Florida Lawmaker Trying To Force Students To Watch Conservative Campaign Fraud Felon’s Film

A state lawmaker is pushing a bill that would require every student in Florida to watch a “patriotic” film by admitted conservative campaign finance fraud felon Dinesh D’Souza.

Florida state Senator Alan Hays is trying to force every student in the Sunshine State to sit and watch a 105 minute right wing propaganda film that is currently in theaters. The filmmaker, Dinesh D’Souza, recently admitted to campaign finance fraud — a felony — and is awaiting sentencing, which could land him in prison for up to 16 months.

The film, “America: Imagine A World Without Her,” is a conservative Tea Party attempt to erase from history five of America’s greatest wrongs. The image, above, is a screenshot from the trailer, which “erases” America’s icons, like the Statue of Liberty and Mount Rushmore, to get the reader to think what the world would be like without the United States.

The Hollywood Reporter writes that the “plan is sure to draw fire from liberals not only because D’Souza is a prominent conservative but because he is also behind the movie, 2016: Obama’s America, which is a profoundly negative take on Democratic U.S. president Barack Obama.”

“I saw the movie and walked out of the theater and said, ‘Wow, our students need to see this.’ And it’s my plan to show it to my colleagues in the legislature, too, before they’re asked to vote on the bill,” Hays said. 

The Hollywood Reports adds that “the bill could pass, given that Republicans hold a substantial majority in Florida’s Senate and House of Representatives, and Gov. Rick Scott is also a Republican.”

“I’ve looked at history books and talked to history teachers and the message the students are getting is very different from what is in the movie,” Hays said. “It’s dishonest and insulting. The students need to see the truth without political favoritism.”

Media Matters calls D’Souza’s film “racially charged agitprop.”

Salon’s Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig, in a review of the film, labeled it a “laughable embarrassment,” and “crazy.” And that’s just for starters. 

“The lies D’Souza must disabuse us of,” Bruenig writes, “in order: First, that the genocide of Native Americans happened in relation to the conquest of their land; second, that African slave labor was exploited to build the American economy; third, that Mexican territories were conquered to form the U.S. Southwest; fourth, that U.S. wars abroad have involved imperial motives; fifth, that capitalism is bad. He goes to the trouble of listing these myths in text on what appears to be a massive parchment-esqe Powerpoint slide, and the structure of the film is a methodical treatment of each in turn.”

Senator Hays, by the way, is 68, a dentist by profession, a Baptist, and has served the good people of Florida since 2004, first as a member of the Florida House.

His website boasts that “Senator Hays has received the Faith and Family Award from the Christian Coalition every year he has served in the legislature. That same organization recognized then-Rep. Hays in 2008 as an Outstanding Protector of Academic Freedom.”

Endorsed by the NRA, Sen. Hays is an anti-education, pro-business Republican who has voted for “open-carry” of guns, voted against in-state tuition for undocumented immigrants, voted to make obtaining an abortion even more difficult, and voted for drug testing of those on welfare.

 

This post has been updated to indicate the correct nature of Mr. D’Souza’s felony.
Image via YouTube