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Citizens Defending Freedom

Religious conservative

https://citizensdefendingfreedom.com · founded 2021

Citizens Defending Freedom (CDF) is a conservative activist organization that files mass book challenges in school districts and public libraries. In Fort Worth ISD alone, CDF challenged over 100 books, leading the district to close libraries for two weeks and pull 120 books from shelves. CDF partners with Brave Books to promote conservative children's books as replacements for removed titles — a documented 'remove and replace' strategy. Endorsed by Charlie Kirk and Mike Lindell.

Notes

Sources: Texas Observer investigation (2023), Fort Worth Star-Telegram reporting on 100+ book challenges in FWISD. CDF operates through local chapters filing challenges under state open-records and parental-rights statutes. Their Florida chapter president Bruce Friedman (who is also NLTE Florida chair) filed 94% of all book challenges in one Florida school district, including challenges to Anne Frank's Diary, a Harriet Tubman biography, and Arthur's Birthday.

Connected Laws

Laws this organization has been connected to based on public records.

Texas HB 900Lobbied for

Relating to the regulation of library materials sold to or included in public school libraries.

CDF chapters actively lobby for enforcement of HB 900 through mass book challenges in Texas school districts.

Source →
Texas SB 13Lobbied for

Relating to public school library materials, including the establishment of school library advisory councils.

CDF chapters actively lobby for enforcement of SB 13 through mass book challenges in Texas school districts.

Source →

Known Funding Sources

Funding data sourced from publicly available IRS 990 filings, news reports, and self-reported disclosures. Amounts are as reported in the cited source.

FunderAmountYearSource

CDF Foundation grants given

aggregate 990

$99,8802024IRS 990

Grants given by the c3 foundation arm (County Citizens Defending Freedom USA Foundation).

Total net assets (c4 — donors not disclosed)

aggregate 990

$2,118,0822023IRS 990

Net assets per most recent 990. As a 501(c)(4), CDF is not required to disclose donors.

Bans filed or organized by this group

122 ban records in our database actually resulted in a ban linked to this group as the filer or organizer — distinct from flags below, which mean only that the group publicly targeted the book.

Showing 10 of 122 attributed bans.

121 books flagged. These are books this group has publicly targeted. A flag is not a ban — books on this list may or may not have been formally challenged or removed from any specific library.