Are we really not doing “phrasing” anymore?

It's really Tobias Fünke-tier wording.

Tommy now spends his time pouring into young men around him

Huh.

That would be: Texas

That's specifically from the Jeezus-y homeschool-centric baseball academy and travel team that actually employees him. One district, Southlake Carroll (they of the "rich racists" NBCNews podcast and just generally obnoxious try-hards), had him listed as an authorized outside coach. So not exactly from a school, but absolutely and horrifically education-adjacent.

No worries though! There was also the nominally public charter school in San Angelo, which still has their Christ-centered mission on their about page from when they were a creepy Christian private school, who just had to fire the football staff and half the adminsitration for giving a bunch of kids rhabdo and then covering it up. Their sister school had to fire all the kindergarten(!) teachers because they marched misbehaving children around the room so the other kids could shout "shame!" and point.

I say that successful athletes get a pass all the time. People still praise Kobe despite being a rapist.

Donald Trump hired a sex offender last year, for a position that deals with kids also. I just don't suspect less from the US.

Texas is run by the GOP:

Just look at the leadership.

It very much is against the law. Read to the end. Here's the last paragraph of the article:

According to the law offices of Ned Barnett, Texas law prevents registered sex offenders from working in places frequented by children, including schools, daycare centers and playgrounds or attending school events like sports games. Some can interact with children at family gatherings or public events, supervised when interacting with children according to court orders and the nature of the offense.

This isn't a problem with the law as much as it is a specific group of people trying to wallpaper a sort of compliance with the law while ignoring the substance of it altogether. First paragraph of the article, emphasis mine:

The Texas Home Educators Sports Association (THESA) thought it could get away with allowing a registered sex offender to coach minors by sending parents a waiver to sign, with the coach's testimony attached, according to Amy Smith at watchkeep.org.

Note also from somewhere in the middle of the article:

The waiver mentioned nothing about his offender status.

And if you're wondering wtf, you're not wrong: all this careful arrangement of fact seems like a very creative effort on the part of the author and editor to actively distance point A from point B. It's possible they're just trying very hard not to piss anyone off in what is already a lost cause.

Or to put it another way, in a state with a very high year-round accumulation of snowflakes, this article involves three very special groups of special snowflakes all at once: a sex offender and his personal fans, the homeschoolers, and the evangelical Christians, and how they are faking compliance with state law by making sure the parents sign a waiver -- one that hides the relevant information about a sex offender with a history of minors -- before giving him free access to their children in direct contradiction to the law, a law they knew enough about to deliberately circumvent.

Houston Astros prospect

Because he's good at baseball...

It's been shown over and over again that parents and administrators will turn a blind eye to shit like this if it means their kid has a chance at the big leagues

I mean,

"Convicted sex offender" can mean anyone from a serial rapist to someone who peed outside. But the byline says:

The former Houston Astros prospect holds previous charges of online solicitation of a minor and domestic violence.

So he shouldn't be in a school.

Yeah exactly.

I came here thinking 'maybe he's on the registry because at 19yo he fucked his 17yo GF and her parents found out'... nope. It's every bit as bad as you'd think.

"Eventually I found myself in chat rooms late into the night while my wife and innocent infant daughter slept. I was engaging in inappropriate conversations that led to adultery. One of these online conversations ended up being with a minor…but it was never a minor…it was a police officer. The sting went down exactly like you would imagine on T.V. It was no question the worst day AND the best day of my life."

Here's the thing with those 'stings'- they are not entrapment. The agent makes it clear they are a minor. There's no confusion, no 'I thought she was 18'. That would kill the prosecution and give the defense ammunition. No, the agent 'minor' gives themselves an age that's below 18.

This is no innocent guy trapped in a big net. This is a guy who made plans with a minor to meet up and have sex, KNOWING they weren't 18.

If that were my kid I'd be demanding the heads of everyone who signed off on his hiring and that waiver as they are obviously unfit to be in charge of education. Doesn't matter if it's the principal of the school, pick someone random off the street and they'd do a better job not hiring would-be child rapists to supervise children.

Might run into more problems at the school board meeting (this one is from Tennessee)

God, You Are Hot': US School Board Member To Teen Girl Student During Public Meeting

Yep. Not into the oul' school board meetings myself but a waiver like that is definitely going to push me across the line into rabbid activism, complete with pitchfork.

The Department of Defense wouldn’t hire me to teach because I’m trans lol. Wonder if the kiddy diddler would pass their background check.

I’m moving states to be even be allowed to teach. I would absolutely lose my current position if it I was outed.

Because a good christian male just made a mistake, he's sorry, it won't happen again.

Meanwhile the girl who just wants to pee in peace is a predator and must be dealt with to the fullest extent of new laws that make Iran look progressive by comparison.

I mean, Texas created the AMBER Alert system. Many republican voters do seem to genuinely care about protecting kids… They just have a really fucking warped idea of what that entails.

It makes it easier for them to identify future candidates for public office.

If you read the article... the waiver doesn't directly mention his sex offender status. And as far as indirect, super vague. No one would guess from the waiver that he was a sex offender.

No the waiver respects consent. If you don't sign...