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Government Corruption

Dem education official refuses to enforce Washington's Parents' Bill of Rights, claims students should be able to keep gender identity secret

2024-06-07

[THEPOSTMILLENNIAL] Washington’s Superintendent of Public Instruction has refused to enforce parts of a Parents' Bill of Rights that passed the Washington Legislature with bipartisan support in March. The initiative had garnered hundreds of thousands of signatures from Washingtonians. The reason for the refusal is to aid students in keeping gender identity secret from their parents.

Initiative 2081 emphasizes, and in some cases augments, rights already granted to parents under state and federal law but does not change them. The law requires schools to notify parents before medical services are offered to their child, except in emergencies, as well as of medical treatment arranged by the school. The law also gives parents the right to review their child’s medical and counseling records and expands when parents can opt their child out of sex education classes.

The bill came before the legislature after hundreds of thousands of Washingtonians signed the parental rights initiative backed by the citizen action group Let’s Go Washington.

Despite the bipartisan passage of the bill, the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, along with other groups, challenged the law, claiming that it violated the state Constitution, which requires new laws not to revise or revoke old laws without stating so. On Tuesday, King County Superior Court Commissioner Mark Hillman ruled against the ACLU and said the challengers to the law didn’t show that it would create imminent harm necessary to warrant blocking it until a trial court judge can consider it, according to KSTP.

In response to the ruling, Washington’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal announced that he will not be enforcing parts of the law.

On Wednesday, Reykdal claimed that the bill could violate student privacy rights and announced that the contested parts of the law by the ACLU and others wouldn’t be enforced. Reykdal said in a statement, "The initiative states that parents and legal guardians have the right to inspect their child’s public school records."

Link

-Lurid Crime Tales-

3rd-strike 'trans' rape suspect prompts rebellion against CA law after attack in women's prison

2024-06-03

[FoxNews] Tremaine 'Treymane' Deon Carroll transferred out of women's prison after being indicted on 2 rape counts

A transgender-identified California convict with a lengthy record of criminal violence has been transferred out of a women's correctional facility and back to a men's prison after being indicted for rape.

Tremaine "Tremayne" Deon Carroll, 51, is an incarcerated biological male who identifies as a woman and faces two charges of forcible rape and one of "dissuading a witness from testifying" in Madera County, according to a criminal complaint first obtained by Reduxx, a feminist news and opinion website, and later reported by JustTheNews.com.

One of the alleged victims of the Jan. 30 incident is a biological female, identified as Jane Doe in court documents, who said Carroll attacked her in the shower at the Central California Women’s Facility and raped her. The complaint also mentions another unidentified victim. Carroll has since been transferred to Kern Valley State Prison, a male-only facility in Delano, online records show.

Women's rights activists tell Fox News Digital that Carroll, who was the public face of a campaign to support California law SB 132, which allows transgender prisoners to be housed in a facility consistent with their gender identity, is a case in point why the law harms incarcerated women.

"Previous to SB 132, biological male inmates were allowed to, on a case-by-case individualized basis, be placed in women's facilities. But not if they hadn't had surgery, and it was always very individualized. What the bill did, what SB 132 did is it took away all of that safeguarding," said Lauren Bone, legal director of the Women's Liberation Front (WoLF).

WoLF is a self-described radical feminist organization that opposes policies that permit biological males in women-only spaces. The group currently represents four female inmates in a lawsuit against the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations (CDCR) that seeks to have SB 132, which is called the Transgender Respect, Agency, and Dignity Act, declared unconstitutional.

"[SB 132] took away the ability to make individualized case assessments. It made it illegal to discriminate on the basis of anatomy and including things like hormones," Bone said. "You don't have to identify as a woman anymore. You can identify as non-binary or many other things. And so, what the results are is that there's 50 men who are housed there. There are hundreds more on a wait list, who are still being processed. Nearly all of them have penises."

Carroll is one of several female-identifying biological males represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, Transgender Law Center and Lambda Legal who intervened to oppose WoLF's lawsuit in August 2023. In sworn testimony, Carroll stated, "I know what it feels like to live in fear and to carry the weight of the past abuse by men. But I am not a threat."

Less than a year later, Carroll would be accused of rape.

Amie Ichikawa, founder and executive director of Women II Women and a former inmate who has closely followed Carroll's case, told Fox News Digital there is no history of Carroll identifying as any kind of LGBTQ+ person until SB 132 passed.

