A heated debate over public schools in the South Carolina House of Representatives took a dramatic turn this week when a Democratic lawmaker referred to the parental advocacy group Moms for Liberty as a “terrorist group” during remarks on the House floor.
The comment came from Gilda Cobb-Hunter, a longtime Democratic representative from Orangeburg, during a broader debate about the state’s public school system and education policy. “We as a state are running headfirst, headlong, into a public school crisis,” Cobb-Hunter said during her floor speech, criticizing the direction of education policy in South Carolina.
As she urged lawmakers to listen to teachers and parents in struggling public schools, Cobb-Hunter mocked references to parental activist groups supporting school choice.
“I heard a reference up here about some PTA or some — Moms for Liberty? Please,” she said. “They are a terrorist group.” The remark immediately prompted a point of order from another lawmaker calling for decorum on the House floor.
But Cobb-Hunter did not walk back the comment when given the opportunity to respond.
“Mr. Speaker, I would suggest to you that what I just said has been widely used in publications, it has been widely used in a whole lot of arenas,” Cobb-Hunter said in response. “Quite frankly, I would caution us to be very careful using the whole decorum language when some of us get up here and do some things that quite frankly I think beg the question of do we even know what decorum means.”
The exchange quickly drew attention because of the growing national profile of Moms for Liberty, a grassroots organization founded in 2021 that advocates for parental rights in education. The group, which now claims hundreds of local chapters across the United States, rose to prominence during debates over COVID-era school closures, mask mandates, and curriculum issues such as gender ideology and race-related instruction in classrooms.
Supporters describe the organization as a parents’ rights movement focused on increasing transparency in schools and expanding educational choice.
Critics on the left have frequently accused the group of promoting book bans or targeting LGBTQ-related materials in school libraries. Some left-wing activists and media outlets have gone as far as to label the organization as extremist, a characterization its leaders strongly reject.
Moms for Liberty activists have been especially active in school board elections and education policy fights in states across the country, often supporting school choice measures and policies aimed at limiting certain curriculum topics.
The group has also drawn sharp criticism from Democrats and teachers’ unions who argue its activism has intensified political battles over education.
Cobb-Hunter’s remarks came during debate over legislation tied to school choice and education funding, issues that have become increasingly contentious in South Carolina as Republican lawmakers push for policies that would expand alternatives to traditional public schools.
The exchange is likely to further inflame the ongoing political fight over education policy in the state, where debates over school choice, curriculum, and parental rights have increasingly divided lawmakers along partisan lines.
The Daily Wire reached out to Cobb-Hunter’s office to ask whether she stands by the characterization of Moms for Liberty as a “terrorist group,” but did not receive a response by publication time.
