Winsome Sears spars with Bill Maher over drag debate: 'Bill, you gotta read more.'

Heather Hunter

April 01, 04:01 PM April 01, 04:01 PM

Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears (R-VA) told HBO host Bill Maher that he needed to "read more" on the debate over drag queen story hours and drag performances for children.

"Bill, you gotta read more," Sears told Maher in a panel discussion Friday night on his show Real Time with Bill Maher.

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Maher's panel discussion with Sears and Tablet magazine columnist James Kirchick explored how schools were insisting "there is no such thing as sex," and it's become a "social contagion" and "trendy" to push the transgender issue.

Sears then explained her stance on the pressure of the transgender issue being put on children in schools and specifically pointed to drag queen story hours and live drag performances with minors in the audience.

"I’m a parent. I’m a parent all day. I get to decide what happens in my child’s life," Sears said. "Not you. Not you. Not the government. Not anybody. I don’t co-parent. I had this child. I’m responsible for this child. Anything happens to Little Johnny, you’re calling me as you should."

The audience applauds Sears.

"If I don’t want my child given lap dances at school by a drag queen, I don’t want it done. That’s happening," she said.

Kirchick interjected, "But do you think the state should have a right to interfere?"

"I'm talking about as a parent. Forget the state. I'm talking about as a parent, this is what happens to my child," she said.

"I'm not sure about lap dances," Maher scoffed.

"It's happening. Did you see it?" she asked the HBO host.

"There is drag queen story hour. There are definitely drag queens reading to children," Maher interrupted.

"There are drag queens that are doing pole dances," she said.

"In school?" Maher asked Sears.

"Bill, you gotta read more," Sears responded.

"I guess I do," Maher laughed.

Maher added, "I'm sure anything happens somewhere, but this is not a common thing. ... I've seen where a child was taken to a pub — which is not right either. ... but I've never seen it happen in a school."

"First of all, so few schools have poles," he quipped.

"They take them to libraries," she said.

"These things are happening in the libraries? Oh my God," Maher laughed.

Sears told Maher he needed "to get out more."

"Well, I don't have kids so I don't hear about this. No one comes home and says, 'Daddy, I had a great lap dance.' It's not happening,'" Maher said.

There has been a push across several states to ban adult drag performances with underage attendees.

A judge blocked a Tennessee ban on drag queen performances with minors in the audience on Friday.

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R-AK) signed into law a bill restricting adult-oriented performances with minors in February, and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) has been stripping venues of their liquor licenses for holding drag performances with minors in the audience.

WATCH: Kirk Cameron blasts libraries that deny faith-based book yet embrace drag queens

Heather Hamilton

December 08, 11:10 AM December 08, 11:11 AM

Actor and film producer Kirk Cameron blasted public libraries for not allowing him to read his new faith-based children’s book while they host drag queen story hours.

"I'm thinking, 'Wow, if we're so committed to diversity, why am I being excluded?'" Cameron told WHD News host Tucker Carlson on Wednesday. “Why can't I use your facility to read my book? You're a library.'"

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Cameron said one of the “most outrageous denials” came from a library in Alameda County, California, which rejected his request to read his book because it included biblical values.

The Growing Pains star’s new book, As You Grow, which was released last week, follows the journey of a tree’s growth. Cameron noted that it details "biblical wisdom through the seasons of life to children and the value of growing the fruit of the Spirit, like love, joy, kindness, patience, gentleness, self-control.”

“My understanding of history is that the family and the church are two great pillars of Western civilization,” Cameron said. “Those two things need to be removed and taken out of the way in order to fundamentally change the power structure and the moral value code of the nation.”

Cameron called on conservative parents and grandparents to follow his example and request to read their favorite children’s story in libraries hosting drag queen story hours “to turn that denial into a revival.”

“Let’s invest in our children and teach them the values we want them to learn,” he said.