Gays Against Groomers Official Resigns Over DeSantis Ad

An official with the conservative group Gays Against Groomers (GAG) is stepping down from his board position over revelations that the founder of the group has ties to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

David Leatherwood announced his resignation from the board and his withdrawal from the organization on Wednesday, saying that he left on "good terms" and that he would "always" support the group's mission. GAG, which describes itself as an "organization of gay people who oppose the recent trend of indoctrinating, sexualizing and medicalizing children under the guise of 'LGBTQIA+,'" has been accused by critics of peddling homophobia and transphobia.

Leatherwood's departure comes three days after transgender Republican Caitlyn Jenner informed him over Twitter that GAG's founder, Jaimee Michell, is "on payroll for De[S]antis and so vitriolicly anti-[T]rump." When Jenner confronted Leatherwood on the social media platform, suggesting that he omitted "highly relevant" information, Leatherwood admitted that his resignation was "directly related to [GAG] Founder's outspoken support for DeSantis, in light of his recent ad that is extremely anti-gay."

DeSantis released a new presidential campaign ad over the weekend, marking the end of Pride Month by attacking former President Donald Trump for his connections to the LGBTQ+ community, including his relationship with Jenner. The ad, posted by the DeSantis War Room Twitter account, sparked fierce criticism from LGBTQ+ conservatives, including the Log Cabin Republicans and Trump's former acting director of national intelligence and first openly gay Cabinet member, Richard Grenell, who slammed the governor's ad as homophobic.

On Sunday, Leatherwood said there was a "MAJOR difference between regular gay people who love America and Alphabet extremists who push radical woke ideology."

"Clearly, Ron DeSantis doesn't understand the difference," Leatherwood tweeted. "Thank god Trump does."

In response to Leatherwood's remarks, Jenner called for Michell to step down, arguing that the group could continue its "great work" by putting in a new leader or by uniting with a "well organized extremely effective" organization like Log Cabin Republicans. A spokesperson for Jenner told Newsweek that Leatherwood's resignation appears to be the result of the pressure Jenner and others put on GAG's team.

GAG and Michell responded to Jenner's claims by blasting the former Olympian in a series of tweets, calling her "the biggest hypocrite and fraud in this movement" and highlighting donations she made in the past to transgender organizations.

"I'm not going anywhere, despite you kindly suggesting I step down and hand the organization I started and grew into a massive success in under a year over to @LogCabinGOP lmao 💀 Oh, and Gays Against Groomers is not going anywhere either. Ever. Not until this agenda is stopped," Michell tweeted at Jenner. "You are a fraud and the catalyst for the explosion of trans identifying youth and the erasure of women. Us women and gays do not want you representing us, and we definitely do not need you."

DeSantis has been one of the nation's leading proponents of cracking down on LGBTQ+ issues.

Over the last two years, he has enacted a ban on transgender athletes, signed the controversial "Don't Say Gay" bill into law and issued restrictions on gender-affirming care, bathroom usage and pronoun choice in schools. The "Don't Say Gay" bill, which prohibits classroom discussion of LGBTQ+ topics, also sparked a public feud with Disney, which opposed the legislation.

DeSantis defended the ad despite the backlash, telling conservative commentator Tomi Lahren on Wednesday that it was "totally fair game."

"Identifying Donald Trump as really being a pioneer in injecting gender ideology into the mainstream, where he was having men compete against women in his beauty pageants—I think that's totally fair game, because he's now campaigning saying the opposite," DeSantis said.