What is going on with Mike Johnson and his "adopted" son?
It's never a good sign when the word "adopted" is in quotes
My worlds are colliding: child safety and politics.
What the heck is the whole story about the new Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and his “adopted” black “son?”
The details are somewhat murky but apparently, Johnson “took custody” of a 14-year-old black teenager who he met through Young Life Ministry. Johnson would have been 25 or 27 years old. Was this before his was married to Kelly Johnson? It’s all a little unclear. Mike Johnson doesn’t want to talk about this “son” that much, except when it’s politically expedient for him.
My thoughts based on what we know so far are:
What does Johnson mean when he (or he and Kelly) says he “took custody?” Johnson says they never formally adopted this young man. So what did they do?
Young Life Ministry is not an adoption agency by any means. It is a huge religious organization that might be doing outreach in your local schools.
I served as a court-appointed special advocate, CASA, for several years. This legal, guardian ad litem position has a lot of responsibility, and mentorship for a child in foster care. Even so, there were firm boundaries between being an advocate and bringing a child into your family’s life. I have seen some people talking about being an advocate as though it is normal to “adopt” ones mentee. In my experience this is far from the case. I never even brought the teen I worked with to my home. In the 3 years I worked with her, I always met her at her foster home, when we would go do activities together.
Whether you are an advocate, or a mentor, congregation member, or volunteer Big Brother/Big Sister—your role, responsibilities, and boundaries should be clear. There should be oversight and guidelines, policies that are known, followed, and monitored with oversight.
This is important for each individual actor to know, and for each organization. An effective child safety policy is not just something that sits in a binder on a shelf: it must be a set of practices that are woven into the fabric of how your organization operates every day. If this is not the case, your organization is very vulnerable to abusers operating with impunity for far too long. This is true even for well-meaning, caring organizations.
Young Life Ministries has a very troubling history of failing to report or address sexual misconduct, harassment, abuse, or sexual assault within its organization. Lawsuits have been filed with the EEOC.
If you are involved in any youth-serving organizations, whether as a participant, volunteer, staff member, leader, employee, or family member, please be on the lookout for bad policy and/or failure to follow policy. Don’t just stand by waiting for someone else to do something. If you sense trouble, speak up. I know this is hard, but it is the only way that things get better! Good policies will make this easier to do, when there are clear channels created to report problems. Channels that will be listened to, and acted upon.
I co-authored a book on this very topic, Doing Right by Our Kids: Protecting Child Safety at All Levels, which I recommend to you. It is a field manual for protecting child safety, written for parents, teachers, and grassroots organization members, as well as leaders.
Investigative reporters: please keep digging deeper to find out what was actually happening with Mike Johnson’s “adoption.” I don’t like the murky story we are hearing so far.
Please note, this post is written as my own professional opinion, and does not represent the opinion of my co-author, or any organization.