Gov. Wes Moore, D-Md., claimed that book bans are not about protecting students but actually about "castrating them," in an interview with former Biden press secretary turned MSNBC host Jen Psaki on Sunday.
"I continue hearing people making the argument that we're doing it," Gov. Moore said of book bans, "because we want to prevent our students from having discomfort or guilt because we don’t want our students to be able to really wrestle with these really difficult things in times when they are maturing as individuals."
But Moore argued that having certain controversial books in schools is "not about making kids feel uncomfortable."
He said that the removal of those books was "about telling other kids that they shouldn’t understand their own power. It’s castrating them."
The argument about books making students uncomfortable is "a guise," Moore added.
Vicki Baggett, a high school teacher from Escambia County, Florida, confronted Santa Rose County School District officials in June for allowing "pornographic" books in libraries.
"As recently as last Thursday I found a book within this school district that has graphic pictures of an adult giving pornographic magazines to minor school age boys, complete with open legged naked women on the magazines’ covers. And yes, this is in your public-school libraries. And this book is one of many," Baggett said.
She continued, "What are we doing? What are we doing to our future leaders of our communities, our cities, our states? Why would this material ever be available to our most cherished asset, our children?"
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Moore said that removing controversial books from the classroom was also about destroying "history."
"The reason that I know that every single day I can stand in my own skin and I can stand in my own power is because I know my history," he said.
Moore added, "And by telling me that that history is not important, or by telling you that if you teach it to me, that is gonna somehow put the person who taught it to me under investigation, you are telling me that you don’t want me to understand my power. And that’s what this is all about."
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The Maryland governor declared that there will be "economic consequences" for leaders who employ "book banning" in their state, and also asked that groups "come to the state of Maryland" for their conferences.
Fox News’ Bradford Betz contributed to this report.
