Right-wing Moms for Liberty group making moves in staunchly blue Manhattan

NEW YORK — Moms for Liberty, a right-wing national organization that got its start pushing back against COVID-era school policies, is looking for new footing in New York City’s most staunchly liberal borough.

The conservative group, which has reportedly been losing influence across the country, announced on social media a Jan. 18 town hall at the Bohemian Benevolent & Literary Association on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

It’s billed as “giving parents a voice” and “an honest conversation on the state of education.”

“All viewpoints are welcome,” the post read.

But condemnation was swift in the Democratic stronghold, where 85% of Manhattanites voted for President Joe Biden in the 2020 general election.

“This group is anti-LGBTQ, supports book bans, harasses teachers & school librarians, and has been labeled by @SPLCenter (Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights watchdog) a ‘far right extremist organization,” Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine, a Democrat, wrote on social media platform Threads.

“Manhattan is the home of Stonewall. We celebrate cultural diversity in our classrooms. We believe in books. M4L has no place here or any other part of NYC.”

State Sen. Brad Hoylman-Sigal, D-Manhattan, urged the prime minister of the Czech Republic on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, to reconsider hosting the group in its consulate building, where the Bohemian Benevolent & Literary Association is located. The lawmaker has been targeted with explicit homophobic rhetoric by conservative parent advocates.

Multiple social media users posted plans to buy tickets, only to skip the event and leave a band of empty seats in their wake. The Movement of Rank and File Educators, or MORE, a powerful caucus of the city’s teachers union, circulated a sample script to call the event space and ask that they cancel the upcoming town hall.

“We need to let them know we have no place for their hate in our city or our schools,” reads the call to action.

A chapter of Moms for Liberty launched last year in Queens, where support for right-leaning candidates is stronger than in Manhattan. It had 20 members as of the fall, Chapter Chair Elena Chin told education news source The 74. Chin did not return the Daily News’ request for comment.

The venue, the Bohemian Benevolent & Literary Association, did not return requests for comment.

Moms for Liberty co-founder Tiffany Justice said on social media that she extended invites to Mayor Eric Adams and Schools Chancellor David Banks, “hoping to hear from them about the literacy innovation they are attempting” in the city’s public schools. City Hall denied her claim.

“Neither the Chancellor nor the Mayor received a formal invitation,” said Amaris Cockfield, a spokeswoman for Adams, “and neither is planning to attend.”

Justice, a New York City suburbs native now based in Florida, has been planning a local event since at least early October, when she told the New York-based “Little Africa News” media outlet that an event was in the works for this winter.

“Four years running now,” said Justice, “ parents can’t go to back-to-school night, and I asked why can’t parents go and visit the schools on back-to-school night? And I was told it’s part of your union bargaining contract. And so when we come to New York, I’m going to invite Mayor Eric Adams to come to our town hall, to speak to us, because I think parents have a lot of questions about why are there elements of our bargaining contract with the teachers union that are cutting parents out?”

Under the latest UFT contract, parent-teachers conferences can be remote unless both parties agree to meet in person.

Moms for Liberty’s influence may be waning across the country and the city’s schools chancellor has increasingly condemned the kind of homophobic rhetoric the group has come under fire over.

Close to 6 in 10 school board candidates endorsed by the organization lost contested races nationwide in 2023, according to Ballotpedia — the highest rate of any endorser that the election tracker examined. The group has also been enveloped in scandal after a co-founder’s husband was accused of rape, leading to surprising revelations about Bridget Ziegler’s sexual history with a woman after championing anti-LGBTQ+ causes.

“Our educators work hard every day to make New York City public school safe and supportive environments for the LGBTQ+ youth,” Banks said at a citywide education panel in December.

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