Neil W. McCabe, the national political director of The Star News Network, interviewed GOP State Representative Jake Hoffman (R-Queen Valley), the founder of the Arizona Freedom Caucus and a candidate for State Senate, about his bill to prevent teachers from sexualizing instruction and grooming students into non-mainstream lifestyles.
Hoffman told The Star News Network and The Arizona Sun Times he was told that Republican Governor Doug Ducey was blocking the bill, which is all set up for passage in the state legislature.
TRANSCRIPT
McCabe: Many parents during the period of the COVID-19 lockdowns in the so-called “Zoom classrooms” learned for the first time the degree to which today’s teachers are sexualizing instruction and grooming their children for non-mainstream lifestyles.
And a Republican candidate for State Senate, State Representative Jake Hoffman, told The Star News Network and The Arizona Sun Times that Republican Governor Doug Ducey is blocking his anti-grooming bill from final passage.
Hoffman: Governor Doug Ducey is being the corporate Republican that we would expect him to be, but what I can tell you is that I think we need to be more aggressive right now.
McCabe: Hoffman, a member of the House Education Committee, said the bill offers more protection for children than the anti-grooming in schools law signed by Florida’s Republican Governor Ron DeSantis.
Hoffman: We actually have a bill that’s passed out of the House, passed out of the Senate Education Committee, and has all of its votes ready to go in the Senate that will end the sexual grooming of children in K-12 classrooms from kindergarten through 12th grade. It’s actually more secure and more protective of our children than even Florida’s law.
McCabe: The founder of the Arizona Freedom Caucus said when the bill stalled, he saw Ducey’s fingerprints.
Hoffman: Yet right now that bill won’t get a vote. And what we’re hearing is that the reason it won’t get a vote is that the executive branch has asked them not to.
And so these are things that we have to be aware of and we have to work towards. We need the grassroots involved. But again, this is why I talk about that relationship between the elected officials at the Capitol and the base.
McCabe: Just as the national media has labeled Arizona a purple state, the Republican base’s activism coming out of 2020 has been phenomenal, he said.
Hoffman: The Republican Party base in Arizona is stronger than ever before. They are more engaged. They are more active. They’re sending more emails, making more phone calls, and showing up for in-person meetings with legislators, more than I’ve ever seen in at least the last decade, maybe longer. And so right now we have momentum, and we need to use that momentum to make sure that we’re passing better legislation.
McCabe: Reporting for The Star News Network and The Arizona Sun Times, Neil W. McCabe, Queen Valley, Arizona.
