PRSA PR Cartel Explored Illegal Boycott to Punish Tennessee

Tranches of legally obtained e-mail files via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) open-government records requests have yielded new evidence of an illegal market boycott of the State of Tennessee, conspired and proposed by top leadership of the New York-based Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) PR industry trade association / 501(c)(6) business league in 2023, on gender-ideology / partisan political grounds.

PRSA’s National Board then included a PR executive with the Fleishman Hillard multinational PR firm owned by PR / ad agency mega-conglomerate, Omnicom, which itself was placed under a 10-year compliance order by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 2025, based on allegations of participating in an “anti-conservative” advertising “cartel,” using a veiled “industry association” front group, according to federal documentation.

(Omnicom holds a $4 billion-plus U.S. Army advertising contract despite its fervent DEI advocacy in violation of Presidential Executive Orders.)

Cartels, “market allocation” boycotts, and similar “refusal to deal” antitrust violations are illegal in the United States, by federal law.

Amid growing evidence that PRSA has engaged for years in longtime antitrust violations and cartel activity involving manipulations of its core governance to favor specific members and their employers, as well as of its “Accreditation in Public Relations” (APR) credentialing program, PRSA leadership secretly sought to boycott Tennessee for partisan political / gender ideology reasons in 2023, as revealed in a newly discovered and legally obtained PRSA e-mail.

The e-mail from PRSA’s then-CEO, Linda Thomas Brooks, to the full PRSA National Board — dated April 7, 2023 — documents conspiratorial discussion and scheming among top PRSA staff and National Board leadership to cancel PRSA’s contract to hold its 2023 PRSA International Conference, known as PRSA ICON, in Nashville, as was scheduled later that autumn.

The prospective move was framed in the PRSA e-mail essentially as punishment for “actions in the Tennessee State House over the past few days, especially the expulsion of two legislators,” Thomas Brooks wrote.

CEO Linda Thomas Brooks cited these matters as the entire impetus for her Board e-mail, stating:

“The actions in the Tennessee State House over the past few days, especially the expulsion of two legislators, have prompted a handful of inquiries about our ICON location.  In response, our staff team has discussed the concerns and difficulties, and has undertaken a few actions/investigations.“

The prospect of PRSA boycotting Tennessee was robustly explored and economically studied by PRSA, according to PRSA’s CEO e-mail, to punish / rebuke Tennessee for having then recently passed state legislation banning irreversible sex-change medical procedures upon children / minors below age of legal consent. (PRSA is in favor of such procedures availed to children.)

PRSA operates five membership chapters in Tennessee (Chattanooga, Knoxville, Memphis, Nashville, and Tri-Cities), with “more than 500 members based in Tennessee,” according to Thomas Brooks’ 2023 e-mail to her Board, as well as PRSA’s “presence at nine universities in Tennessee through PRSSA totaling nearly 200 student members.” Many PRSA members are government- and university-employed:

In 2026, a University of Tennessee-Knoxville PR program faculty member is listed on PRSA’s website as a PRSA committee chair, as is a Lebanon, Tennessee-based PR executive with the National 4-H Council.

PRSA’s Linda Thomas Brooks specifically cited in her e-mail, as grounds for the PRSA boycott against Tennessee, PRSA’s desire to issue or signal a partisan-ideology protest, because Tennessee had passed legislation in March 2023 to:

1) ban so-called “gender affirming” irreversible surgeries / medical procedures for underage children (Tennessee’s legislation ultimately was upheld in the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v. Skrmetti in June 2025), and to

2) ban “adult cabaret performances” such as “Drag Queen Story Hour” and similarly sexualized adult performances in front of minors, such as in public schools.

