(Headline USA) Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill on Monday that forbids instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade, a policy that has roiled the radical Left.
The anti-grooming legislation has pushed Florida and DeSantis, an ascending Republican and potential 2024 presidential candidate, to the forefront of the country’s culture wars, with LGBT advocates, students, Democrats, the entertainment industry and the White House denouncing what critics and their collaborators in mainstream media have wrongly called the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.
The word “gay” doesn’t even appear in the bill. DeSantis and other Republicans have repeatedly said the measure is reasonable and that parents, not teachers, should be broaching subjects of sexual orientation and gender identity with their children.
“We will make sure that parents can send their kids to school to get an education, not an indoctrination,” DeSantis said to applause before he signed the bill into law.
The bill states: “Classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.” Parents would be able to sue districts over violations.
Public backlash began almost immediately after the bill was introduced, with early criticism lobbed by Chasten Buttigieg, the “husband” of U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who is gay, and condemnation from LGBTQ advocacy groups. Democratic President Joe Biden called it “hateful.”
As the bill moved through the legislature, celebrities mobilized against it on social media, and criticized it at this year’s Academy Awards, all misrepresenting the bill as something it most decidedly isn’t. Florida students staged walkouts and packed into committee rooms and statehouse halls to protest the measure, often with booming chants of “We say gay!”
The Walt Disney Company, a powerful player in Florida politics, apparently has no problem with kids in kindergarten being groomed in transgenderism and exposed to explicit sexual propaganda. After DeSantis signed the measure, the company released a statement saying, “Our goal as a company is for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts, and we remain committed to supporting the national and state organizations working to achieve that.”
The bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Joe Harding, has said it would not bar spontaneous discussions about sexual orientation or gender identity in schools but would prevent districts from integrating the subjects into official curriculum. During the bill’s early stages, Harding sought to require schools to inform parents if a student came out as LGBTQ to a teacher. He withdrew the amendment after it picked up attention online.
At the bill signing ceremony Monday, several young children accompanied DeSantis and other politicians near the podium, with some holding signs bearing the governor’s “Protect Children/Support Parents” slogan. DeSantis gave the children the pens he used to sign the bill.
Adapted from reporting by the Associated Press
