WASHINGTON — It is fair to say that until last month, Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow was not a figure of national political prominence. That changed on April 19, when she delivered an impassioned speech countering Republican accusations that Democrats like she were “groomers” for supporting the rights of gay and trans students.
The four-minute broadside immediately roused Democrats who had been huddled in a defensive crouch for months; one circulating version has been viewed more than 15 million times
“I’m going to start talking that way,” Democratic consultant James Carville told the Washington Post.
“A role model for the midterms,” read a headline in the New Yorker.
The speech came after months of charges from politicians like Ron DeSantis, the ambitious Republican Florida governor, that teachers who wanted to discuss sexuality and gender were, in fact, trying to indoctrinate children. The charges were baseless but effective, and books like “Gender Queer” suddenly became the targets of national bans.
“There was a hesitancy to want to talk about things, at least for me,” McMorrow told Yahoo News during a recent visit to Washington, D.C.
That changed on April 13, when Republican state Sen. Lana Theis gave an arresting invocation to open the Michigan State Senate session. “Dear Lord, across the country we’re seeing in the news that our children are under attack,” Theis said. “That there are forces that desire things for them other than what their parents would have them see and hear and know. Dear Lord, I pray for Your guidance in this chamber to protect the most vulnerable among us.”
McMorrow walked out of the legislative chamber along with two other Democrats, seeing Theis’s concern as a thinly disguised reference to the “grooming” line of attack. She did not think much of her response to what had seemed like intentional political provocation, a local Republican trying to replicate the rhetoric of Fox News.
“I guess she took offense to that,” McMorrow said of Theis.
Five days later, Theis sent out a fundraising email that seemed to confirm as much. “These are the people we are up against,” the email said. “Progressive social media trolls like Senator Mallory McMorrow (D-Snowflake) who are outraged they … can’t groom and sexualize kindergarteners or that 8-year-olds are responsible for slavery.”
McMorrow said she was stunned to find herself a target of such attacks. “She’s a mom, I’m a mom, and being accused of, let’s be honest, befriending children for the purpose of molesting them, is horrific,” McMorrow recalled.
She and Theis were not exactly friends, but they had been friendly. “I have gone out for coffee in her district. We talked about our families, and she asks about my baby all the time,” McMorrow told Yahoo News.
“She likes my truck,” adds her husband Ray Wert, who accompanied McMorrow to Washington and is the former editor of automotive website Jalopnik. (Theis did not answer a request for comment from Yahoo News.)
The fundraising email had gone out on a Monday. On Tuesday came McMorrow’s response.
“I am the biggest threat to your hollow, hateful scheme,” McMorrow said from the statehouse floor.
Describing herself as “a straight, white, Christian, married, suburban mom,” the 35-year-old New Jersey native and Notre Dame graduate positioned herself as precisely the kind of suburban voter whom the GOP “grooming” attacks were trying to court.
She addressed not only Republican attacks on gay and trans kids but also charges that schools were imposing divisive racial justice ideas that are broadly (and often inaccurately) deemed Critical Race Theory.
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