This is a guest opinion column

Spend two seconds listening to Alabama Public Library Service Chairman John Wahl, and you’d think porn is rampant in the children’s section of your library.

Spend two minutes browsing in the children’s section, and you would see what Alabamaians without political motives see: zero porn or sexually explicit material in the children’s sections. Teenagers, as they are experiencing puberty and developing into adults, tackling jobs and new relationships, require more advanced reading material that tackles their experiences at an age-appropriate level.

John Wahl is gaslighting Alabamians about public libraries and it’s time for him to be held accountable for his actions.

Wahl took over as Chairman of the Alabama Public Library Service Board this year without relinquishing his role as chair of the Alabama GOP, a direct conflict of interests as public libraries are intended to be apolitical receptacles for diverse worldviews and lived experiences- yes, even in the children’s and teen’s sections. His extremist politics and unabashed admiration for authoritarian government have spilled over into his role as APLS board chair, and he is intent on obfuscating the legal definition of “sexually explicit” in order to censor our public library collections.

His political ambitions have exposed themselves time and time again, such as when he facilitated the exit of longtime respected APLS board member Virginia Doyle, who questioned the motivations behind the push for book banning led by extremist groups Moms For Liberty, Eagle Forum and Clean Up Alabama. This in turn led to the appointment of extremist anti-library activist Amy Dozier Minton, and then two others, creating a stacked board intent on attacking Alabama libraries and holding state funding hostage.

The goal, he said in an interview with radio host Jeff Poor this year, is to make sure libraries are “comfortable” for those groups – ignoring the comfort of the vast majority of Alabamians who despise censorship, regardless of party affiliation. Being uncomfortable while reading a book is often a byproduct of learning – one cannot be comfortable reading about Alabama’s horrific history of racism, anti-trans bigotry, bullying, human trafficking and rape. After all, the Bible is a study in afflicting the comfortable, according to the New Testament book of James 1 verses 9-11.

Under his leadership, Fairhope Public Library found its state funding stripped because they refused to cower to the bullying from Moms For Liberty members over an award-winning book about human trafficking. American teenagers are the most vulnerable to sex and labor trafficking in our nation and it is important that they have this information, but Wahl wants to prevent them from reading these stories in their appropriate teen and young adult sections.

However, Fairhope community members and politicians even within Wahl’s own party condemned his actions and supported the librarians’ decision. Within days, the full amount of state funding had been raised by library supporters who do not want to see these extremists bully and defund yet another library as part of the national strategy outlined in Project 2025 (of which Moms for Liberty is an official coalition partner).

Yet Wahl has only doubled down, and in direct violation of the new APLS code that he himself championed, continues to abuse his authority to force libraries into compliance to his personal beliefs and interpretations- a conveniently ever-moving goalpost- rather than allowing local boards and librarians to make those decisions with the Constitutional rights of all Alabamaians in mind.

We can all agree we want to protect our children from inappropriate and sexually explicit material. However the legal definitions Wahl has cited to the press do not and were never meant to apply to these challenged library books, but to actual pornography and child sexual abuse content. Learning about abuse, sex education, sexual orientation and other such subjects are not illegal for either children or parents by any state or federal code – but Wahl is attempting to make it so.

It’s time we stand up to Wahl and demand his resignation. He is no friend to the public library or librarians.

Leadership of Read Freely: Angie Hayden, Sam Olson, Jessica Hayes, Krysti Shallenberger, and Amber Frey.