MSNBC's Deadline: White House, one of the network's top-rated shows, fully leaned into its divisive view of conservatives Tuesday by touting as fact a report from the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) which proclaimed without evidence that parental rights groups are hate groups.
Host Nicolle Wallace huffed through multiple readings of the report, calling parents concerned about racially divisive and sexually explicit content presented to young children as “reactionary anti-student inclusion groups” and akin to January 6 rioters. She added at another point that such groups and women speaking out against biological men in sports as “target[ing],” “malign[ing] and threaten[ing] kids.”
For good measure, the head of SPLC added her own thoughts about these “terrifying individuals” while former FBI official and MSNBC contributor Frank Figliuzzi called parental rights and female sports advocates reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).
The SPLC’s report attacked Mom’s for Liberty and Parents Defending Education, coalitions of parents seeking to review their children’s education, and referred to them as anti-government, extremist, inciters of domestic violence, and a hate group. Host Nicolle Wallace said the report was “rooted on research and data” and portrayed its contents as fact, including this excerpt.
Reactionary anti-student inclusion groups such as Moms for Liberty, Moms for America, Parents Defending Education that the Southern Poverty Law Center lists as extremist groups are, by their very nature, responding to social progress that they dislike and have no control over. Like many other hard-right groups, these reactionary anti-student inclusion groups are constantly painting themselves as an oppressed class, while vilifying those discriminated against.
Wallace welcomed SPLC President and CEO Margret Huang as a hero for her work on the report. Huang rebuked Moms for Liberty for, “pushing to ban certain books, ban curricula, punish teachers who talk about inclusive education, and generally make our school boards miserable in seeking to provide an inclusive education for all.” She described their efforts as “terrifying” to children and “detrimental to their well-being.” As she spoke, the headline “Breaking News; Report: Schools Are Primary Target for Locally Driven Extremist Mobilization” ran across the screen.
MSNBC continued their portrayal of concerned parents as hate-filled extremists by describing the alleged harm these groups caused students. Wallace read from the SPLC’s report that, “The fear and pain experienced by Black, brown, and LGBTQ communities went far beyond any individual incident, deeply disrupting their ability to participate in an inclusive democracy.”
Frank Figliuzzi even compared groups on SPLC’s hate list to the KKK. He claimed that these groups adopted the KKK’s tactics to infiltrate schools and force their hate-filled agenda on unsuspecting citizens. He said:
But I harken back to decades ago when the FBI and DOJ really aggressively targeted and successfully went after criminally the KKK. And what happened there was they took off their hoods and their sheets, they put on suits and ties, they went local, and they ran for office. So, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen this going local mainstreaming of hatred. We’ve seen it before. And we see it now with people who truly are driven by hate and deception running for school board and elective office.
Figliuzzi rejected parents’ concern about the curriculum, viewing such attempts at influence as manipulative tactics to promote hate.
“Activists have made a concerted effort to organize in the local arena, pursuing their agenda in venues where it is easier to gain power.” Wallace read from the report. “In 2022, the hard-right movement succeeded in burrowing deeper in peoples’ lives in visible and material ways, even if it did not have widespread electoral success. Its fingerprints are everywhere: people’s homes, schools, doctors’ offices, libraries, bars, restaurants, churches, and other community spaces.”
At no point did MSNBC offer a counterpoint to Huang and its panel’s accusations against conservative parental groups. Instead, they presented the SPLC’s harsh accusations as objective and factual. They willingly labeled involved parents as members of a hate group and reminiscent of the KKK. Unfortunately, there seems to be no bottom at MSNBC.
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The transcript is here to read.
