The Maine Republican Occasion is kicking off the TV advert campaigns within the state’s governor’s race Wednesday with a culture-war assault that criticizes Gov. Janet Mills’ administration for utilizing tax {dollars} to create pro-LGBTQ lesson plans for kindergarten college students.
The one-minute advert accuses Mills of spending $2.8 million to create a collection of state Division of Schooling movies that educate “radical faculty classes” comparable to same-sex relationships and transgender selections to kids as younger as kindergarten-age.
“Is that this actually what our children needs to be studying in kindergarten as a substitute of math, science and studying?” the narrator asks after a clip from a state training video is performed. “Janet Mills’ radical agenda is simply improper for our children and for Maine.”
The clip is from a for much longer video, “Freedom Holidays,” that the state Division of Schooling recommends as a social research, language arts, and life-and-career lesson plan to show kindergarten college students about three core vocabulary phrases: rights, historical past and authorities.
The lesson, which is narrated by a Whitefield elementary faculty trainer, explores 4 holidays that remember freedoms in america and touches on freedoms not too long ago achieved by sure teams of Individuals, together with blacks, girls and LGBTQ people.
The advert marketing campaign will begin operating throughout a number of Maine-based TV and radio stations on Wednesday. Produced by a Virginia firm, the advert purchase – the primary of not less than $4 million the Maine Republican Occasion plans to run – value about $94,000, marketing campaign finance data present.
Earlier this month, the Democratic Governors Affiliation introduced a $5 million TV marketing campaign. The massive fundraising totals to date – Mills has raised $2.7 million so far and former Gov. Paul LePage has raised $1.3 million – counsel this might turn out to be the costliest governor’s race in Maine historical past.
Maine Republican Occasion leaders spent the weekend on the Democratic Occasion Conference in Bangor criticizing their rivals for attempting to distract voters from vital pocketbook points, like rising fuel and grocery costs, by specializing in emotional “tradition conflict” points comparable to abortion.
When requested why they selected to make their first TV advert about an emotional non-pocketbook subject, a Republican Occasion spokesman mentioned: “Inflation and financial system points are so distinguished within the information proper now that no person has to pay to get the message out. The information cycle and fuel pump costs are convincing.”
The Maine Republican Occasion not too long ago amended its platform to emphasise the necessity for Republican politicians to battle to maintain same-sex marriage and transgender identification points out of public faculties. Some proposing these conservative amendments initially referred to as out the “Freedom Holidays” video.
In distinction, Democrats enshrined LGBTQ rights of their platform over the weekend.
When requested concerning the advert, a Democratic Occasion spokesman had no particular remark, however pointed to the get together plank addressing politics within the public faculties: “Our college students deserve an sincere remedy of all topics, with a curriculum guided by educators, not corrupted by political agendas rooted in prejudice.”
A Mills spokeswoman didn’t return a Wednesday night time e-mail searching for a response to the advert, however earlier within the day, Mills herself took to Twitter to have a good time the Worldwide Day in opposition to Homophobia, Transphobia & Biphobia with a tweet.
“Hate has no place in Maine. Our LGBTQ+ group deserves to dwell free from hurt or discrimination,” Mills tweeted Tuesday. “I stand with you and can all the time help your proper to be precisely who you’re.”
The state Division of Schooling didn’t reply Tuesday to emailed questions on how these studying modules, initially created to assist public faculty lecturers attain remote-learning college students through the COVID-19 pandemic, had been commissioned or authorized, or what number of instances they had been put to make use of. Nonetheless, the “Freedom Holidays” video was faraway from the company’s on-line archive of the modules after the e-mail was despatched.
The video was nonetheless out there on YouTube, nonetheless, the place it was posted by the Whitefield trainer who created it.
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