Two weeks ago, Bourne resident Kari MacRae, filed a civil rights lawsuit against the town of Hanover for firing her.
At a public meeting in September, the Bourne School Committee read out an email from a former student complaining about MacRae’s posts and concerns that the high school teacher had more than 20,000 TikTok followers.
A week after the national organization Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit against Hanover on MacRae’s behalf, former Bourne school board member Anne-Marie Siroonian spearheaded a recall petition against MacRae and declared if the petition was successful she would run for MacRae’s seat.
Siroonian, who serves on the Bourne Charter Review committee, did not return requests by The Epoch Times for comments about her recall petition.
The petition followed a one-hour school board discussion on Sept. 22 focused mostly on criticism of MacRae by school district officials and members of the community.
MacRae—who has four adult children, including an adopted daughter who is Dominican and bisexual—was called transphobic, immoral, hateful, a bigot, a bully, accused of degrading LGBTQ+ students, and was repeatedly called upon to resign.
She told The Epoch Times that she was very saddened by the barrage of criticism, but also very uplifted by a swell of support from the community that followed.
“People started calling me and saying thank you so much for standing strong,” MacRae said.
Macrae said she would not resign from the committee.
“So many people are getting really upset right now as more and more things are coming to the forefront about what’s going on in our schools, and what’s going in the workplace, as far as infringing on other people’s rights for a teeny-tiny percentage of people who are just trying to figure themselves out.”
The controversy stems from a TikTok video and seven memes posted by MacRae back in May.
The 59-second video starts out with MacRae carrying her grandson piggyback to the polls to cast a vote for herself in the town school board race.
Here’s MacRae’s entire statement in the TikTok video:
“The reason why I ran for school board and the reason why I am taking on this responsibility is to ensure that students, at least in our town, are not being taught critical race theory; that they’re not being taught that the country was built on racism; so they’re not being taught that they can choose whether or not they want to be a boy or a girl; it’s one thing to include and it’s one thing to be inclusive and it’s one thing to educate everybody about everything; it’s a completely another thing to push your agenda, and with me on the school board that won’t happen in our town.”
One of the memes posted by MacRae ridiculed Biden-appointed U.S. Assistant Secretary of Health Rachel Levine, an open transgender, with the caption “'I’m an expert on mental health and food disorders’... says the obese man who thinks he’s a woman.”
Another meme she posted depicted a large, muscular, tattooed, bearded man wearing a sports bra with the caption, “Hi my name is Meagan, I’m here for the girls’ track meet.” Below was a second caption, “Equality doesn’t always mean equity.”
A third meme posted by MacRae read: “I feel bad for parents nowadays. You have to be able to explain the birds and the bees, the bees and the bees, the birds and the birds, the birds that used to be bees, the bees that used to be birds, the birds that look like bees, plus bees that look like birds but still got a stinger!!!”
MacRae also posted a meme critical of George Floyd being viewed as a martyr, illegal immigration, and a short video against the use of preferred pronouns.
She did not create the memes, but shared them on her Facebook page.
MacRae told The Epoch Times that she stood behind her video and the posts.
“If you have a child that is struggling, or questioning their identity, we need to support those kids.
“But we definitely do not need to be applying this as the norm to the whole population of the schools,” MacRae said, “It’s a very dangerous thing.”
Bourne resident and real estate investor Michael Fraser told The Epoch Times he considers MacRae a hero.
“She represents the silent majority,” Fraser said, “but this is what they do to anyone who doesn’t agree with them, they'll try to take them out by Brown Shirting them.”
Francis Cichowski, of Pocasset, who was escorted out of the Sept. 22 meeting by police for refusing to stop speaking after his 3-minute limit expired, argued that the criticism of MacRae was unwarranted.
Cichowski said MacRae was elected by voters because of her views and that groups like the Bourne Education Association and the Bourne Public School’s Administration Team were “nothing more than lobbyists” with no voting rights.
The town of Hanover has until Dec. 23 to answer MacRae’s lawsuit, which charges the town with violating her First Amendment rights to free speech.
The lawsuit argues that the controversy over her social media posts was restricted to her role on the Bourne School Committee and that there were never any concerns raised by Hanover parents or students over her role as a high school teacher there.
For her recall petition, Saroonian has to garner 1,484 signatures of Bourne registered voters to oust MacRae.
