Beaufort County books under review match list made by local member of conservative group

Was a national conservative group behind the effort to ban books in Beaufort County schools?

The list used to pull 97 titles from school libraries nearly matches the list a local Moms for Liberty member created and sent to the school the morning the titles were taken off shelves.

Moms for Liberty is an American conservative nonprofit organization that began in Florida that advocates for parental rights in education. It has been tied to efforts to remove books from schools and has chapters nationwide, including in Beaufort County.

The Beaufort County parent who complained and sent the list, Ivie Szalai, said she is a member of the group, but that Moms for Liberty was not her motivation.

“I spent a lot of hours working on [the list],” she said. “The initial deep dive research to find the information and do the screen grabs was probably about five days of what would equate to a 9-5 job and maybe even more once I had all of that information. I then put that all into a document.”

Sending the list

Szalai sent the list along with each title’s ratings from BookLooks.org to the members of the School Board, superintendent and other district employees on Oct. 19, the same day Superintendent Frank Rodriguez made the decision to pull books off the shelves and start a lengthy review process.

The books were pulled based on a list provided by a community member the morning of Oct. 19, district spokeswoman Candace Bruder had said.

Contrary to previous district statements that they never received a reconsideration form to start the review process, Szalai completed a form for all the titles and emailed it to board members and Chief Instructional Services Officer Mary Stratos on Oct. 21, according to the forwarded email.

When asked, Bruder said information technology services personnel are looking into whether they received the email.

“Given this timing, the course of action would not have changed, as the process was already in motion,” Bruder said.

Szalai said her decision to send the list wasn’t politically motivated.

“This was in no means guided by my religious preference or my political preference,” Szalai said. “I fully believe that we need books in our school system that are for every race, every gender, every sexual preference, as long as they are not sexually explicit.”

Some Beaufort County community members believe the list is politically motivated, saying there are books on the list that BookLooks.org doesn’t flag as having inappropriate sexual content.

“I think it is important to note that the focus of the book banning has been on pornography in books, yet also include all versions of ‘Stamped,’ a book about racism that is rated a ‘one’ on their evaluation tool and includes no sexual conduct content,” community member McKinley Person said at the board meeting this week. “This is evidence that their motive is not pure, but driven by an agenda that includes racism and anti-LGBTQ bigotry.”

A “one” rating means “Child Guidance,” and “no references to sexual activities,” according to BookLooks.org’s rating system.

The book Person refers to is “Stamped” by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi and has several versions, including a kids version. According to BookLooks.org: “This book contains inflammatory racial and social commentary.”

What is BookLooks.org?

On BookLooks.org, the first frequently asked question is “Are you affiliated with Moms for Liberty or any other groups?”

They answer: “No. We are not affiliated with any other groups. ... However, we do communicate with other individuals and groups with whom there is an intersection of mission and values. ... We commonly allow these entities to use our work and accept suggestions for books to look at.”

Szalai cited BookLooks.org, according a copy of the email she sent to the school district. Nowhere in the email did it say that BookLooks.org might be affiliated with a political organization, according to Bruder.

The Mom’s for Liberty Brevard, Florida, Facebook page frequently shares BookLooks.org ratings with the public. Most Facebook group pages are private.

School Board members and district employees were mixed on whether they were aware of BookLooks.org being used as a rating system by Moms For Liberty at the time the books were pulled for reconsideration. Many members didn’t realize that until after the review process had already started.

“I did discover that when I was looking at the book list and when I explored the rating system,” board member Cathy Robine said.

While Szalai’s email only included ratings, she posted the list of books to Facebook in a Google Doc with links to so-called “Slick Sheets.”

A “Slick Sheet” is a document with the book’s rating and citations of potentially inappropriate content, created by parents at BookLooks.org. Beaufort County parent Joseph Castagnino said he used the “Slick Sheet” for “Tricks” by Ellen Hopkins to read at the board meeting Oct. 18.

The Moms for Liberty Brevard, Florida, Facebook page also frequently shares “Slick Sheets.”

“I will say the decision to pull books had nothing to do with any sort of political view,” Bruder said.

She said it partially had to do with wanting to start the review process quickly and to do so the books first had to be pulled from shelves.

Harassment, intimidation, threats

It also had to do with the safety of employees, according to Bruder.

“We have seen the harassment, intimidation and verbal threats of termination and legal consequences directed at public officials and employees continue to escalate at board meetings, on social media, and via email,” she said in a statement to The Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette.

At the time of the titles being pulled for review, Bruder said they only heard from those wanting to take the books out of schools and not those, like the more than 20 that spoke at the board meeting this week, wanting to keep them in schools.

Community members wanting books to be removed started email chains between the board, district employees, local and state government members and solicitors, according to Stratos.

The email chains threatened legal action and said the schools were violating federal laws by having “pornographic materials in schools.”

Stratos said she acknowledges and welcomes community members’ feedback, but this was “utilizing language of law to leverage into a demand.”

“I want to say that the safety of employees was considered,” Stratos said when asked whether these threats were taken into consideration when making the decision to review the books. “I think that’s the language. And the opportunity to maintain a climate for educators again, back to teaching and learning.”

Since the titles have been pulled for reconsideration Stratos said they’re still receiving threats targeted at employees.

The district has received two FOIA requests for the names of librarians, according to Bruder.

Castagnino filed a complaint with the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office on Oct. 25 citing South Carolina codes such as Section 63-5-70: Unlawful conduct towards a child and said he “wanted the school district to be held criminally responsible for allowing the books to be provided to minor children.”

The Sheriff’s Office said it took the report for documentation and is not investigating, according to Maj. Angela Viens.

“It’s not necessarily you know, someone’s going to show up and physically do something,” Stratos said. “It’s just those kinds of things take a toll on educators that are already working their tails off to serve kids all day, especially in a post pandemic, working for academic acceleration.”