"This is somebody that I did keep a close eye on because of their history, their background, their habitual manipulation, frivolous lawsuit after frivolous lawsuit, constantly filing complaints against everyone. I knew this was going to be an issue," Ichikawa said.

Link

Government Corruption

Judge backtracks ruling that blocked Florida immigration law

2024-05-24

Follow up to this story from yesterday.

[TheHill] Just hours after handing down a ruling confirming that an immigration law in Florida was blocked, a federal judge appeared to issue a reversal of his own ruling.

Judge Roy Altman issued an injunction Tuesday, temporarily blocking a key part of Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R) immigration law, which would make it a felony to transport undocumented ~~migrants~~ colonists into the state.

Altman agreed with the Farmworker Association of Florida that federal immigration laws would likely preempt the law.

In a supplemental order issued Wednesday, Altman wrote he wanted to "clarify the scope of that preliminary injunction." The judge said there were several reasons why a statewide injunction should be appropriate in the case.

Hours later, Altman seemed to backtrack. He issued another order, noting that "on further reflection," he will be hosting a briefing on "the proper scope of the injunction."

The judge wrote that all parties must submit a brief by June 6 on whether the injunction should apply to the plaintiffs or be a district- or state-wide injunction.

In his original order, Altman rejected arguments from Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody (R) that an injunction could prevent law enforcement from doing its job, including in their efforts to identify people who are narcos.

Florida’s immigration law, SB 1718, was signed by DeSantis last year and led to some ~~migrants~~ colonists being relocated to blue states across the country on buses and planes.

Immigrant rights activists and the Farmworker Association of Florida filed the lawsuit last July, specifically focusing on the transportation of individuals who entered the country unlawfully.

Following Altman’s injunction, Spencer Amdur, a senior staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Im~~migrants~~ colonists’ Rights Project, said the decision was the right call. He called the law unconstitutional and said it "threatened Floridians with jail time for doing the most ordinary things, like going to work, visiting family, and driving kids to soccer games."

"This ruling is an important victory for Florida communities," he said in a statement. The Hill has reached out to the ACLU for an updated comment on Altman’s decision.

The Miami Herald noted that the conflicting back-to-back orders from Altman on Thursday have created confusion about how pending cases will be prosecuted and how the injunction will proceed.

Link

Home Front: Politix

Wyoming Governor Signs Ban on Sex Changes for Minors

2024-03-24

Good. Does Wyoming make it a majority of states yet?

[THEGATEWAYPUNDIT] Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon signed a bill on Friday that bans doctors from performing "gender transition" and sex change procedures on minors.

Under Senate File 99, any healthcare professional who provides a minor with puberty blockers, hormone therapy, or sex change surgeries will be subject to having their licenses suspended or revoked.

While he signed the bill, the governor did not seem enthusiastic about doing so.

"I signed SF99 because I support the protections this bill includes for children, however it is my belief that the government is straying into the personal affairs of families," Governor Gordon said in a statement about the legislation.

Gordon continued, "Our legislature needs to sort out its intentions with regard to parental rights. While it inserts governmental prerogative in some places, it affirms parental rights in others."

Of course, the American Civil Liberties Union of Wyoming opposes the ban.

"By signing this bill into law, Gov. Gordon has put the government in charge of making vital decisions traditionally reserved for parents in Wyoming," ACLU of Wyoming Executive Director Libby Skarin said in the announcement. "This ban won’t stop Wyomingites from being trans, but it will deny them critical support that helps struggling transgender youth grow up to become thriving transgender adults."

Link

-Great Cultural Revolution

Trans inmate who killed baby and identifies as Muslim woman sues chaplain for allegedly not allowing hijab

2024-02-21

[FoxNews] Inmate who killed stepdaughter in 2001 now identifies as an 'Islamic practicing transwoman'

A transgender inmate serving a 55-year sentence for strangling his 11-month-old stepdaughter to death filed a civil lawsuit against the prison chaplain for allegedly prohibiting him from wearing a hijab outside his immediate bed quarters, despite identifying as a Muslim woman.

Autumn Cordellionè, also known as Jonathan C. Richardson, is currently serving out his sentence at the Branchville Correctional Facility, an Indiana Department of Correction state prison for men.

