Roy Cooper Joins Trans Activists to Torpedo Parents’ Rights In North Carolina
After losing in the legislature, Cooper’s activist allies aim to seize your kids in the courts
Democrat Gov. Roy Cooper may have failed to rob parents of the right to shield their children from radical LGBTQ ideology, but an army of transgender footsoldiers aims to finish the job.
The Campaign for Southern Equality, an LGBTQ+ activist group that advocates for the transitioning of children, filed multiple federal complaints against a set of North Carolina laws that protect children from predatory practices and allows full transparency between parents and schools.
While the group calls the law “Don’t Say Gay,” in reality it’s a strategic move to tarnish the commonsense law guaranteeing parents the right to know what’s happening to their children inside school, an action the group pretends is oppressive to youth who identify as gay or transgender.
Legislators and parents tell a different story, pointing out that the popular law is critical for protecting children and families. Yet it only passed after the Republican-run legislature overrode Democrat Gov. Roy Cooper’s July 2023 veto.
“The Parents Bill of Rights is founded on the principle that parents, more than anyone, understand what is best for their children and should be the primary decision-makers in matters of education and health,” North Carolina Rep. Destin Hall (R) told Restoration News. “Any complaints made by radical activists do not represent the reality that this law is supported by North Carolinians of all political persuasions.”
Big Money
The Campaign for Southern Equality is funded by numerous groups that support “progressive” causes across America.
Between 2019 and 2021, the Arcus Foundation, a leftist mega-funder bankrolled by medical device heir Jon Stryker, donated $625,000 to the Campaign for Southern Equality. The Arcus Foundation focuses on funding LGBTQ+ advocacy, making over 181 grants totaling $28 million in 2018 alone. Stryker’s wife, Patricia, is a top figure in Democratic circles; she’s credited with helping flip Colorado blue and has been a member of the prominent Democracy Alliance since its founding, helping to elect Democrats and push “progressive” ideology.
The Campaign for Southern Equality is also funded by the major leftist “dark money” network run by the Tides Foundation, netting $240,000 between 2020 and 2021. Tides is infamous for paying out over $607 million in grants to left-wing groups in 2020 alone. (“Dark money” is characterized as donations that are sent through a passthrough group to another group so the original donor’s identity can be shielded.)
The Rockefeller Foundation gave over $100,000 to the Campaign for Southern Equality in 2017. The Rockefeller Foundation has a nefarious history of collaborating with Ford Foundation to fund population control measures in the U.S. and poor countries, including India.
It’s also funded numerous liberal advocacy and public policy efforts, including New America, a left-of-center think tank; the Urban Institute, a left-of-center hybrid civil rights group and policy advocacy organization; and the Funders Committee on Civic Participation, which aims to get out the Democratic vote and boost Census results in blue states.
Parents vs. the Left
The Parents’ Bill of Rights(SB 49 and HB 574) blocks school administrators from working in the background to influence a child over their sexuality. One key component is requiring schools to notify parents if their child asks to be identified by a different name or pronoun. Another empowers parents to review any school curriculum and establish age-appropriate limitations on any gender or sexuality-based instruction. In full, the law allows parents to be in-the-know and speak out if they believe the school system is not teaching what is in their child’s best interest.
The law also shields girls’ sports from biological males, a critical measure for protecting women from predatory men who identify as “transgender.”
A recent poll by Steve Cortes’ League of American Workers highlights the widespread popularity of defending girls’ sports, with 76 percent of North Carolinians supporting the ban. That includes 53 percent of self-identified Democrats.
From the legislation:
All teams participating in interscholastic or intramural athletic activities shall comply with the following: 1. Each team shall be expressly designated by the biological sex of the team participants as one of the following: I. Males, men, or boys. II. Females, women, or girls. III. Coed or mixed. 2. Athletic teams designated for females, women, or girls shall not be open to students of the male sex.
