With many of the Republican presidential candidates lining up to speak at the Moms for Liberty summit which was held in Philadelphia over the weekend, extremism expert and founder of Task Force Butler, Kristofer Goldsmith, implored the viewers of Nicolle Wallace's Deadline White House on Friday to spread the word about just who this group is.
GOLDSMITH: For the last couple of years that we've been talking about fights with school boards, you know, shutting down school board meetings, and then we've been talking about how the Proud Boys are showing up. Well, who is bringing the Proud Boys? It is the Moms for Liberty.
These people are friends. They know each other. It's not like they're running around wearing masks, right?
These are fascist groups that are aligned 100 percent. What's really going on right now with, you know, an organization that didn't exist two years ago, now seeing every major presidential candidate, is we have the Proud Boys stepping back and standing by, while the moms with a friendly face are smiling and trying to rebrand what is fascism.
We are talking book burning. We're talking about racism and we're talking about persecuting the LGBTQ community. These are the Proud Boys with a wig and lipstick. That is all that they are. And because of the words "Mom's for Liberty," not a lot of people are going to understand that.
So folks watching this need to be evangelists, right? You need to get out online and talk to your friends about what Mom's for Liberty is, and help them understand that they are a pipeline into the most radical of extremism in this country.
The SPLC has more on the extremist group here:
Moms for Liberty is a far-right organization that engages in anti-student inclusion activities and self-identifies as part of the modern parental rights movement. The group grew out of opposition to public health regulations for COVID-19, opposes LGBTQ+ and racially inclusive school curriculum, and has advocated books bans.
Here's more from their extensive research on the group's dangerous liaisons:
In addition to falling in line with James Lindsay’s groomer rhetoric and Chris Rufo's CRT attacks, Moms for Liberty has not only developed but leveraged its close political alliances and ties to extremist groups to broaden its reach and spread its messages of anti-inclusion and hate.
This has been done in tandem with an effort to publicly rebrand the organization and appeal to a less radical audience. Although the group got its start on some of the most right-wing media outlets, it has since removed these press releases and appearances from its website, including the Glenn Beck Program, Breitbart, and the Rush Limbaugh Show.
Within Moms for Liberty's web of political allies are a number of connections to antigovernment groups, White nationalists, election deniers, and participants in January 6th events.
[...]
The political action committee that allowed Moms for Liberty to support so many candidates during the 2022 midterm election cycle was mostly funded by a $50,000 gift from Publix grocery store heiress, Julie Fancelli, who also financed one of the rallies leading up to the January 6th storming of the Capitol Complex.
Alexis Speigelman, Moms for Liberty’s legislative chair and chair of the Sarasota County chapter, was among “Stop the Steal’ organizer, Roger Stone's allies who planned a caravan to Florida U.S. Sen. Rick Scott’s house with the goal of demanding that he challenge President Biden’s presidential victory.
An even deeper connection is Bridget Ziegler and her husband, Christian, vice-chair of the Florida Republican party. Christian was at January 6th events but claimed that he was so far away that he only saw people waving flags. He never saw “anyone entering the Capitol or breaking stuff.”
This is who these so-called "mainstream" candidates, and not just Trump, are pandering to.