Middletown Dad, Mom Praise District's Transgender Policy On Fox News

MIDDLETOWN, NJ — Two Middletown parents have now been interviewed on Fox News for their thoughts on Middletown's transgender student policy, which has been met with a cease-and-desist lawsuit from Gov. Phil Murphy and his Attorney General Matt Platkin.

And both Brian Mason and Ann Marie Lusquinos praised the controversial policy.

"They want to keep parents in the dark when it comes to if a child decides they're going to change their name and gender," said Mason, a father of seven, in his June 30 interview with Fox. "So our Board of Education rightfully stepped and said no, we're going to go against the governor and we're going to give parents the right to know what's going on. The governor and Attorney General decided it's going to sue its own taxpayers and citizens, which is obviously ridiculous."

In June, school districts in Middletown, Marlboro and Manalapan were all sued by the state of New Jersey for passing policies that require parents be notified if a child seeks to go by a new name, gender pronoun, use a different bathroom or play on a different sports team.

Mason and Lusquinos, a Middletown mother of two, were also interviewed in this additional Fox story on the topic.

"I get a phone call if my kid is absent. I have to sign permission slips for everything, whether it be medicine or whether it be field trips or a syllabus," said Lusquinos. "And for the attorney general to turn around and say that we can be involved in all that but not involved if our child decides to go by a different gender or a different name? That it’s okay to keep from us?"

And, as previously reported, new acting Middletown school superintendent Jessica Alfone released a strongly worded statement saying she too backs the BOE's transgender student policy.

The Middletown school district has agreed not to implement the controversial policy until August 15. On that date, a Superior Court hearing will be heard, with lawyers from both the Middletown school district and the Attorney General arguing their sides.

So the entire matter has been tabled until Aug. 15.

The Attorney General has said that "outing" kids to their parents makes them unsafe.

But Mason argued that is comparable to having teachers not send home a bad report card because a child will get "in trouble."

"It's not about outing kids because they're already telling their friends and teachers about it. So the parents are going to find out anyway," he said. "During the COVID lockdowns, these are the same people who argued they should stay home and learn remotely ... Basically, they're saying they should not send a bad report card home. It's not a legitimate reason to keep parents in the dark. They really just want to separate parents and children further and further."

Mason is the same father who briefly ran for Middletown school board in 2021, before he dropped out of the race and threw his support behind Kate Farley, who voted for the transgender policy.

On June 25, New Jersey mom Nikki Stouffer, founder of the New Jersey Project, also spoke to Fox News, and she similarly backed the transgender policy. Stouffer does not live in Middletown.

"Why in the world would the Attorney General and Murphy think it would be appropriate to hide any sort of information from parents?" asked Stouffer in that June 25 interview. "That we are monsters who would only hurt our kids?"

How did Mason get on Fox? He said he was contacted by a producer with Fox News Digital and asked if he would do an on-air interview; that producer has relatives in Middletown and has been following the transgender story that Patch was the first to report on. Mason is affiliated with the New Jersey Project and he thinks that group recommended his name to the Fox producer.

The New Jersey Project is a growing grassroots organization of NJ parents who are angry that Gov. Murphy kept schools closed for so long during the pandemic, required children to wear masks, dislike the Dept. of Education's new sex education curriculum and are now fighting the governor on the transgender issue. Stouffer said her group is responsible for getting 151 people elected to to 85 school boards across the state in the past two years to enact their policies.

NJ Sues Middletown, 2 Other Districts For Transgender Student Policies (June 22)