As Moms For Liberty Meets In Philadelphia, Don’t Underestimate Their Extremism And The Threat They Pose

At the Bucks County Beacon, I have a big piece up about Moms for Liberty. It’s a lot. I start by digging out a more accurate story of the group’s origin than is usually presented.

For that, we have to go back to the beginning of 2015. Four Florida school board members were unhappy with the Florida School Board Association, particularly its lawsuit filed in opposition of the state’s new school voucher program, so they formed a new group —t he Florida Coalition of School Board Members. ExcelInEd, Jeb Bush’s pro-school choice advocacy group greeted them with glowing praise. 

The founding members included Erika Donalds, a former New York investment banker turned Florida Tea Partier, now a high-powered choice advocate in Florida who is CEO of her own charter school company and married to a state legislator. Also in on the ground floor was Shawn Frost, who has worked hard to become an education politics power player in Florida. 

Other folks passed through the organization in the years ahead, including Anne Corcoran, wife of Florida’s pro-privatization legislator-turned-Education Commissioner-turned chief of New College; Rebecca Negron, the wife of the state senator who helped write the tax credit scholarship voucher bill; and Eric Robinson, former GOP party chair and sometimes called “The Prince of Dark Money.” 

In other words, a group of people well connected in the world of pro-privatization politics in Florida.

In that group from Day One: Bridget Ziegler. Joining her soon after was Tina Descovich, who was elected to Brevard County School Board with a signature issue of her opposition to Common Core. Descovich ran on two decades in business and a degree in Communications, as well as serving on the executive staff of a US Army Commanding General. Soon after joining the group, Descovich was its president.

FCSBM operated for a few years, giving out awards and working legislative connections as it ”consistently fought above its weight” to win “key battles on school choice, charters and other hot-button education issues.” But the group ran out of steam, and in May of 2020, Descovich and Ziegler filed for voluntary dissolution of FCSBM. 

Within a few months, they were ready with a new operation. On December 10, Descovich and new MFL founder Tiffany Justice were posting about the launch of the new group; Descovich even had a picture of thirteen women already wearing the group’s t-shirt and displaying their logo. 

It’s not just that Moms for liberty was founded by women with political connections and savvy, but that they had been working at conservative anti-public education advocacy for years. Those connections and prior experience make it less puzzling that the group somehow had money up front for t-shirts and logo design. 

The speed with which the group launched was impressive. They claimed fundraising by selling t-shirts on Facebook, but that would not begin to account for receipts of a half a million dollars in their first year. And they benefited from more than just anonymous donors writing $100K checks.

There’s plenty more. Read the full piece here.