Pop star Pink is fighting back against book bans.


What You Need To Know

  • At her concerts in South Florida on Tuesday and Wednesday, pop star Pink will give out 2,000 copies of books that have been banned from Florida schools

  • Pink is collaborating with PEN America, a nonprofit group that works to protect free expression through writing, to call attention to the rising number of book bans in the state

  • PEN America recorded more than 3,300 instances of books being banned in U.S. public school classrooms and libraries last academic year -- more than 40% were in Florida

  • The four titles that will be distributed at Pink’s shows are Gorman’s “The Hill We Climb,” Todd Parr’s “The Family Book,” Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” and a book from the group “Girls Who Code,” founded by Reshma Saujani

During her concerts Tuesday and Wednesday in Miami and Sunrise, Florida, the “Trustfall” singer is giving out 2,000 copies of books that have been banned from Florida schools.

Pink is collaborating with PEN America, a nonprofit group that works to protect free expression through writing, to call attention to the rising number of book bans in the state. She announced her plans Monday during a live Instagram conversation with PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel and poet Amanda Gorman. 

“I'm a voracious reader, and I'm a mom of two kids who are also voracious readers,” Pink, wearing an “I read banned books” T-shirt, said during the conversation. “And I can't imagine my own parents telling me what my kids can and cannot read, let alone someone else's parents, let alone someone else that doesn't even have children that are deciding what my children can read.”

PEN America recorded more than 3,300 instances of books being banned in U.S. public school classrooms and libraries last academic year. That included more than 1,500 unique titles. More than 40% of all book bans occurred in Florida school districts, according to the group.

Last year, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican candidate for president, signed a bill giving parents a say in which books schools can and cannot have in their libraries. 

“This is a wave that is taking over our country, our schools, our libraries,” Nossel said. “They're going after books about children of color, stories of LGBTQ families, books about babies, about animals. This is censorship in its purest form. It is meant to suppress narratives that we need here as a pluralistic society. And so we have to push back.”

The four titles that will be distributed at Pink’s shows are Gorman’s “The Hill We Climb,” Todd Parr’s “The Family Book,” Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” and a book from the group “Girls Who Code,” founded by Reshma Saujani.

On X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, Pink got into a back-and-forth Monday with critics who falsely accused of her distributing pornography to children. 

“I think I talk about reading. Books. Classics. Not porn,” the three-time Grammy Award winner wrote. “Porn isn’t my thing. Supporting freedom of speech is. Allowing hateful, narrow minded bigots to decide what all children can read is not my thing either. FREEDOM! MERICA!”

In a separate post, she wrote: “The following are some titles of books that have been banned from schools in Florida…. Lmk which book is pornography…. To Kill A Mockingbird, The Hate You Give, Forrest Gump, A Catcher In The Rye, The Hill We Climb, Girls Who Code, Atlas Shrugged, 1984, The Kite Runner, The Bluest Eye, A Wrinkle In Time, The Diary of Anne Frank, The Fault In Our Stars, etc etc.”

X included a community note with the post saying “the list has been proven incorrect” and linking to a fact check by the USA Today. But the fact check only debunked a previous claim that the books were banned statewide in Florida, an assertion Pink never made.