Protesters and Presidential Candidates gather at Moms for Liberty National Summit.

Transgender “Dance Protest” at Moms for Liberty Summit

A smattering of protesters hollered insults, like “bigot” and “fascist,” over a loud speaker, blasted music, waved rainbow flags and danced in the street in a transgender “dance protest” on Friday and Saturday at the Moms for Liberty “Joyful Warriors” National Summit in Philadelphia.

The political rally, which was advertised beforehand as a dance protest in media stories, social media posts, box trucks with electronic signs, and handmade signs plastered on utility poles in the city listing the location and the words “Trump is coming to town.”

Protest organizers had a stack of cardboard signs for walk-up protesters to borrow, but the stack was not fully used. There were snacks, sidewalk chalk for writing insults on the ground, tables with reading materials to persuade the public, and people with clipboards and pens working the crowd.

Moms for Liberty Summit: Standing Up for Conservative Values

A world away, attendees of the Moms for Liberty summit gathered inside the venue with messages of encouragement for each other to continue standing up for conservative values despite being called “bigots” or worse by those with opposing values.

Over the course of two days, the grassroots conservative Moms group, which formed out of parental concern over “destructive” policies in schools two years ago during the COVID-19 pandemic, had the political power to attract five Republican presidential hopefuls: candidates Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, and former President Donald Trump on Friday and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and Vivek Ramaswamy on Saturday. Some summit speakers believe that is why Moms for Liberty is being targeted.

Ramaswamy and Family

Vivek Ramaswamy, alongside his wife Apoorva Ramaswamy, a throat surgeon, sat on stage with his two children and Moms for Liberty cofounder Tiffany Justice, talking about national policies, popping a pacifier into the baby’s mouth, describing the changes he would make to education, and handing the children teddy bears.

Each time the children did something cute, the room full of mostly moms cooed in unison, “Awww.” One mom remarked later that it is probably good marketing to bring the kids on stage. “[I]t totally works.”

Ramaswamy’s policies work for many moms as well. They stood up to applaud several times in the middle of his speech, including when he announced that if elected, he will shut down the U.S. Department of education. The money saved would make school choice possible.

He would also end other federal agencies such as the FBI, IRS, ATF, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which he would make into something different.

“The FBI does not need to exist. In fact, local prosecutors and local police get the job done just fine without an intermediary agency sitting in between. Same thing with the U.S. Marshalls and you have the DOJ. When you have a bureaucracy that sits in between, that’s a formula for corruption—for labeling conservative parents domestic terrorists,” he told the press after his speech.

These agencies, he says, create a fourth branch of government.

He said that the opponent protesters gathered outside didn’t want to hear the truth, and then listed some truths.

“God is real, there are two genders, fossil fuels are a requirement for human prosperity, reverse racism is racist, and parents determine the education of their children,” Ramaswamy said. He had some other truths but by then, the Moms were on their feet and cheering too loudly to hear his words.

At 37, Ramaswamy is the first millennial to run for U.S. president. He says his generation is hungry for a cause, purpose, and meaning.

He said that the woke culture of radical America being popularized today leaves a black hole in its wake—”a moral vacuum.”

“And when you have a black hole that runs that deep, that is when the poison begins to fill the void. Wokeism, transgenderism, COVIDism, depression, anxiety, drug usage, suicide,” Ramaswamy said.

“You think it’s a coincidence that we see the rise of these secular cults and insecurities at the same time—it is not the reason. They are symptoms of a deeper hunger, a de