According to the lawsuit filed Nov. 30 and obtained by Fox News Digital, a prison chaplain told Richardson the hijab was not allowed to be worn outside his immediate bed area. Richardson is seeking $150,000 in damages and the ability to wear the hijab "anywhere I go within the facility."

"I informed him that I wear the hajib [sic] in order to cover my head and ears for modesty purposes, as I am an Islamic practicing transwoman," Richardson said in the lawsuit.

The chaplain then proceeded to inform Richardson that his listed religious preference is "Wiccan," a pagan Earth-centered religion with a male god and moon goddess, "and I responded that I am an eclectic practitioner who is a member of the Theosophical Society in America," Richardson alleged in the complaint.

"I practice a diversity of faiths in order to custom tailor my spiritual beliefs to my spiritual needs," Richardson said in the lawsuit.

That’s not how it works in prison.

Richardson claimed his 14th amendment, or equal protection clause, was violated by the chaplain's alleged refusal to let him wear the hijab.

"Male Islamic practitioners are allowed to wear their kufis across the facility, and are not restricted to their bed areas only," the complaint stated.

He further alleged the chaplain violated his Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment and claimed he was subject to "harassment and ridicule" by other Muslim prisoners.

"He should be aware, as Chaplain, the stigma and shame that is attributed to Islamic women when they go uncovered and without a hijab [sic]," Richardson wrote in the complaint. "Women are viewed as whores, tempters of men, and adulterators; by Islamic society both in and out of prison. I have been shunned, made a social pariah, and amongst my own religious community."

Yes, but because you are mentally ill, not because you’re a bad Moslem girl.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Indiana Department of Corrections for comment from the chaplain, but the facility said they do not comment on pending litigation. The chaplain also could not be reached.

Fox News Digital previously reported Richardson, who was convicted of reckless homicide after strangling his 11-month-old stepdaughter to death in 2001, was suing the Indiana Department of Corrections for not granting his wish to get sex reassignment surgery.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is representing Richardson in that lawsuit.

An Indiana law, adopted last summer, prohibits the Department of Corrections from using taxpayer dollars to fund sex reassignment surgeries for inmates. However, the ACLU argues in the lawsuit, filed on Aug. 28, 2023, that the law is a violation of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of "cruel and unusual punishment."

He isn’t the only one cosplaying as Moslem:

NEW: Keffiyeh-donning gay activists in Seattle have declared a “homosexual intifada.”

It signals activists will become violent to support terrorists who would toss them from the highest rooftop the moment they accuse someone of misgendering them.

Read👇🏻https://t.co/6jr3kj6HL5
— Jason Rantz on KTTH Radio (@jasonrantz) February 20, 2024

Link

-Great Cultural Revolution

Department of Justice Files Statement of Interest in Lawsuit from Transgender Inmate

2024-01-11

[Breitbart] The U.S. Department of Justice filed a statement of interest in a lawsuit brought in Georgia claiming that the denial of transgender care violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

“People with gender dysphoria should be able to seek the full protections of the American with Disabilities Act [sic], just like other people with disabilities,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “We are committed to ensuring constitutional conditions inside our jails and prisons so that those detained inside these facilities, including people with gender dysphoria can live safely and receive needed medical care. The U.S. Constitution requires that people incarcerated in jails and prisons receive necessary medical care, treatment and services to address serious medical conditions.”

The lawsuit alleges that the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC) violated a transgender inmate’s rights under the ADA, the Rehabilitation Act, and the U.S. Constitution by denying treatment for transgenderism.

“The protections of the U.S. Constitution and the Americans with Disabilities Act do not stop at the doorsteps of our jails and prisons,” said U.S. Attorney Ryan K. Buchanan for the Northern District of Georgia. “Our office remains committed to ensuring that all people with disabilities, including those with gender dysphoria, continue to receive access to such medically necessary treatments, even while they are in custody.”

In another case from Missouri, Kelly McSean, a transgender inmate convicted of rape and pedophilia, has filed a civil rights lawsuit after being denied female undergarments at the St. Francois County Jail and South Missouri Mental Health Center.

