Gov. Ron DeSantis said Monday that he will sign legislation restricting challenges to books in public schools, blaming “activist” teachers and others of making a “mockery” of his parental rights legislation by filing frivolous challenges.

The 2021 Parental Rights in Education Act, sometimes referred to as “Don’t Say Gay,” allows parents the opportunity to review, and potentially object to, school library books that they find “inappropriate,” with the goal of removing questionable material from school libraries, even if other families are OK with the content.

Especially targeted was LGBTQ content.

What followed were wholesale challenges to books and other material, requiring their removal from libraries and classrooms pending sometimes protracted reviews of their suitability.

Legislation passed during this year’s legislative session () allows only one challenge per month unless the challenge comes from the parent or guardian of a child in a public school.

“It is done intentionally, and it is part of an agenda, and that’s wrong,” DeSantis said during a news conference.

“I mean, schools are there to serve a community. Schools are not there for you to try to go on some ideological joyride at the expense of our kids,” he said.

The Legislature hasn’t sent the bill to DeSantis yet, but he said that he will sign it once that happens.

DeSantis appeared at Warrington Preparatory Academy, a charter school that opened last year at the site of a consistently poorly performing public school.

The bill is an omnibus pertaining to state education policy. The governor highlighted the book challenge changes plus language that expedites charter conversions, requiring districts to allow charter operators access to the facilities to devise a turnaround plan. Districts couldn’t remove resources or charge rent and would have to maintain the building. Children in the public-school zone would be first in line for charter school admission.

‘The Bluest Eye’

House member Jennifer Canady, a Republican from Polk County, mentioned a new bar on placing students in dropout prevention programs “solely because of a disability.” Students who are placed in those programs would be entitled to individualized goals “so we are focused on what they need to do in order to be successful,” she said.

“This bill is going to require that we treat students as the individuals that they are and make sure that they are in the best learning environment for them,” Canady added.

As for book challenges, in 2022 set up a more orderly system for them, including review by the Florida Department of Education.

Still, books and sheltered from access by kids have included bestsellers including “The Kite Runner” and “The Bluest Eye,” the latter by the Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winner Toni Morrison, plus “All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George M. Johnson about growing up Black and queer.

In Jacksonville, books about , which are on the state’s recommended list, were unavailable to students for months pending reviews.

During the 2022-2023 school year, recorded 1,406 book ban cases in Florida, which accounted for 40% of the national total. That organization the Escambia County School District over its banning policies.

DeSantis insisted he is only after books that aren’t “age and developmentally appropriate.”

“You should not be having books in these schools, particularly in younger grades, that are sexually explicit, that are promoting ideology like gender ideology. We don’t believe you teach a kindergartener that they can change their gender — that’s just not appropriate, that’s not what parents want to be taught in our schools,” he said Monday.

Litigation

PEN America and the Florida Education Association, representing classroom teachers, have complained that the laws are so vague that they invited districts to overly restrict access to material. The state laws don’t directly threaten felony charges for violations, but the Duval County district that that could happen if they expose children to material deemed pornographic.

To DeSantis, such concerns are “performative; that’s political. You’re trying to be an activist when you should be trying to be an educator.”

He did concede: “It’s from all ends of the political spectrum — I mean, there’s some people that really think all these books that have been in school are inappropriate; there’s other people that know that they’re appropriate but are trying to act like Florida does not want these books in.”

Overall, “it’s being done to create a narrative that somehow, oh my gosh, all these books are, quote, banned. No book is banned in Florida. The most grotesque pornographic books that are in schools that have been removed because they’re inappropriate, you can go buy it in a bookstore if that’s what floats your boat, you’re able to do that. But do not jam that down the throat of a sixth-grade child,” the governor said.

“…Just as it’s wrong for a school district, an activist teacher, a school union to try to impose an agenda on a student, it’s also wrong for a citizen activist or parent to do these passive-aggressive false challenges to try to act like somehow we don’t want education in Florida,” he said.

