Lake County Gazette

Republican gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey has slammed library authorities for promoting celebrations of LGBT+ with children.  

"Waukegan and Highwood library officials and board members supporting this propagandizing are active participants in child abuse," Bailey said. "They should be removed and the process that led to this should be investigated. Public libraries are taxpayer-funded to broadly share ideas and knowledge; they aren't mechanisms for 'trans' activists to sexualize kids, pushing pornography and depravity on kindergartners. Seven and 8-year-olds don't care about politics and they don't think about sex. Only people who have never had a child could believe otherwise. As governor, I will bar state funding to libraries hosting 'drag queen' anything and pushing political propaganda to children."

The Waukegan Public Library and Highwood Public Library are hosting a PrideFest and are encouraging children to dress up in drag. On the itinerary for the "Kiddie Corner" (meant for children ages pre-k through elementary) is drag queen storytime. Officials from both organizations have refused to respond as to why they are sponsoring these events, the Lake County Gazette reported.

"As governor, he will advocate for common sense education reforms that put our children first," Bailey's website stated.

The Lake County PrideFest is also sponsored by the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, according to the Daily Herald.

"Educational nonprofits use 'social and emotional learning' to smuggle divisive politics into the classroom," according to John D. Sailer's article in City Journal. 

Sailer explained that the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) has "almost singlehandedly propounded the pedagogical concept of 'social and emotional learning (SEL).'"

Recently, it has used SEL to promote equity. With the SEL design, "students can expect a politicized education focused on race, identity politics and activism. Another CASEL brief, issued last spring, describes strategies for implementing Transformative SEL in the classroom. One involves 'using SEL discussions to validate student experiences of oppression.' Another: 'SEL instruction as a space to encourage youth to use their voice for social justice.'”

Together with his wife, Bailey founded a Christian school in southern Illinois that caters preschool up to grade 12. He is currently a member of the Education Committee in the Illinois State Senate. As part of the committee and with an understanding of the importance of access to quality education, Bailey "works to find responsible solutions to education funding gaps across the state."