Some “drag queen story hour” “performances” in other states have been well-known to devolve into highly inappropriate and concerning displays, including unwanted physical contact between adult drag queen performers and young children in documented, separate incidents, in which a drag queen straddled a child and another drag queen conducted a “strip-tease” and rolled around on the floor with children as part of drag show “performances” targeting children.

https://www.foxnews.com/video/6323838711112

Two Democrat Tennessee legislators who had broken rules of protocol in the State Legislature in March 2023 also had been censured for bringing a bullhorn into the legislative chamber in order to mount a disruptive protest on the floor, during session, in violation of rules of decorum.

According to Linda Thomas Brooks’ e-mail, PRSA wished to show public support / solidarity with those Democrat legislators who had broken rules.

In her explosive e-mail, PRSA’s CEO coordinated talking points with other PRSA National Board members — which, in addition to Omnicom personnel, also included government-employed (with taxpayer dollars) PR practitioners in Lee County, Florida and state-funded colleges/universities in Oregon and Florida — about the prospect of issuing, in effect, a desired PRSA boycott / rebuke / refusal-to-deal against the State of Tennessee, in retaliation for the state’s legislation.

Thomas Brooks even cited PRSA having “a special eye toward tourism/event related statements” in publicly scolding or boycotting Tennessee, with the implied intent of exacting PRSA’s desired economic harm and retaliation on Tennessee’s some $30 billion annual tourism industry.

Thomas Brooks wrote to her National Board:

“We are investigating whether other organizations and/or businesses might be issuing statements about this situation, with a special eye toward tourism/event related statements.  As we learn more, we will assess whether it would be recommendable for us to be signatories to some public statement. We could also decide to issue a stand-alone statement, but we think it could be more powerful to be part of allied voices on this.”

Thomas Brooks stated to her Board that the only reason PRSA was not moving immediately to cancel PRSA’s Nashville ICON contract in partisan protest was due to costs PRSA would incur by violating terms of its contract:

“Earlier today I spoke with Michelle, and we reviewed the financial scenario that would be associated with cancelling our contract in Nashville.  In round numbers, it would cost approximately $1 million for us to cancel at this time.  Obviously, that is not a consideration that would make sense for PRSA.”

PRSA begrudgingly went on to host its conference in Nashville, due to being locked into an expensive contract that PRSA was too cash-poor to break.

Later, at year-end 2023, CEO Linda Thomas Brooks lauded the Nashville conference in PRSA’s 2023 annual report as “a hallmark of the year,” without disclosing the earlier desired boycott in April.

(Also discovered in the 2023 annual report: More than $5 million in multiple math errors in legally non-compliant, 11-month financial statements that violated New York State Not for Profit Corporation law. When I reported the math errors, a new version of the annual report was hastily and quietly replaced online, with no explanations. CEO Linda Thomas Brooks falsely told a dues-paying member who inquired about the errors that it was a mere “typo.”)

PRSA’s partisan political advocacy for years has underscored its support in favor of irreversible sex-change procedures performed on underage children for gender-ideology reasons.

What this policy has to do with promoting ethical and effective PR — no one knows.

Nonetheless, PRSA also is in the “business” of promoting “Drag Queen Story Hour” adult performances for pre-school / early-elementary-age children who are too young to read for themselves.

For example, in 2018, PRSA’s Los Angeles Chapter awarded the City of West Hollywood its PRSA-LA Award of Excellence in the category, “Creative Tactics, Teaser or Other Collateral,” for its PR campaign, “Drag Queen Story Hour Fans.”

Another example: In 2024, PRSA National published a blog post that was widely amplified as PR best-practice “thought leadership,” which also advocated directly for “Drag Queen Story Hour” events targeting children.

https://prsay.prsa.org/2024/06/04/pride-month-in-a-year-of-loathing-allies-needed/

In this PRSA blog post, the author — who now is chair-elect of PRSA’s Counselors Academy — cited that proper gender ideology “allyship” “acts like your straight school principal who blocks book banning in their school library and hosts a local drag queen for Story Hour.”