Rogue School Boards
In contrast, the far-left Campaign for Southern Equality—which supports transitioning children—demonizes the Parents’ Bill of Rights as “surveillance of all students.”
Students? No. Administrators? Absolutely.
The Parents’ Bill of Rights seek to protect children and parents from school administrators who may decide to work from their own political motives and secretly push those ideals on an unsuspecting child. North Carolina state Superintendent Catherine Truitt believes the laws provide transparency. “Parents, not the state, are ultimately responsible for raising their children,” she said. “The ‘Parents’ Bill of Rights’ ensures that parents remain aware of major health-related matters impacting their child’s growth and development.”
North Carolina state Sen. Amy Galey (R) believes when a state employee hides essential information about a child from their parents, “a web of lies grows.”
“The school must not lie to parents about essential facts regarding students’ mental health. Parents are better suited to help their children than state employees, who only know the information that the child has given and not the full family picture,” she continued.
That became clearer after the law went into effect on Jan. 1, 2024, when a handful of school boards went rogue and defied the Parents’ Bill of Rights. Their message is clear: Ideologues and bureaucrats, not parents, know what’s best for children.
(RELATED: North Carolina Parents Score Victory Against Woke School Bureaucrats)
The Chapel Hill-Carrboro school board passed conflicting policies that cut out parents from knowing if their child asked to be identified by alternative pronouns and even refused to ban gender identity studies for kindergarten through 4th grade. What does a 4th grade student need to know about their sexual identity?
“School boards must enforce school law, including the Parents’ Bill of Rights . . . I am disappointed in the school board’s irresponsibility and arrogance toward their constituents and the state legislature as they resist full implementation of the law in their Board policies,” Former Buncombe County school board member Lisa Baldwin told Restoration News.
The defiant school boards “have only further demonstrated why this important law was needed in the first place and just how disconnected these school boards have become from parents and basic common sense,” Baldwin continued.
The Asheville City Board of Education is also in on the resistance, announcing steps that would avoid “undue harm” for LGBTQ+ students. Board members and the board attorney repeatedly stated the new law conflicted with their “mission.”
“Understanding that the law as written will impact the LGBTQ+ community so deeply, we as a board want to be so deliberate about the language so as to limit its harm as much as possible,” said board chair George Sieburg.
These rogue school boards pretend they’re protecting at-risk children. What they’re really protecting is a militant transgender ideology that manipulates and destroys vulnerable children, mutilating their bodies and twisting their developing minds. It’s parents who truly know and care for their kids best, not government.
Raising Your Kids For You
Many activists who oppose the Parents’ Bill of Rights believe the law is targeting a nonexistent threat. They believe that the idea that “gender ideology” is being taught or that there are “sexually explicit” books in school is simply a witch hunt. That couldn’t be farther from the truth.
During one public comment period in Asheville, where students and parents were voicing their concern with the Parents’ Bill of Rights, the Left’s “witch hunt” on families was put on full display.
“A big part of my elementary school experience was being educated about gender and sexuality,” said student Colette Russ.
It can’t be said any clearer. Why are elementary students being taught about gender and sexuality and why is a group that supports the transitioning of children leading the charge to keep it that way?
The work being done to protect children in North Carolina is similar to Florida’s HB 1557 which affirmed it is a parent’s fundamental right to make decisions regarding the upbringing of their children. The bill blocks instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through 3rd grade. It also requires school districts adopt procedures for notifying parents if there is a change in services from the school regarding a child’s mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being.
From North Carolina to Florida, these practices are common sense and place the power of right and wrong in the hands of the parents—not the state and especially not radical groups.
So why is the Campaign for Southern Equality fighting so hard to take away parents’ rights? Other than its skewed ideology and the apparent flawed way it views children (practically as adults who can do as they please), they are funded by anti-American leftist organizations that support “progressive” initiatives across America.
They are another cog in the wheel that seeks to devalue American society.
(READ MORE: Wisconsin is Ground Zero for Militant Gender Ideology)
