Democratic socialist Florida state Rep. Angie Nixon, who recently won the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate, blasted the idea of restricting children’s access to drag shows, and called such entertainment "wholesome" during an interview in August.
During a sit-down with Nixon on the Legal AF podcast, Melba Pearson, a criminal law expert and civil rights advocate, appeared to conflate Florida’s Parental Rights in Education law, which concerns children’s education, with the Protection of Children Act that restricts minors' access to drag shows.
"I believe it was today or yesterday, the appeals court upheld that, the law that basically we call ‘Don’t Say Gay,’ that the biggest provision that everybody’s most familiar with is that it makes it illegal for anyone under 18 to be at a drag show," Melba said. "So basically it’s criminalizing drag in a lot of ways, right? And so, you know, in seeing that, what does that tell you and how can you translate that into policy, you know, when you get to D.C.?"
"Yeah, for sure. What that is telling me is that there’s an attack on an 'othering' of people who don’t look like Donald Trump. Like, right?" Nixon said. "Like, it is just an attack on marginalized communities. They want to create this country that looks a certain way, that acts a certain way, that believes a certain way. And it’s frustrating."
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She went on to defend drag shows as "wholesome entertainment," saying she has taken her own children to shows.
"I don’t understand, like, there’s no sexualization at a drag show! It’s just people dressing up and singing and performing! I’ve taken my children to drag shows, and it’s fun! It’s entertainment," she said. "It’s wholesome entertainment and it’s nothing wrong. It’s just like, I don’t get it."
Theo Wold, former assistant attorney general and former White House deputy assistant for domestic policy under President Donald Trump, told Fox News Digital that Nixon's statement was inaccurate.
"Drag has always been sexualized entertainment — that’s why it originated in bars and nightclubs in front of adult audiences. On one hand, DSA candidates, like Rashida Tlaib endorsed Angie Nixon, want to Islamify America by opening our borders and electing radical Muslim clerics to high office, especially our courts; on the other hand, they want to bring drag performers to kids," he said.
"It doesn’t make sense until you understand their larger project, which is to destabilize Western civilization — whether by undermining our legal regime or by destabilizing the nuclear family," he said.
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Curtis Houck, the Managing Editor of the NewsBusters division of the Media Research Center, suggested that certain news networks will desperately try to avoid covering Nixon's comments.
"Needless to say, it's doubtful this will be a comment that's played on the regular across the liberal, elitist networks like ABC or CNN in the months to come as proof she's outside the mainstream," Houck said.
"It's a completely cockamamie claim that, if the so-called fact-checkers like Politifact were honest brokers, they would have already penned an item with a pants-on-fire rating. The only thing that's "wholesome" about drag shows is how wholly sexual they are. Even those who support that kind of thing should be able to acknowledge that. What a grotesque commentary on the left that someone like her would want young children to attend drag shows," Houck added.
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Founder of Gays Against Groomers, Jaimee Michell, condemned Nixon's statements of drag shows being wholesome family events as "dangerous" lies.
"Angie Nixon’s comments are a lie, and a dangerous one," Michell told Fox News Digital.
"There is no shortage of video of drag performers in pasties, thongs, or barely-there costumes grinding, twerking, and simulating sex in front of children — including babies and toddlers — while those kids are encouraged to stuff dollar bills into their outfits. That is not 'people dressing up and singing.' That is adult sexual performance. Calling it 'wholesome entertainment' is gaslighting," she said.
Michell also said that the practice of drag was inherently sexual and built on "exaggerated, hyper-sexualized parody of women."
"Nixon taking her own children to these shows does not make it wholesome. It makes her judgment a warning," she added. "Florida passed a law to keep minors out of lewd live performances for a reason. This is not about banning adults from performing. It is about whether we are going to keep pretending that exposing kids to nearly nude adults collecting tips is just 'fun.' It isn’t.
"Nixon is wrong, the footage proves it, and Florida voters already know it," Michell said.
Nixon, a progressive activist and DSA member, defeated establishment-backed candidate and retired Air Force officer Alexander Vindman by more than 10 percentage points despite Vindman’s $16.3 million campaign war chest, compared with Nixon’s roughly $1 million.
Nixon will now face Trump-backed Sen. Ashley Moody, R-Fla., in November for the right to serve the remaining two years of Rubio’s Senate term.
