The museum cited security issues among its key concerns, plus a desire not to host political speakers, but in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, the leaders of the Tikvah Fund, the group organizing the conference, accused the museum of having a political litmus test. The Museum of Jewish Heritage had been set to host the annual gathering of conservative thinkers, but backed out earlier this spring. The Jewish Leadership Conference has already lost one venue in New York City after adding DeSantis to its list of speakers. He called DeSantis an “outspoken opponent of LGBTQ equality who is trying to foist his agenda on LGBTQ families, and it’s extremely hurtful and distressing.”ĭeSantis campaign spokesman Dave Abrams did not respond directly to that criticism, but said the governor “will always stand up for what is right and will not be deterred by the radical Left.”ĭeSantis, who is widely believed to be weighing a bid for the White House in 2024, inflamed ire among LGBTQ groups when in March he signed into law a bill that forbids Florida schools from teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity to public school students from kindergarten through the third grade.Īt the time of the bill signing, DeSantis said schools were a place for “an education, not an indoctrination.”
