Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is aiming to expand the state’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” law, officially known as the Parental Rights in Education Act, such that it would apply to public school classrooms from pre-K through grade 12.

The existing law, which was enacted last year, prohibits discussion or classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity for public school students from kindergarten through third grade.

The Orlando Sentinel first reported the proposal to expand the statute, which was made at the behest of Florida’s DeSantis appointed and avowedly anti-LGBTQ Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr.

Exemptions are carved out in cases where otherwise prohibited materials are included in existing state standards or constitute part of reproductive health instruction, provided that parents or students are able to opt-out.

Asked for a reaction to DeSantis’s proposed expansion of the “Don’t Say Gay” law during a press briefing Wednesday, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre spoke out against the move by the Florida Governor:

“Yeah.  It’s wrong.  It’s completely, utterly wrong.  And we’ve been crystal clear about that, when it comes to the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill and other — other actions that this governor has taken in the state of Florida.”

But make no mistake, this is a part of a disturbing and dangerous trend that we’re seeing across the country of legislations that are anti-LGBTQI+, anti-trans, anti the community in a way that we have not seen it in some time. And so — and it’s not just the LGBTQI+ community.  We’re talking about students.  We’re talking about educators.  We’re talking about, just, individuals.”

The President has been very clear, this administration has been very clear: We will continue to fight for the dignity of — of Americans, for the dignity and respect of the community, of opportunity that should be given to students and families in Florida and across the country.”

So, again, this is just plain wrong, and we’re going to continue to speak against — speak out against it,” Jean-Pierre said.

Brandon Wolf, Press Secretary for Equality Florida, the largest state-wide LGBTQ+ equality rights and advocacy organization, released the following statement:

“After a year’s worth of gaslighting and assurances that the Don’t Say LGBTQ law was narrowly focused, the DeSantis Administration is now saying the quiet part out loud: they believe that it is never appropriate to acknowledge the existence of LGBTQ people, or our contributions to society, in schools. This time, the governor is placing the crosshairs squarely on individual educators, threatening their professional licenses for making mention of the LGBTQ community in any grade level.

The Board of Education’s proposed rule would see more books with LGBTQ characters ripped from school shelves, more discussion of diverse families muzzled, and further character assassination of hardworking teachers in Florida. Free states don’t ban books. Free states don’t censor communities out of classrooms. Free states don’t copy/paste their political agendas from the likes of Vladimir Putin.”

This proposed rule is yet more government power being perverted to serve Ron DeSantis’ desperation to run for President. And its consequences will weigh most heavily on those who have already been forced to bear the brunt of his insatiable lust for power.“

Equality Florida also noted that while the DeSantis Administration has rejected requests to clarify the law’s vague, unconstitutional language, its proposal would add legal liability for individual educators, threatening their professional licenses for violations. The proposed rule is scheduled for a vote by the State Board of Education at their meeting on April 19 in Tallahassee.

DeSantis is considering a run for the presidency and has made culture war issues the forefront of his administration’s policies.

Former openly gay Florida Democratic State Rep. Carlos Guillermo Smith tweeted: “It was never, ever, ever, ever about kindergarten thru 3rd grade. It was always about demonizing us and censoring LGBTQ people out of existence in our schools.”

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is in the process of revoking the Hyatt Regency Miami’s alcohol license after the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation determined that the hotel’s affiliated James L. Knight Center had hosted “A Drag Queen Christmas” performed Dec. 27 with minors present in the audience.

The Knight Center is a major South Florida venue and has previously hosted the Miss Universe and Miss USA pageants. The venue’s main room can seat 4,600 people.

This is the third time the state’s Division of Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco, which operates under the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, has targeted a business that hosted a drag show.

A popular restaurant and pub in Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood is also under threat of losing its liquor license. The R House identifies itself on its Facebook page as “the proud home of South Florida’s most popular weekend drag brunches.”

The July 2022 complaint filed by the Department of Business and Professional Regulation asks for a final order that the R House restaurant is a declared a public nuisance and has its liquor license revoked. 

According to the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the complaint was issued after a video of a recent performance at the bar’s drag brunch went viral. A topless drag queen wearing lingerie stuffed with money can be seen in the video attempting to dance with a young girl, who the DPBR estimates is “between three and five years old.” Twitter account “Libs of Tik Tok” originally found the footage on Tik Tok, posted by a user who wrote, “Children belong at drag shows!!!! Children deserve to see fun and expression & freedom.”

In late December “A Drag Queen Christmas” was hosted by the Orlando non-profit Orlando Philharmonic Plaza Foundation on Dec. 28, filing a complaint alleging that children under age 18 were allowed to attend.

The complaint against the Orlando Philharmonic alleged the foundation violated Florida law in allowing for a person to “commit lewd or lascivious exhibition” in the presence of an individual who is less than 16 years old.

In this latest targeting of the show, which is a holiday-themed drag show that tours in 36 different cities and features stars from the reality show “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” Insider webzine journalist Kimberly Leonard reported that the DeSantis administration officials accused the Knight Center of several violations, including a prohibition of “lascivious exhibition” before people younger than 16, mirroring the December complaint against the Orlando Philharmonic.

