A conservative Florida school board candidate made national headlines this week after publicly claiming that doctors who help treat transgender children should be lynched.
Alisabeth Janai Lancaster, who is running for a seat on the Santa Rosa County School Board, made the comments at a policy forum Monday for the county’s conservative candidates, according to The Pensacola News Journal.
“These doctors who agree to mutilate these children and prescribe hormone blockers to these children, in my opinion, they should be hanging from the nearest tree,” Lancaster said to applause from the room.
Lancaster did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.
The local candidate’s comments sparked an uproar outside Florida this week after avideo shared on social media by Twitter user Alejandra Caraballo has gone viral.
A different video of Lancaster’s speech was first shared by the Gulf Coast Patriots, who hosted Monday’s “Closing Arguments” forum near Pensacola, the News Journal reported, but the account deleted the clip following media attention.
Candidates at Monday’s event were given five minutes to introduce themselves and discuss their positions, according to the newspaper. During her speech, Lancaster emphasized her Christian values and said she would like to see prayer restored to moments of silence.
“Our country was founded on Judeo-Christian values and beliefs which I believe should be respected and encouraged,” the self-identified grandmother said.
Lancaster cited the “welfare and protection” of students as his main reason for running and said children shouldn’t be “burdened with a waking agenda”. She also denounced critical race theory.
Lancaster’s comments drew condemnation from opponent Carol Boston.
“A statement advocating a violent act such as lynching is heinous and alarming,” Boston told the News Journal. “It’s unAmerican to call for the murder of Americans who disagree with us.”
Although the school board races are nonpartisan, the Santa Rosa County Republican Party previously endorsed Lancaster as the preferred candidate in the race, the newspaper reported. A party representative did not immediately respond to Insider’s inquiry about whether the organization would continue to support Lancaster following his violent comments.