McSean has been awaiting trial after escaping jail and attacking sex offender treatment program staff, and he has a long rap sheet of offenses going back to his teen years, having raped both boys and girls, going in and out of jail, until his eventual imprisonment. Recently, he has claimed discrimination for not being given his desired undergarments, which the ACLU has backed. Per Reduxx:

Though McSean is alleging various forms of mistreatment, the majority of his complaints appear to stem from his inability to access “gender affirming” items and treatments, most notably women’s undergarments. He also takes issue with being “misgendered” and “demeaned” while in custody, and having been treated as a male despite his state and prison documentation listing him as a “female.”

McSean has similarly alleged sexual harassment, with these claims stemming from “misgendering” incidents, “discrimination on the basis of sex,” and routine searches not being conducted in the fashion he demands. He has also claimed he was “sexually assaulted” during a strip-search, emphasizing that his penis and “breasts” had been exposed to male officers.

McSean has claimed that these incidents have caused him severe anxiety, nightmares, high blood pressure, and loss of appetite, amounting to alleged damages between $50,000 to $100,000. In one complaint, McSean claimed that the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) had intervened on his behalf.

“After being informed that the ACLU and an attorney has contacted the St. Francois county detention center of [sic] the constitutional rights of transgender persons, I submitted an inmate request form as to the status of ability to purchase and have female undergarments,” he wrote in August of last year.

Link

Government Corruption

Abbott's Texas illegal immigration crackdown challenged by ACLU as Biden DOJ mulls action

2023-12-20

[Washington Examiner] AUSTIN, Texas — The Biden administration is mulling legal action against Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) after civil rights organizations sued over a new law that gives state and local law enforcement the ability to arrest suspected illegal immigrants.
The Lawfare train is right on time.
Blowback from Democrats and liberal organizations commenced less than 24 hours after Abbott signed SB 4, which gives non-federal police the legal authority to arrest immigrants who have illegally entered the state from a foreign nation. Immigration laws are federal, therefore, until the signing of SB 4, only federal law enforcement had the authority to make such arrests, and some already have taken legal action to quell Abbott's latest border security action.

Abbott signed the bill, along with two others that passed during recent special legislative sessions, Monday during a ceremony in the border city of Brownsville. SB 4 criminalizes unlawful entry to the country, while other enacted laws provide $1.5 billion for border wall construction and create a mandatory 10-year minimum prison sentence for human smugglers.

The American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Texas, and the Texas Civil Rights Project filed a lawsuit in federal court on behalf of El Paso County and two immigrant rights groups Tuesday challenging Texas.

"Governor Abbott’s efforts to circumvent the federal immigration system and deny people the right to due process is not only unconstitutional, but also dangerously prone to error, and will disproportionately harm Black and Brown people regardless of their immigration status," said Anand Balakrishnan, senior staff attorney at the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, in a statement. "We’re using every tool at our disposal, including litigation, to stop this egregious law from going into effect."

Link

Home Front: Politix

Ohio abortion providers move to make heartbeat law illegal after amendment takes effect

2023-12-18

[Washington Examiner] Ohio abortion providers are asking a judge to strike down the state's "heartbeat" law, which blocks abortion at around six weeks of gestation, in light of the new abortion-expanding constitutional amendment that voters approved last month.

The amendment went into effect on Dec. 7 and guarantees access to abortion for any reason as long as a physician signs off on it.

Chief advocates of the abortion amendment, which include the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the ACLU of Ohio, filed an amended complaint to their already active challenge to the heartbeat law, asking a judge to consider the suit in light of the new amendment. Ohio's six-week law and similar proposals in other states are often described as heartbeat bills because they ban abortion after the point at which a doctor can detect a fetal heartbeat.

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-Great Cultural Revolution

National Review June 2022 - The Money behind the Transgender Movement

2023-07-15

[National Review - June 2022] Today, Illinois voters go to the polls in the state’s party primaries. Democrats are virtually certain to renominate J. B. Pritzker, the state’s incumbent governor, even though his policies have managed to drive longtime Illinois businesses such as Caterpillar out of the state.

