Dr. Justin Spiehs confronts journalist Rachel Mipro at trans event
LAWRENCE – A ‘Gender Marker and Name Change Clinic’ was held on Wednesday, May 17, at the Lawrence Public Library in partnership with Kansas Legal Services. This was held as an “emergency informational session” on getting gender marker paperwork submitted prior to Senate Bill 180, also known as the ‘Women’s Bill of Rights,’ providing a legal definition of what a woman is, going into effect in July of this year.
Dr. Justin Spiehs, a man known around the liberal town of Lawrence, Kansas for protesting mask mandates on children and running as a Republican for Douglas County Commissioner District One, showed up to protest the event with a couple of friends. It was at this event he ran into journalist for the Kansas Reflector Rachel Mipro, who was covering the event. It was then that Dr. Spiehs questioned her regarding a word that was used to describe his and another friend’s sign in a previous Kansas Reflector article that Mipro had covered.
Dr. Spiehs was confronting Mipro on an article from May 5 that featured a picture of him being blocked by trans activists. The picture, taken by Kansas Reflector editor Sherman Smith, was captioned, “Protestors block the view of two people with hateful signs during rally in support of transgender rights on May 5, 2023, at the Statehouse in Topeka.”
Dr. Spiehs was holding a sign that said, “If you’re born with a dick then you’re not a chick.” His friend, Sue Herynk, held a sign that said, “Make ‘normal’ great again.”
In a video uploaded to Dr. Spiehs’ YouTube channel, he questions Mipro on what it was she found “hateful” about the signs. Mipro did respond, but her words are hard to hear. When Dr. Spiehs asked her to repeat herself, she refused.
“What was hateful,” Dr. Spiehs asked Mipro in the video. “Because under the caption of me you said it had hateful speech. What was hateful? Are you going to stand by your work?”
Mipro said she does stand by her work, to which Dr. Spiehs questions her again, “Then what was hateful?” However, Mipro refused to respond further.
Dr. Spiehs said in the video that she wasn’t answering because she knew it wasn’t hateful, because otherwise she would say what was hateful and why. The video ends with Dr. Spiehs calling Mipro and Smith “big time cowards.”
According to Media Bias Fact Check (MBFC), the Kansas Reflector has high factual reporting due to a clean check record as of December 14, 2022, and using proper sources, “linking to credible sources such as whitehouse.gov, Washington Post, Politico, Center for Responsive Politics (Open Secrets), and bls.gov (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics).”
However, they have also been rated as having a left-bias, stating in their analysis, “Articles and headlines promote liberal perspectives through moderate, loaded language.” MBFC also noted editorial positions and op-eds routinely favor the left. Specifically, they note the media source often promotes LGBT “equality” and concerns of climate change, while also frequently reporting negatively on Republican politicians.
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Ian Brannan
Ian Brannan is an independent journalist who founded The Kansas Constitutional in April 2022. His work focuses on issues including abortion, Convention of States, drug policy, education, government, LGBT issues, media, and more. He is also the co-host of the Rainbow Rabble-Rousers podcast.
