When she was fighting to get “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation” banned from a local high school library last spring, Jennifer Pippin, a Florida Moms for Liberty chapter head, claimed that her objection was because the award-winning graphic novel was "sexually explicit" and "not a true adaptation of the Holocaust." It’s not that she didn’t want Anne Frank taught, she claimed. It was just that version wasn’t the right version, never mind that it was authorized by the Anne Frank Fonds, a foundation started by Otto Frank that controls the diary’s copyright. Surely, your local Moms for Liberty chapter leader is more qualified to decide what gets taught about the Holocaust than the Anne Frank Fonds.
There might be something else going on, though. Media Matters reports that in September, Pippin appeared on TruNews, a grossly antisemitic platform. Pippin isn’t the first Mom for Liberty to embrace this type of thing. Last summer, a Moms for Liberty chapter had to apologize for approvingly quoting Adolf Hitler in its newsletter. At some point, the “it’s just one chapter/chapter head” excuse cannot be allowed to stand, but Moms for Liberty remains a favorite of top Republicans.
On TruNews, Pippin was gushingly interviewed by Rick Wiles, the outlet’s head, who pledged, “I will do everything I can to help you. I will help raise money. I will help organize. I will help you get a lawsuit against the school board” during a discussion of removing “inappropriate” materials from schools.
The same Rick Wiles who interviewed Pippin is the one who has said things like, “That’s the way the Jews work. They are deceivers, they plot, they lie, they do whatever they have to do to accomplish their political agenda,” and “the American people are being oppressed by Jewish tyrants.”
Those aren’t isolated statements, and it’s not just Wiles. Media Matters found TruNews headlines (which are vile hate I will not link directly) including, “Jew Coup: Seditious Jews Orchestrating Trump Impeachment Lynching,” and “TruNews looks at Jewish contribution to legalized abortion … We Delve Deeper Into The Origins Of Abortion And How It Has Become America’s Jewish Holocaust.”
This is the company Pippin keeps as part of her effort to ban books, including “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation,” from schools lest children be exposed to anything inappropriate. You know, inappropriate like where—gasp!—Anne Frank suggests to a female friend that they show each other their breasts. The only parts of Frank’s story kids should be exposed to, I guess, are the parts directly about Nazis. Understanding that she was a kid with a life and interests and fully developed humanity should be verboten.
Then again, Pippin is apparently comfortable talking to people who believe all Jewish life is to be feared and loathed, so why would we expect that the essential humanity of a Jewish girl in the 1930s and 40s would be important to her? She doesn’t understand the lessons of the Holocaust, yet she is trying to police what information about it is available in high schools. And she’s happy to enlist the platforms and support of hardcore antisemites to promote her crusade.
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