PRSA actually pushed during the 2024-25 academic year to its national network of PRSSA student chapters (at taxpayer-funded universities like the University of Tennessee-Knoxville) a so-called “anti-book-banning” campaign by the EveryLibrary political organization, as part of PRSA’s annual nationwide Bateman Case Study Competition.

Participating PRSSA students competing in the Bateman Competition were required to assume roles as grassroots activists and PR proponents for EveryLibrary within their own local university communities, to promote child access to books like “Gender Queer” — which includes cartoon-like illustrations depicting multiple sex acts as well as sex toys.

“Gender Queer” has been called out by Congress as inappropriate for children’s school libraries:

https://www.congress.gov/event/118th-congress/house-event/LC72812/text

https://edworkforce.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=409689

A PRSA-hosted student / faculty advisor conference call / webinar with EveryLibrary staff personnel revealed EveryLibrary’s guidance given to PRSSA students to “go after political leaders” / “elected officials” as “fair game” in students’ Bateman Competition campaign:

Tennessee public-university student participation in the PRSA / PRSSA Bateman Competition partisan political campaign for EveryLibrary violated the letter and spirit of Tennessee’s “The Little Hatch Act,” which bars diversion of taxpayer-funded resources to push partisan political campaigns, such as what EveryLibrary is 100% about:

PRSA CEO Linda Thomas Brooks was behind the choice of EveryLibrary as PRSA’s Bateman Competition “client,” which procured for EveryLibrary’s use PRSSA students nationwide as unpaid / uncompensated student PR labor.

Linda Thomas Brooks promised PRSA’s Board — per National Board minutes — that the EveryLibrary campaign was “not” about “advocacy,” but this claim was patently false, relative to the enormous public-advocacy campaigning and database-procurement scope of this illegally executed campaign, in violation of state and federal Hatch Act-related laws.

PRSA seeks to force its left-wing ideology and partisan views on U.S. citizens, via the PR industry, and to exact retaliation / consequences against PR industry practitioners and businesses who reject views not to PRSA’s liking.

In 2023, through its Tennessee-boycott ideation, PRSA sought to send a clear, public message to the nationwide PR industry that any PRSA members’ non-acceptance of or push-back against certain gender ideology public policies would / could result potentially in similar “cancel” retaliation by PRSA, against those who do not kowtow to left-wing dogma.

PRSA’s CEO even stated directly in her Board e-mail that site-selection decisions of PRSA “future events” would take into consideration if a state or municipality reflects PRSA’s partisan political ideas, as a litmus test for whether that market is suitable as a PRSA event site location.

This act arguably violated antitrust law on “market allocation” boycotts that intentionally pre-select “winners” and “losers” in a secretive and veiled manner to benefit a particular party.

To that point, Linda Thomas Brooks wrote in her e-mail:

“The staff and PRSA Board of Directors have been engaged in thoughtful conversations around this topic and have gathered feedback on the process of choosing ICON locations, for example, what factors should be looked at, the importance of looking at these decisions through the lens of our various constituencies, and how local legislation could impact our members. All of that is being considered as we book future events.”

Also in her e-mail to the PRSA Board, CEO Linda Thomas Brooks only gave voice to Tennessee PRSA members who are politically aligned with her / PRSA’s ideology — not to the majority of Tennesseans who indeed vote Republican.

Tennessee is a Republican super-majority state, as reflecting the will of the electorate:

Data posted in December 2024 by Nashville public relations and public policy firm Stones River Group make this fact clear:

In violation of PRSA’s own “Nonpartisan” and “Antitrust” policies (which widely are concealed from rank-and-file member view so that Board leaders are not held accountable for violations), PRSA pushes partisanship and cartel-driven agendas routinely — with a long, documented track record.

PRSA officials are fully knowledgeable that antitrust violations risk PRSA’s corporate charter, and, that leadership offenders could be fined and/or sentenced to jail time.

PRSA Board personnel receive extensive “training” on antitrust and are each required to sign off on compliance.