Maine High School Pays Drag Performer $1,000 to Host Catered Workshop for LGBT Students

School officials called drag performer 'Priscilla Poppycocks' a 'role model for these kids'

Maine First Project co-founder and president Larry Lockman provides Maine citizens advice on how to win back local school board control. Courtesy of Maine First Project

Dominick Varney, known as Priscilla Poppycocks when performing in drag, paints his social media page with sexual innuendo. Yet Maine’s Bangor High School (BHS) paid him $1,000 to put on a workshop with a theme of his choice for LGBT students in May.

“I just know you are a role model for these kids, and we just want you to shine a light on them,” BHS English teacher Emilie Throckmorton wrote to Mr. Varney, who also works as assistant director of undergraduate academic advising and support services for the University of Maine (UMaine).

The comment was included in an email obtained through a public records request by parental rights advocate Shawn McBreairty. Mr. McBreairty is a director at the Maine First Project, a parental rights group.

Shawn McBreairty, the director of special projects for the Maine First Project. Courtesy of Shawn McBreairty

Ms. Throckmorton and Dana Carver-Bialer—the school’s coordinator of diversity, equity, including, and belonging—arranged to hire Mr. Varney, emails reveal. And on May 4, the school allowed students to skip class and enjoy a catered lunch while watching Mr. Varney’s presentation, documents show.

Yet, students who copy his behavior in school likely would face discipline for violating the school district’s rules against obscene talk and clothing that displays underwear. BHS is Bangor’s only high school, serving about 1,200 students, according to its website.

In 2016, the school’s juniors had a median grade-point average of 2.88, its website states. The Epoch Times reached out to BHS but received no response by publication time.

“We will invite about 20 kids to attend,” Ms. Throckmorton wrote in an email to Mr. Varney. “The topic/format is up to you.”

It’s not clear how many children attended the performance, whether they had parental permission to attend, or what was presented. But Mr. Varney’s website shows he has a routine called “Livin for Drag,” in which he describes how he became a drag performer.

The Epoch Times reached out to Mr. Varney by phone and email but received no comment by publication time.

Dragging Kids Into It

That infuriates Mr. McBreairty.

“$1,000 is not a bad gig for an hour and a half worth of talking,” he told The Epoch Times in an email. “BHS parents and area taxpayers should wonder how many grants Bangor School Department has applied for to enrich actual educational basics. Math, reading, science—those things that are supposed to be taught.”

He’s not aware of other instances in which Maine public schools paid a drag performer to speak to children, he said. But it’s likely not illegal, he added.

Currently, 70 percent of Maine high school students lack basic proficiency in English and 76 percent lack basic proficiency in math.

“It is unclear to me what a man dressing up as a woman has to do with educational and student success,'” Mr. McBreairty said.

He wonders how many parents know that BHS paid for and organized this event.

A drag performer at a pride month event at the old town hall in Fairfax, Va., on Jun. 3, 2023. Terri Wu/The Epoch Times

“This event was not made ‘public,’ as far as I am aware. I’m guessing that the vast majority of Bangor High School parents were unaware it was even happening,” he said.

Mr. McBreairty has advised parents concerned over the incident to take their children out of public schools or fight to reform them.

“These are not the schools from the 1980s and 1990s,” he said. “They are now full-blown indoctrination centers in what equates to educational terrorism,” he said.

It’s not the first time Maine public schools have supported the transgender agenda.

In the last school year, a Maine school counselor secretly gender-transitioned a 13-year-old girl without her mother’s knowledge, and Maine state curricula promoted transgenderism to kindergartners.

A Maine student has also told The Epoch Times that she faces bullying for being heterosexual. The minor said that her peers tried to coerce her into adopting a different sexual orientation while her school aggressively pushed LGBT ideology.

‘Joyful Events’

Whatever the feelings of students’ parents might be, Mr. Varney appears to enjoy significant academic and activist support. The money BHS used to pay him came from a grant from the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, a Maine LGBT activist group.

The foundation entrusts its grant recipients to vet speakers and vendors they hire with their grant award money, said Julita Bailey-Vasco, the group’s acting chief communications officer.

The funding was used to support a five-part event series in the 2022-23 school year “to bring LGBTQIA+ students through issues of empowerment so they can advocate for themselves,” Ms. Bailey-Vasco told The Epoch Times.

The group’s grant-giving guidelines prioritize “joyful events,” “building relationships and solidarity with other organizations and/or communities of youth,” “space for students to learn self-agency,” and “cross-identity (racial, cultural, ethnic, gender, sexual orientation, etc.) dialogues.”

As part of his work for the taxpayer-funded UMaine, Mr. Varney’s biographical page on the university website links to his personal website. That site advertises his acting roles, performance resume, and contact information.

UMaine’s guidelines state that it’s “unacceptable” for university employees to use university resources “for conducting an outside business or private employment, or other similar activities conducted for private financial gain.”

The Epoch Times reached out to UMaine’s press department by phone and email but received no comment by publication time.