“If you are trying to be an activist, if you’re trying to withdraw valid materials as a way to basically lodge a protest, you’re going to be held accountable for that, because you’re depriving the students of their right to be able to have a good education.”

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According to the report from the UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute, one of the nation’s leading sources of data on LGBTQ Americans, 15% of parents surveyed say their children worry about talking about their families in school, including drawing pictures or completing writing assignments that depict their parents, and 9% report that their children fear remaining in the state.

Among parents of LGBTQ children, 9% say their kids worry about talking about their identities in school and 13% are afraid of living in Florida. Some told researchers they have stopped engaging in their kids’ school, as they no longer feel safe.

Led by Gov. Ron DeSantis, proponents of the “Don’t Say Gay” law passed last March argue that such measures are needed to help parents ensure their young children are not exposed to information about sexual orientation and gender identity they might disapprove of. Early on, backers of the move said the Florida law was mischaracterized by media accounts and opponents who warned it could lead public school teachers and administrators to .  

However, as schools reopened after COVID shutdowns in fall 2022, officials removed anti-LGBTQ bullying resources from state websites and handed down mandates to for student use from shelves and to ignore nondiscrimination protections for transgender kids.

A survey of 113 LGBTQ parents conducted between June and September 2022, the is an early snapshot of the law’s impact. In the first six months after it was passed, nearly 9 in 10 LGBTQ parents said they were concerned about the law’s effect.

Fears were less intense among those whose children are not yet of school age, are nearly done with school or attend a private school that is not bound by the law. Some of these families said they plan to move if the law is not overturned by the time their child is ready for kindergarten, or that their high schooler plans to go to college in a less hostile state. 

“That so many of them are considering moving is, of course, concerning,” said Abbie Goldberg, author of the report and a professor of psychology at Clark University, which co-sponsored the study. “Whether others have the resources is another question.”

Top reasons cited for continuing to live in Florida were to stay close to family and friends (49%), because of work (47%) and because the state is where they grew up (38%), as well as custody arrangements, caregiving obligations for older relatives, the fact that their child will soon graduate from high school and quality-of-life factors unrelated to the political climate. Still, 21% reported that they are less out in their communities. Almost one-fourth said they now fear harassment from neighbors.  

Five of those surveyed — including parents in three households where one of the adults holds dual citizenship — said they were considering leaving the country. “Should [Donald] Trump (again) or DeSantis become president, we have an exit plan to move out of the country,” one told Goldberg.

In response to open-ended questions, a number of those surveyed said their fears had intensified as time passed. One, for example, said initial concerns were allayed by reading the bill, which prohibits teaching LGBTQ topics before fourth grade and requires such content to be “age-appropriate” thereafter. 

“I am okay with and support the idea of not teaching or telling young children [about LGBTQ people or sexuality]. However, I am concerned that the… ‘developmentally appropriate’ part is too vague and could be interpreted too loosely.” 

But as it became clear that the law’s impact went far beyond curtailing early-grades classroom discussions of sexuality, many parents began seeing ripple effects that have had a negative impact on their families.   

Indeed, confusion among educators about what is permissible under the new law and other legislation empowering community members to sue when they believe it has been violated have raised concerns in some parents about interacting with their children’s schools. 

“We didn’t join our son’s [parent teacher organization] and we didn’t offer to coach Little League this spring,” one said. “We are very, very cautious about having playdates,” reported another.

Several mentioned escalating anti-LGBTQ rhetoric as the cause of heightened concerns. “I worried that as a parent volunteer, I may confront conservative parents who perceive me as a groomer,” said one. “I worried that our family could be targeted and reported to child protective services with false assertions about our parenting based merely on our relationship.”

The rise in anti-LGBTQ rhetoric is not the only pressure many of the families surveyed are under, Goldberg added: “Most people’s identities are complicated. Many of these families are people of color, have kids who are LGBTQ, who are feeling the effects of multiple pieces of legislation.”