Jack Ciattarelli, the Republican nominee for New Jersey governor, is shown on video at a campaign stop last month saying is against having kindergartners learn about “gender ID and sexual orientation” and sixth-graders about “sodomy” and that he’d “roll back” new LGBTQ curriculum requirements in the state’s schools.
The remarks — first published Tuesday by Gothamist/WNYC — were quickly denounced by gay-rights advocates and supporters of Gov. Phil Murphy, the Democratic incumbent Ciattarelli is trying to unseat in the Nov. 2 election.
Ciattarelli, a former member of the state Assembly, made the comments during an appearance at a Flemington gun range June 26, telling the crowd he feels “lucky” his children are in their 20s and he doesn’t “have to be dealing with what you’re dealing with right now.”
“You won’t have to deal with it when I’m governor (because) we’re not teaching gender ID and sexual orientation to kindergarteners,” he added. “We’re not teaching sodomy in sixth grade. And we’re going to roll back the LGBTQ curriculum. It goes too far.”
Ciattarelli’s remarks come a few months after the Democratic-controlled New Jersey Legislature passed a bill (A4454) that Murphy signed into law in March requiring all schools in the state beginning in the fall to include instruction in kindergarten through eighth grade on “diversity and inclusion in an appropriate place,” including gender and sexual orientation.
That came after another law (S1569), signed by Murphy in 2019, requiring school districts, with the approval of their local boards of education, to include instruction that accurately portrays “political, economic, and social contributions of persons with disabilities and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.”
The state last year also updated school standards for health and physical education to say students should be able to “define vaginal, oral, and anal sex” by eighth grade, though that is not specifically part of the LGBTQ curricula.
Many Republican lawmakers and Christian advocates have opposed those changes, saying it’s wrong for schools to teach explicit sexual content to young children and that should be up to parents.
But advocates especially took issue with Ciattarelli’s use of the word “sodomy,” which can describe sexual acts practiced by people of various sexual orientations, though it is often used derisively against homosexuals, and laws against sodomy have historically been used to prosecute people for homosexuality.
Steven Goldstein, founder of Garden State Equality, New Jersey’s leading gay-rights group, said by “equating LGBTQ relationships with ‘sodomy,’” Ciattarelli is “now Frankenstein’s clone of Marjorie Taylor Greene for New Jersey” — a reference to the Republican Georgia congresswoman who often draws criticism for far-right comments.
“He is a fringe crackpot who operates in a galaxy far, far away from human decency,” Goldstein said in a statement, adding that Ciattarelli is the “most dangerous gubernatorial nominee of either party in my lifetime.”
Ciattatrelli told WNYC his use of the word had “absolutely nothing to do with someone’s sexual orientation, and the inference that it does is purposefully misleading.”
“Read my statement,” he added. “It has to do with mature content being taught to young children. That is a parent’s job, not the school district’s.”
Christian Fuscarino, executive director of Garden State Equality, called Ciattarelli’s comments “offensive,” “uninformed” and “out-of-touch with New Jersey family values — love, acceptance, and compassion.”
“It’s revolting to hear a gubernatorial nominee of a major political party regurgitate the same, tired talking points we have heard for decades from anti-LGBTQ leaders and discredited shock-jock personalities,” Fuscarino told NJ Advance Media on Tuesday night.
”Teaching LGBTQ inclusive lessons reduces the rates of bullying in schools and can save lives,” he added. “At a time when suicide and bullying rates among LGBTQ youth are still at alarming levels, we deserve elected leaders who will prioritize inclusion, not pander to far-right ideologues.”
Lauren Albrecht, chair of the New Jersey Democratic State Committee’s LGBTQ Caucus, called Ciattarelli’s comments at last month’s event “hateful and divisive.”
“Assemblyman Ciattarelli’s ignorance of the LGBTQ curriculum and his willingness to diminish and demonize the LGBTQ community is exactly why this curriculum is so important — we still have a long way to go when the Republican Party nominates a bigot for governor whose views are this far out of step with New Jersey,” Albrecht added.
Ciattarelli said in a statement Tuesday he hears from “parents across the state — Democrats, Republicans, and Independents — who are angry that extremists like Governor Murphy are infringing on their right as parents to educate their children about life’s most personal and intimate topics — and then trying to shame them when they dare speak up.”
“All schools should be promoting diversity, inclusivity, tolerance, and respect for others, but that doesn’t mean pushing explicit subjects in elementary school classrooms,” he added.
Ciattarelli said “love is love, and who you love is no business of your Governor.”
“And resources should be made available to students who want to understand themselves as they grow into adults,” he added. “We should not, however, encourage the abdication of parenting or expect teachers to replace parents. Let me be clear, as Governor, nothing we do or teach in our public schools will ever supplant the role and responsibility of parents.”
During the Flemington event, Ciattarelli also attacked Murphy and progressives for “dividing” residents, while describing the Republican Party as the “party of Lincoln” and the “big-tent party.”
He then complained about a sign he recently saw at a bank that advertised a “new LGBTQ bank card.”
“I’m sitting there saying, ‘The more we cater to each special interest, the more you remind us about how different we all are from each other,’” Ciattarelli said.
Ciattarelli has long been considered a moderate Republican. He once called former President Donald Trump a “charlatan” and last month defeated two Trump-embracing challengers in the GOP primary to win the party’s nomination to run against Murphy, a self-avowed progressive Democrat.
His record on LGBTQ issues is mixed. When he was in the Assembly, Ciattarelli voted against legalizing same-sex marriage in New Jersey and voted for a ban on gay-conversion therapy in the state.
Murphy, meanwhile, has the support of a coalition of LGBTQ leaders in New Jersey who endorsed him for re-election in February, saying they know he will “continue to fight for full equality for all our residents.”
Ciattarelli’s comments came weeks after he already won the Republican nomination and turned his attention to the general election in increasingly Democratic-leaning New Jersey. Recent polls show Murphy with a double-digit lead over Ciattarelli in a state Trump lost decisively in both 2016 and 2020.
But political experts say Ciattarelli, who also says he supported some of Trump’s policies, has the challenge of trying to appeal to both the GOP’s base and independent voters as he faces an uphill battle against Murphy.
So far, the Murphy vs. Ciattarelli race has been colored by the campaigns attacking each other as being extreme members of their respective parties.
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Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @johnsb01.
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