculously after him. He made some, I think, maybe some subtle jabs here and there that you would maybe, that are perfectly within bounds, nothing out of, you know, no ridiculous broadsides that even maybe previous comedians made.

And then 2018 went overboard. Well, it's interesting you say it's the best White House correspondent senator you've been to. I mean. Well, right. The third without a president. Yeah. Okay, right. So because in recent years, you know, since Trump was elected, it's kind of been seen as, you know, this huge snub.

Trump isn't going. He's telling all his people not to go. And it's kind of like on the downhill, right? Because they used to get the president every year. And now the president's not there. So it kind of at least looked like it was on the downward. I think so certainly in attendance and certainly in celebrity attendance, which I think sort of also a positive that we no longer have celebrities there. But that's sort of distracted from the purpose of the dinner, which was to point out to. to celebrate the free press in the First Amendment. And it became this celebrity watching gawking aspect. The unfortunate thing about, I sort of wish that the president would be there because I think he would, I think he would do great, actually, in that kind of environment. It's always been sort of an arena where the president could get up there and tell jokes. I think that would give him a great opportunity to ad lib. be kind of in the arena and take some jabs at reporters that he doesn't always like.

Well, you mentioned celebrities, though. Let's not forget that Trump was one of the celebrities who showed up at this thing under Obama. And Obama, like, stood there and roasted him and he just took it. That was my very first year. Oh, you were there. Yeah, yeah. Oh, man. Seth MacFarlane was there.

And then, right, right, yeah. And Seth McFarland, actually was a pretty funny comedian I thought that year. But right, right. And that sort of inspired Trump to run, I think he said after that. Right. So it's interesting that he now won't go to the dinner. I agree with you, Fred. I think he would do really well at this dinner.

I mean, he's so funny that I would really love to see him do it. But, yeah, you know, as Daniel mentioned, this year, the White House, you know, they sent Sarah Hugabe-Sanders last year. And I believe Mercedes Schlapp, the communications director, was also in attendance. This year, not only were none of the White House folks there, the big names, the administration actually encouraged people not to go. So what do you think this says for the bigger fight between the media and the president? Well, I did think in the Correspondents Association President Olivia Knox, who I have a lot

of respect for, and he's a very good guy. He spoke initially and did give a... Point out that there had been death threats in some cases to him and other reporter, which is, of course, a pretty horrible thing. I've something I haven't personally experienced myself, so I can't imagine that. But he did talk about how it can be harmful for the president to talk about enemy of the people, fake news and so forth, which I understand that. But at the same time, in some previous years with these dinners, we did see even people within the association take a much harsher tone with the president.

And I think if Trump is out there saying that the press is biased against him, it doesn't, the way to prove him wrong is not to get up there and make speeches about Trump being too hostile. Well, I mean, for a lot of, you know, especially during the Obama years, the press really just received him with applause, right? I mean, he would come and give a speech and everyone. There was like a veneer of, oh, we're watching you. Got to stay on your game, Mr. President. But everyone was like just still loved the president, you know, President Obama when he was there. And they applauded him and laughed at his jokes and everything. Well, when I was covering the Obama administration, I was watching him by.

Right. Well, of course you were. Yeah. No, but so that made everyone, a lot of people think, you know, this event just should not exist. Like, I kind of felt that way. I was like, you know, this is just way too chummy. Like, this needs to end. And it's so outside of the experience of ordinary Americans, like, it just seemed kind of decadent, frankly.

But do you think that that's off? Or do you think there's a way that this kind of thing should be done in a way that's, like, actually healthy for America? Well, no, I get that argument that the, which is basically. been around ever since, you know, I've been well, well before I came to D.C. You know, people have said that this, that there is something unseemly about reporters in general going to this event, not only with White House officials, but with politicians in general being schmoozing each other. Makes it look like they're all one. They're all part of the same, you know, corrupt thing. It does look.

The swamp. You're right, right, right. And it kind of, yeah, reporters, the press, we're supposed to be the watchdogs of government. and we're supposed to, and not necessarily out there schmoozing with people and cocktail parties. But at the same time, I think perhaps that that's one strong product of the President of the United States, in this case, Donald Trump, deciding not to come to the event. In recent years, we did have before the Michelle Wolf Train wreck, the year before that, we had Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein speak, which was,

journalism legends, regardless of what you might think of Bernstein in sort of recent years, but with CNN. And, you know, this year we had a great historian speak, which is kind of ties in with, you know, news of first draft of history, which he talked about, and the history of journalism and the presidency, which was, I think it's becoming more of a journalism event, I guess, that's what I'm trying to say, as opposed to what it, what had been criticized and perhaps rightfully so in the past. So do you think the Correspondents Association understands that the way to preserve themselves and the legitimacy of this event is to just try to play things down the middle as much as possible and not get partisan? Do you think they learned from last year's train wreck? Well, yeah, I think they fairly immediately learned from last year's train wreck

because they fairly immediately decided not, not to go with a comedian. I mean, when I was there, I'd heard some board members even discussing this, that, well, the purpose of a comedian had always sort of been in previous years, history of that, to balance out the president. And if the president doesn't show up, then perhaps you don't need that. And that's, yeah, I mean, I would like to see more things of notable journalist, legendary journalists, legendary historians.

I think they'd be great to speak from now on. It might also be interesting if they did something like, I don't know, you know, maybe invite like Sean Hannity or Tucker Carlson to have like a dialogue or a panel. I mean, I don't know. I feel like you could have sort of a fun debate about what's objective, what's not. Maybe Molly Hemingway, the federalist, who's done so many arguments on media criticism. Fred, most important exit question. How is the food?

Yes. Okay. Steak and shrimp, it was not, no, low carb, so that's a good thing. Steak shrimp and some vegetablesy, so. Okay. So more about the company than the food. Yeah, you're right, right, right, right. Yeah, it was a good company.

All right, well, thanks for joining us, Fred, and you should check out his podcast that he does with Jared Stetman. It's called The Right Side of History, and their next episode will feature an interview with Senator Mike Lee. We're going to leave it there for today. Thanks for listening to The Daily Signal Podcast brought to you from the Robert H. Bruce Radio Studio at the Heritage Foundation. Please be sure to subscribe on iTunes, Google Play, or SoundCloud,

and please leave us a review or a five-star rating on iTunes. We'll see you again tomorrow. You've been listening to the Daily Signal podcast, executive produced by Kate Trinko and Daniel Davis, sound design by Michael Gooden, Lauren Evans, and Thalia Rampersad. For more information, visitdailySignal.com.