Exclusive— With the Help of Moms for Liberty, South Carolina Pre-Files Parental Rights Bill

Representatives from the South Carolina state legislature pre-filed a Parental Bill of Rights last week after lawmakers, parents, and the grassroots organization Moms for Liberty teamed up to fight back against leftist indoctrination in schools.

Tara Wood, head of the Moms for Liberty chapter in Charleston County, South Carolina, and Christi Dixon, head of the Moms for Liberty chapter in Berkeley County detailed during an interview on Breitbart News Saturday the groundswell of parental involvement and support in their counties in shining a light on the infiltration of Critical Race Theory, gender theory, and pornographic materials in schools. Moms for Liberty is a 501 (c)(4) with chapters across the country that champion “parental rights at all levels of government.”

“We have an amazing person in our group, she’s our legislation chair, and she got this parental rights bill from Florida. She’s working with some other people. They tweaked it a bit, and we got it sponsored. And now we have a parental rights bill, and we just pray that is passes,” Wood told host Matthew Boyle, Breitbart News’s Washington bureau chief. “We’re definitely making an impact … in a short amount of time.”

The legislation, sponsored by state Reps. Robert May, III. (R), Mike Burns (R), and Anne Thayer (R), would “prohibit certain government infringement on the fundamental rights of parents to direct the upbringing, education, health care, and mental health care of their children except in limited circumstances” and seeks to increase the age of consent for minors to certain health care services to 18 instead of 16. The bill also emphasizes the rights of parents to know and have input about what their children are learning and to work with teachers and school officials on how to best approach their child’s education.

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“We have a right to ask what the teacher’s lesson plan is like. What are you teaching? Where are you getting your resources from? You know, parents are the number one stakeholder in their children’s education,” Dixon said.

For now, Wood and Dixon rely on other parents to tell them about what is going on in their children’s schools. When parents send examples of Critical Race Theory, social-emotional learning, and sexually explicit reading materials — something they said they are seeing “all the time” — they inform state legislators and school board members who then reportedly investigate the claims.

“But this information goes all the way up to the governor as well, so that’s how we’re doing it because we have to bring awareness to our legislators and our governor [who] can do something about it — which why we really hope the parental rights bill gets passed next year,” Wood said. 

Dixon spoke about the misconception that Critical Race Theory (CRT) is not taught in schools, a claim often trotted out by leftist media and politicians. Democrats particularly toted the line after Glenn Youngkin’s victory in Virginia’s governor race. Youngkin largely campaigned on fighting Critical Race Theory in schools. Several scandals in Loudoun County specifically brought attention to the issue on a national level, with parents turning up in droves to vote for Youngkin and against Democrat Terry McAuliffe, who simultaneously has a history of supporting CRT, all while pretending it is not real. 

“We hear all the time, ‘Critical Race Theory is not in our curriculum.’ And we have found instances where … materials are being brought into the classroom. But we have found is, we have to stop thinking of the critical theory as a curriculum because it’s not that — it’s a worldview, it’s an ideology — the same as strongly held religious beliefs would be,” Dixon said. “Teachers today, are indoctrinated into this critical world view in the colleges and universities. And they say it’s not in the official curriculum. We do know that the teachers’ unions and groups like we have in South Carolina … they send teachers for training. They give them free materials, and we don’t have the oversight as to the ancillary materials that can come into the classroom.”

But in spite of the heated national debate surrounding leftist indoctrination of K-12 students, both Dixon and Wood said communication and respect, especially in interacting with school boards, are key in furthering productive change.

“You don’t have to look at them [the school board] as the enemy, but if you start a dialogue, you educate people. As you learn from each other, and you ask questions from your teacher — we don’t have to become enemies. We can become partners when we communicate. And there are people who do have an agenda, and they’re at high levels, like in our federal department of education and our state department of education,” Dixon said. “But you know what’s happening, we’re shining a light. And you know what happens when you shine a light? The evildoers with bad motives, they’re going to run, they’re going to hide, or they’re going to gaslight you. Stand firm, keep educating yourself, and don’t back down. Because if we back down, we might not get another chance to fight this battle.”