Attorney General Charity Clark gaslighted individuals challenging her failure to uphold federal laws regarding Title IX, parental rights, and immigration during a community forum held in Essex on Monday, June 2, to discuss The Impact of Federal Actions on Vermont.

Democrat state officials and legislators are touring Vermont with “town halls” billed as policy forums, when the true intent is to foment fear and anger toward the Trump Administration and distract from the lack of meaningful work they should be doing.

An hour of Q & A followed the panelists’ presentations on the potential impacts of federal funding cuts to Vermont’s state budget and economy, and Vermont’s strategy against the Trump Administration by enacting laws and filing lawsuits.

Most at the poorly attended event were supportive of elected officials’ actions in response to the Federal Administration and commiserated on their fear and hatred of Trump.

However, there were four challenges to the Attorney General’s failure to uphold Title IX, Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), and federal immigration law.

Clark, one of three state officials on the forum’s panel, explained that her job is to, “uphold the Constitution and to represent Vermont in court,” and to ensure compliance with federal laws. “I swore an oath to do that, and I try every day to remember that oath and bring that spirit to the work that I do.”

Marie Tiemann, President of SPEAK VT, an organization dedicated to education free from political and sexual persuasions, addressed the A.G.’s failure to uphold Title IX. Tiemann noted that Title IX uses the word “sex,” not “gender identity,” and pointed to the SCOTUS’ overturning of the Chevron case in 2024, limiting the power of federal agencies to reinterpret laws. “I wonder why Vermont does not want to follow along in protecting women. Do you women want to be in a locker room with a male?”

Clark responded to Tiemann’s situational question rather than the language of Title IX and case law, “There have been many instances in my life where I have felt threatened physically by a man, and it was never in a locker room.”

Tiemann countered that there have been many women and girls who have been traumatized, assaulted, and injured by allowing biological males to play in women’s and girls’ sports, and asked, “how many more women and young girls have to give up scholarships because they’re overpowered by a male body that is stronger than them?”

Clark responded, “How many scholarships in the state of Vermont do you think are going to trans women over women who were given the right gender assignment at birth? I mean, we’re talking about an extremely teensy tiny . . . I don’t think it happens in Vermont.”

Clark then engaged in a condescending lecture, claiming she wants to “protect everyone,” sanctimoniously declaring that trans people deserve our respect and love, and finished with, “I appreciate you are concerned about an issue that I don’t even see, and I have certainly not experienced in my life.”

Essex resident Phil Diesing asked whether the state would find it advisable to change the “Privacy” section under the Vermont Agency of Education’s  Continuing Best Practices for Schools Regarding Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Students policy because it keeps students’ social transitioning confidential from parents, which violates Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and Trump’s Executive Order that ends radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling.

Clark replied, “I don’t know that any of the three of us have anything to do with that.”

Treasurer Mike Pieciak, another forum panelist who serves on the board of Outright Vermont, a non-profit transgender youth activist group, offered an answer. He said that sometimes youth who think they might be part of the LGBTQ+ community are worried about what their parents will think and rationalized that the privacy policy is in place because, “sometimes, unfortunately, it’s not always a safe place at home.”

Children “worrying” about what their parents think fails the statutory standard of abuse or neglect under Vermont’s Title 33 Child Welfare Services, which governs due process for the Department of Children and Families.  I asked Clark, “Why aren’t you upholding due process according to Vermont state law and federal law in regard to the rights of parents to know what’s going on with their children?”

Clark responded, “what you said doesn’t sound like a legal analysis, it sounds like an opinion,” at which point Representative Lori Houghton, mic czar and Democrat majority leader who  mischaracterized a DeTrans Awareness Day event that was shut down by trans activists as an “attack on the transgender community,” cut off Clark’s response and dismissed me after I clarified, without a mic, that Clark was dismissing federal law.

The last challenger pressed Clark on her failure to uphold federal immigration law and Title IX, “Why do you think you have the right to not uphold immigration laws . . . Title IX laws?”

Clark responded that none of the panelists had authority over immigration and education, and referred the crowd to other state agencies, stating, “we certainly can’t enforce immigration laws. That’s a federal issue.”

While the Office of the Attorney General’s website states it’s mission to “enforce the law with equal right and justice to all,” Clark’s actions prove otherwise. During the panelist presentations, she proudly directed the audience to the Office of the Vermont Attorney General’s website page highlighting 17 lawsuits she has instigated or participated in with other states against the Trump Administration, many of which challenge federal laws on immigration and education.