The department’s complaint said performers engaged in “acts of simulated sexual activity, and lewd, vulgar, and indecent displays” that included:

• Performers forcibly penetrating or rubbing exposed prosthetic female breasts against faces of audience members
• Intentionally exposing performers’ prosthetic female breasts and genitalia to the audience
• Intentionally exposing performers’ buttocks to the audience
• Simulating masturbation through performers’ digitally penetrating prosthetic female genital
• Graphic depictions of childbirth and/or abortion

Hyatt Regency Miami is allowed to keep selling alcohol until the department makes a final decision. The business has 21 days to request a hearing, Beth Pannell, spokeswoman for the department, told Insider.

Regulators had warned the facility to change how it marketed the show before it went live, according to a copy of the letter included in the complaint. The letter accused the marketers of putting on a performance that constitutes “public nuisances, lewd activity, and disorderly conduct” when minors are present.

News of this latest action was first reported by far-right conservative internet based outlet Florida’s Voice.

As more and more Republican states target drag shows, in just the past few weeks, Tennessee became the first to ban adult performances, including drag, from public spaces such as parks and schools. 

A prosecutor with the Broward County, Fla., State Attorney on Monday dropped two charges of unlawful sexual activity with a minor filed against former D.C. police lieutenant Brett Parson by Boca Raton, Fla. police in February 2022.

A spokesperson for the State Attorney’s office told the Washington Blade the charges were dropped at an 8:30 a.m. hearing before a judge at the Broward County Circuit Court in Fort Lauderdale on Monday, March 13.

In a three-page Closeout Memorandum released by the Broward State Attorney’s Office, Assistant State Attorneys Neva Rainford-Smith and Damette Lennox state that prosecutors decided to drop the charges after it became clear that the then 16-year-old boy, who told authorities that his sexual encounter with Parson was consensual, did not want to participate in the prosecution against Parson.

An arrest affidavit filed by Coconut Creek, Fla., police at the time of Parson’s arrest on Feb. 18, 2022, says Parson allegedly had a consenting sexual encounter with a 16-year-old boy who told police he met Parson on the gay online dating app Growlr and agreed to meet for a sexual encounter after the two exchanged “explicit” photos of each other.

The age of sexual consent in Florida is 18, which made it illegal for Parson to engage in sex with the youth, even though the age of consent in several other states, including D.C., is 16.

Charging documents say the youth and Parson agreed to meet at a gas station in Coconut Creek near where the youth lived. The documents say both arrived in separate cars and, at the suggestion of the youth, drove separately to another location at a secluded parking lot at about 1 a.m., where they engaged in sex in the car Parson had been driving.

Police became involved, according to the charging documents, after the youth noticed people were walking near where they were parked and asked that they drive to yet another location. With Parson following the youth as the two drove in their separate cars, the youth drove into a restricted location. Police stopped both cars, the charging documents say.

One of the officers allowed Parson to drive away after Parson said he was lost and did not know the person in the other car. But for as yet unexplained reasons, the youth, when questioned by a police officer, provided full details of his involvement with Parson, which enabled police to locate Parson through text messages between the youth and Parson that police obtained from the youth’s cell phone.  

“The defendant was a 53-year-old man who was in Broward County visiting family after one of his parents had surgery,” the memorandum released by prosecutors says. “The defendant and the victim, a then 16-year-old boy, met on Growlr, which is a gay dating application,” the memo continues. 

“It should be noted that in order to have an account with Growlr, the user must be 18 years of age or older,” the memo says. “This victim’s profile listed him as 19 years of age,” the memo states.

The memo says the youth told police at the time they stopped him that Parson “never forced him or threatened him” and that while at times he was uncomfortable, “he never showed signs of wanting to stop or never told the defendant to stop.” It says the youth’s parents, who charging documents say were called by police to the scene where the youth was stopped, told police their son did not want to talk about what happened “but was starting to realize  what happened was wrong.”

The charging documents state that at the request of the parents, police and prosecutors filed the two charges of unlawful sexual activity with a minor against Parson. But the memorandum released by the State Attorney’s office on March 13 at the time the charges were dropped in court states that in the months following Parson’s arrest, the youth and his parents were reluctant to speak with a victim advocate to arrange for interviews needed to go forward with the case.

“She left multiple voicemails in early April of 2022 and did not receive a call back,” the memo says. It says between then and February of this year, the youth’s parents continued to decline to make the youth available for an in-person interview needed if the case against Parson was to continue.

“Myself and [the youth’s mother] wanted to move forward, but do not want to put him through this against his will,” the memo quotes the youth’s father as saying in an email to one of the assistant prosecutors, according to the memo. “If there is a way to proceed without his involvement, we would like to. But if this requires his involvement, then we prefer to drop the case,” the memo quotes the father as saying.

“Obviously, even though lack of knowledge of age or misrepresentation of age is not a defense to the crime charged, the defendant’s position has always been that he believed the victim was a 19-year-old man, which is what the victim had listed as his age in the dating application,” the memo continues.

“Due to lack of victim cooperation, my conversations with the victim’s parents and the potential scheduling of a deposition of the victim, the State believed it was in the best interest of the victim to not require him to come in for deposition and subsequent trial testimony, to respect his wishes and announce a nollo prosequi in the case,” Assistant State Attorney in Charge Neva Rainford-Smith concludes in the memo.

The term “nollo prosequi” is a Latin phrase used in criminal law for a decision not to prosecute a case.

Parson has declined to speak with the media since the time of his arrest.