A Minnesota parent organization is pushing back after being labeled a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center in its annual “Year in Hate and Extremism Report.”
The center claims Moms for Liberty advances an “anti-student inclusion” and “antigovernment” agenda.
But Moms for Liberty says its goal is to empower parents to be a part of their child’s public school education.
“Two-thirds of Americans think the public education system is on the wrong track today. That is why our organization is devoted to empowering parents to be a part of their child’s public school education. That is our fundamental goal, which began just two years ago when teachers unions locked students out of schools during the pandemic,” the group said in a statement provided to Alpha News.
“Empowering parents continues to be our mission today and that has fueled our organization’s growth — like wildfire to now 45 states in the country. Name-calling parents who want to be a part of their child’s education as ‘hate groups’ or ‘bigoted’ just further exposes what this battle is all about: Who fundamentally gets to decide what is taught to our kids in school — parents or government employees? We believe that parental rights do not stop at the classroom door and no amount of hate from groups like this is going to stop that,” the statement continued.
Angie Greig is the Moms for Liberty Wright County chapter chair, the very first Minnesota chapter of Moms for Liberty. She joined Liz Collin on her podcast to talk about the new “hate group” classification and discuss the work the group is doing.
Greig got involved in politics a couple of years ago.
“I wanted to be proactive with my school and with my daughter’s classes and what she’s learning in school and I really didn’t think there was a big problem until I started asking questions,” she said.
“Moms for Liberty, we want to empower parents to be able to ask questions, to be involved in their kids’ school. I think over the last 25 years, parents have been slowly pushed out of public schools and their kids’ lives when they’re in the public schools. Parents have to be able to start asking questions. People have to be able to start standing up for their children and what they’re learning and require that our public schools actually teach our children academics such as math and reading,” she added.
Greig said she has been met with resistance by school boards in her county.
“I started realizing how important it was to be part of the school board system, to be a parent that was present at the school board meetings, and to be a parent that is not afraid to speak out about things I saw or questions that I had. I felt like the school board meetings were the right place to do that,” Greig said.
Greig said she ended up speaking at more meetings and the board in her daughter’s school district then voted to “silence” her. People now must have approval to speak at a school board meeting and their comments have to be based on what the agenda is for that meeting.
“It can’t be anything that just comes up, it can’t be anything I want to talk about. It has to be approved and based on what they’re going to be talking about at that school board meeting,” Greig said.
Last year, Moms for Liberty called into question a Bill Nye video that 10th graders at Buffalo High School were supposed to watch, which claims that gender is a “spectrum.”
“One of my Moms for Liberty group members had a parent approach her and he was very upset about this video that his child had to watch in school. He wondered what we could do about it,” Greig recalled. “Parents got involved in that class and the teacher had to take that off of the agenda for the kids to watch.”
She encouraged parents to get involved and speak out.
“I always think there’s hope. I always think there’s something to fight for. What I’m seeing on the ground here is a swell of parents who are starting to ask questions, who are starting to feel empowered, who are really starting to pay attention to, what are my kids bringing home, what are my kids not bringing home, and why not, and not being afraid to email the teacher certain questions,” she said.
Moms for Liberty Wright County meets monthly. There are also chapters in Dakota, St. Louis, Otter Tail, Scott and Olmsted counties.
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Liz Collin
Liz Collin has been a truth-teller for 20 years as a multi-Emmy-Award-winning reporter and anchor. Liz is a Worthington, Minnesota native who lives in the suburbs with her husband, son and loyal lab.
