Pence moves to claim culture war lane before DeSantis gets there

Former Vice President Mike Pence wants to make something clear: No 2024 Republican presidential candidate will outflank him on the gender, sexuality and education controversies that animate the right.

He’s staking a claim as an original, if sunnier, culture warrior — a bona fide alternative to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis or former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. And Pence sought to reaffirm that status Wednesday during appearances in Minnesota and Iowa that denounced schoolhouse gender-affirming policies and lessons on race.

“The truth is, it wasn’t our choice to start the left’s culture war. But now we have no choice but to win it for the sake of our children and grandchildren,” Pence told a crowd in Minneapolis, shortly after federal appellate court judges in nearby St. Paul heard arguments over an Iowa school gender identity policy that the former vice president opposes. “We will win this fight.”

Iowa’s Linn-Mar Community School District, which educates close to 8,000 children just northeast of Cedar Rapids, is now at the center of a Republican school takeover campaign. And Pence and conservative groups are fighting in court to stop the school system from enforcing a policy that directs educators to protect the gender identities of their students on campus, raising questions about whether families have a right to know about their child’s requests.

The lawsuit showcases Pence’s culture-driven education agenda and dovetails with his decades-long focus on everything from railing about adultery to criticizing Disney’s “Mulan” in the 1990s. Most of all, the case is tied to a state in the American heartland still crucial to the Republican presidential nominating calendar.

While the conservative Parents Defending Education organization launched the lawsuit last year, the Pence-backed Advancing American Freedom organization and a coalition of Christian groups have filed legal briefs similarly opposed to the school district’s policy. A group of Republican state attorneys general have also supported halting the policy in court.

But the legal battle is also the focus of a Pence political initiative — funded with an initial budget of $1 million — that aides say will utilize digital advertising, rallies and volunteer advocacy efforts to advocate for parental rights policies.

The focus, as Pence characterized it, is a broader battle over young people that has engulfed schools and colleges.

“We’re told that we must not only tolerate the left’s obsessions with race and sex and gender but we must earnestly and enthusiastically participate or face severe consequences,” Pence said Wednesday. “Nowhere is the problem more severe, or the need for leadership more urgent, than in our public school classrooms.”

Prominent Democrats and LGBTQ advocacy groups denounced the Pence-style agenda on Wednesday, a sign that disagreements over what children learn and who they are will fuel both parties in the runup to 2024.

“It’s disappointing that someone who professes a deep love for the U.S. Constitution would so venomously assault the rights of the most marginalized,” American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten said in a statement. “Sadly, Mike Pence is mimicking the Trump-DeSantis playbook, rather than blazing a path that builds on the patriotism and courage he demonstrated on January 6, 2021, to thwart the overthrow of our democracy.”

Illinois Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker, during his budget address Wednesday, said the “real intention” of the broader conservative ideological battle “is to marginalize people and ideas they don’t like.”

Correct pronouns can be a lifesaving prospect for transgender and nonbinary youth, who are more vulnerable than their peers to suicidal ideations, according to The Trevor Project’s 2022 report on LGBTQ youth mental health. The suicide risk is higher for LGBTQ kids ages 13 to 17, the group’s survey found.

“The only thing radical is to suggest that schools have a duty to forcibly out transgender students to their parents, without regard to their safety, and to turn a blind eye to harassment by their peers, in the name of free speech,” said Peter Renn, senior counsel at the Lambda Legal gay rights organization.

Pence is comfortable in this space, dating back to his time as a talk radio show host and columnist, when he criticized “Mulan” for depicting women in the military. As governor of Indiana, his education agenda focused primarily on advancing charter schools and vouchers.

Last year, Pence issued what he called a “freedom agenda” that included “patriotic education” for high school students to have knowledge of the Federalist Papers and the Constitution. But it was the battle over his Religious Freedom and Restoration Act — a measure that critics said would have resulted in the LGBTQ discrimination — that became one of the hallmarks of his gubernatorial administration. The episode caused Indiana to lose $60 million in convention business.

Then, in April 2022, the Linn-Mar Community School District board approved policies and regulations intended to support students who are transgender, nonbinary or questioning their gender identity. The policy would allow affected students to ask administrators or counselors for a “Gender Support Plan,” and let students agree whether their parents or guardians would be part of subsequent meetings to discuss the request.

The policy would have teachers ask students how they wanted to be addressed in class and in communications with their families. It noted that “intentional” or “persistent” refusals by staff and other students to respect a student’s gender identity would violate school anti-bullying and harassment rules.

Linn-Mar’s policy also stated that parents and guardians would have the right to review their student’s education records, in accordance with federal law.

Parents Defending Education filed a federal lawsuit in August on behalf of seven unnamed parents who alleged the policy violated their constitutional rights by depriving them of information related to their students, and control over decisions related to their gender identity, while also threatening to illegally discipline students based on their speech.

A federal district court judge in September rejected a request to halt the policy while the lawsuit proceeded in court, prompting an appeal to an 8th Circuit panel that was heard Wednesday.

“I believe it’s an issue, not that the majority of the American people stand with us on, but I think it’s got to be almost every parent in America,” Pence said Wednesday. “You do not craft a gender transition plan for my child without my knowledge or consent. I believe the American people believe that.”

Pence’s path to his party’s nomination centers on reaching Evangelical conservatives in Iowa and South Carolina, early primary states where he has lavished voters and activists with attention. After making the Minneapolis speech, he traveled to Cedar Rapids, where he rallied with parents in opposition to policies like the Linn-Mar Community School District’s. The school district did not respond to requests for comment.

Pence’s splash in eastern Iowa likely resonates in that part of the state, where coverage of the parental rights movement has saturated local media, said David Kochel, a veteran Iowa Republican strategist.

“The fact that he’s moving towards the race and he’s in Iowa as opposed to Tallahassee, it’s more intentionally political in terms of the ’24 race," Kochel said. "He’s taking advantage of an opportunity in Iowa that DeSantis has chosen not to take advantage of yet, but they’re gonna end up in basically the same place on the issue.”