But while the state’s coffers suffer, Pritzker will be doing just fine. He is a scion of a billionaire family, whose members include former secretary of commerce Penny Pritzker, who was an Obama campaign donor. Another Pritzker sibling, meanwhile, exemplifies how the family has used its vast wealth to promote liberal causes: specifically, the cultural normalization of transgenderism. Earlier this month, Jennifer Bilek explained this in great detail for Tablet. (Bilek prefers to use the term "synthetic sex identities," or SSI, because she thinks the word "transgenderism" lacks "clear boundaries" and is thus "useless for communication."): A sample:

Ever since, a motivating and driving force behind the Pritzkers’ familywide commitment to SSI has been J. B.’s cousin Jennifer (born James) Pritzker — a retired lieutenant colonel in the Illinois Army National Guard and the father of three children. In 2013, around the time gender ideology reached the level of mainstream American culture, Jennifer Pritzker announced a transition to womanhood. Since then, Pritzker has used the Tawani Foundation to help fund various institutions that support the concept of a spectrum of human sexes, including the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, the Williams Institute UCLA School of Law, the National Center for Transgender Equality, the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Palm Military Center, the World Professional Association of Transgender Health (WPATH), and many others. Tawani Enterprises, the private investment counterpart to the philanthropic foundation, invests in and partners with Squadron Capital LLC, a Chicago-based private investment vehicle that acquires a number of medical device companies that manufacture instruments, implants, cutting tools, and injection molded plastic products for use in surgeries. As in the case of Jon Stryker, founder of the LGBT mega-NGO Arcus Foundation, it is hard to avoid the impression of complementarity between Jennifer Pritzker’s for-profit medical investments and philanthropic support for SSI.

Bilek provides further examples of the Pritzkers’ efforts (including some of Governor Pritzker’s policies) in the piece. It backs up what Helen Joyce wrote for National Review last summer, detailing the main forces aiding "Trans Activism’s Long March through Our Institutions":

One is an American transwoman billionaire, Jennifer (James) Pritzker, a retired soldier and one of the heirs to a vast family fortune. Pritzker’s personal foundation, Tawani, makes grants to universities, the ACLU, GLAAD, the HRC, and smaller activist groups. To cite a couple of examples, in 2016 it gave the University of Victoria $2 million to endow a chair of transgender studies, and throughout the "bathroom wars" it supported Equality Illinois Education Project, which is linked to a group campaigning for gender self-ID in the state.

It is an expensive endeavor to reject reality. One hopes that it is also, ultimately, a failed one.

Link

-Land of the Free

DOJ argues DeSantis-backed law banning Chinese land ownership near Florida military bases 'unconstitutional'

2023-07-01

[FoxNews] The Justice Department argued in a new court filing this week that a Florida law restricting Chinese land ownership by U.S. military installations and major infrastructure is unconstitutional.

In a "statement of interest" filed in U. S. District Court in Tallahassee on Tuesday, the DOJ argues that SB 264 – signed into law last month by GOP presidential candidate and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis – violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution, as well as the Fair Housing Act of 1968 (FHA).

FHA broadly prohibits housing discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, familial status, disability and national origin.

"These unlawful provisions will cause serious harm to people simply because of their national origin, contravene federal civil rights laws, undermine constitutional rights, and will not advance the State’s purported goal of increasing public safety," the Justice Department wrote.

The state law imposes new restrictions on persons and entities from "foreign countries of concern," defined as China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela and Syria.

It bans "foreign principals," defined as someone whose "domicile" in the People's Republic of China and not a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident, from owning or acquiring agricultural land or real property within ten miles of any "military installation" or "critical infrastructure facility" in Florida.

The legislation has an exception for individuals with a valid non-tourist visa or who have been granted asylum to purchase one residential real property if the property is less than two acres in size and not within five miles of a military installation.

The law also prohibits the "purchase or acquisition of real property by the People’s Republic of China," including by Chinese political and corporate entities.

DeSantis has described the legislation as a way to "counteract the malign influence of the Chinese Communist Party in the state of Florida."

"Restricting China and other hostile foreign nations from controlling Florida’s agricultural land and lands near critical infrastructure facilities protects our state, provides long-term stability, and preserves our economic freedom," Florida’s Commissioner of Agriculture Wilton Simpson similarly stated last month, according to the filing.

"Food security is national security, and we have a responsibility to ensure Floridians have access to a safe, affordable, and abundant food supply," Simpson added in May. "China and other hostile foreign nations control hundreds of thousands of acres of critical agricultural lands in the U.S., leaving our food supply and our national security interests at risk."

The American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing four Chinese citizens who live in Florida and a Florida brokerage firm suing the state, claims the legislation will "cast an undue burden of suspicion on anyone seeking to buy property whose name sounds remotely Asian, Russian, Iranian, Cuban, Venezuelan, or Syrian."

On May 22, plaintiffs Yifan Shen, Zhiming Xu, Xinxi Wang, Yongxin Liu, and Multi-Choice Realty, LLC filed a complaint seeking a preliminary injunction.

The DOJ filing seeks to support that motion. U.S. District Judge Allen C. Winsor scheduled a July 18 hearing on the matter.

DeSantis is not the only GOP presidential contender critical of the Biden administration's perceived inaction to curb the national security risk of Chinese influence on U.S. institutions.

During her foreign policy speech in Washington, D.C., earlier this week, Nikki Haley, who served as ambassador to the United Nations under the Trump administration, called out how Chinese investors have bought nearly 400,000 acres of land in the U.S., including miles of farms near sensitive military facilities.

"And China has taken majority control of agricultural industries," she said. "This must end. The line between Chinese investors and the Chinese Communist Party is exceptionally thin."

"The Communist Party has abused our openness in extraordinary ways," Haley added. "It uses our economic freedom to threaten our security and food supplies – our academic freedom to corrupt our students and scholars – and our freedom of speech to spread lies and shape our laws."

Link

Home Front: Politix

Montana Governor Gianforte On Banning TikTok: They're ‘Spying On Americans, Enough Is Enough'

2023-05-20

[WIRE] Montana GOP Governor Greg Gianforte discussed his decision to sign legislation banning China’s TikTok app, saying that the communist regime uses it to steal the data of American citizens and use it for "nefarious purposes."

"I would first say the ability of the Chinese communist government to use TikTok to spy on Americans is well documented," he told Fox News host John Roberts. "That’s why I’m pleased that we’ve banned the application here in Montana. I wish the bill actually was broader. I would have liked to have picked up other social media apps that [are] owned by foreign adversaries. But this is a good step in the right direction."

Gianforte slammed the leftist American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for claiming that the bill was too broad and that his government could not impose a total ban.

"Well, they’re just wrong," he responded. "The Montana Constitution has a very broad protection for individual privacy. And TikTok violates that. And this is why we’ve banned it here. I mean, spying on Americans, enough is enough. We’re not going to let foreign adversaries surveil the people of Montana."

Link

-Great Cultural Revolution

NH historical marker to Communist leader removed 2 weeks after dedication

2023-05-18

[MSN] A historical marker dedicated to a feminist and labor activist in New Hampshire who also led the Communist Party was removed Monday just two weeks after it was unveiled.

The green and white sign describing the life of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn was installed May 1 in Concord close to where she was born in 1890. But it quickly drew criticism from two Republican members of the Executive Council, the five-member body that approves state contracts, judicial nominees and other positions. They argued it was inappropriate given Flynn’s communist involvement. Republican Gov. Chris Sununu, meanwhile, called for a review of the historical marker process.

“All polices and guidelines were followed in removing this controversial marker,” said Sununu's spokesperson, Ben Vihstadt. He said Concord city officials weren't advocating to keep it, and once state officials realized it was on state property and not city land as previously believed, the state removed it.

But supporters of the sign accused the state of violating its own rules for the markers. They argued markers can only be “retired” if they contain errors of fact, are in a state of disrepair or require refurbishment.

“We still say that under the department’s own guidelines, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn’s birthplace in Concord is a fitting location for a historical marker,” said Mary Lee Sargent, a former U.S. history teacher and longtime labor and feminist activist.

Known as “The Rebel Girl” for her fiery speeches, Flynn was a founder of the American Civil Liberties Union who advocated for women’s voting rights and access to birth control. The marker also says she joined the Communist Party in 1936 and was sent to prison in 1951. She was one of many party members prosecuted “under the notorious Smith Act,” the marker says, which forbade any attempts to advocate, abet or teach the violent destruction of the U.S. government.

Flynn later chaired the Communist Party of the United States and she died in Moscow during a visit in 1964, at age 74. Her marker was one of 278 across the state that describe people and places — from Revolutionary War soldiers to contemporary sports figures.

Under the current process, any person, municipality or agency can suggest a marker as long as they get 20 signatures from New Hampshire residents. Supporters must draft the marker’s text and provide footnotes and copies of supporting documentation, according to the state Division of Historical Resources. The division and a historical resources advisory group evaluate the criteria.

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