by Staff Reporter | Oct 8, 2025 | News
By Staff Reporter |
A popular Phoenix drag star and DACA recipient was arrested for sex with a minor last month.
Michael “Mikey” Browder, 35 — better known in the Valley by the drag persona “Aubrey Ghalichi” — was arrested for having sex with a 13-year-old boy.
Per court records obtained by ABC 15 News, the 13-year-old victim posed as an 18-year-old on an online dating website. In an interview with police, Browder allegedly admitted to the crime, but on the caveat that the victim looked to be of age and that the victim’s apartment was too dark to discern the victim’s age.
Browder, a DACA recipient, worked for the Arizona Dream Act Coalition (ADAC) as a DACA coordinator. He told media outlets that he qualified for a work permit under former President Barack Obama’s program for those who immigrated to America illegally as children.
Browder was also an involved anti-ICE activist. In February, Browder was one of many to protest for hours at the Arizona State Capitol against mass deportations initiated by President Donald Trump.
Browder immigrated illegally into the United States from Mexico when he was 10 years old with his mother, Vanessa “Cherry Elizabeth” Browder, who also resides in the Valley.
Browder didn’t apply for DACA until December 2020 when he was 30 years old, according to an interview with AZ Mirror. Browder reported receiving an approval letter in June 2021, less than five months after he and six others with ADAC flew to Washington, D.C. to “send a message” to then-incoming President Joe Biden and his administration.
“We want immigration reform now. We’ve waited eight years since Obama; he said there was going to be some kind of immigration reform for DACA recipients and it hasn’t happened yet,” said Browder in an interview with Prospect. “We’re hopeful that Biden does something now because a lot of us would like to vote hopefully in the next election, in 2024.”
If convicted, Browder could qualify for deportation.
DACA recipients must renew their status every two years. Under federal law, disqualification for renewal extends to those who commit any misdemeanor that is an offense of domestic violence, sexual abuse or exploitation, burglary, unlawful possession or use of a firearm, drug distribution or trafficking, or driving under the influence.
Additionally, those who pose a threat to national security or public safety, those who receive sentencing to time in custody for more than 90 days, or those convicted of a felony or three or more other misdemeanors don’t qualify for DACA renewal.
While working with ADAC, Browder handled the advance parole application process for DACA applicants.
Browder worked closely alongside ADAC executive director Karina Ruiz de Diaz — the LUCHA activist and illegal immigrant benefitting from DACA who filmed herself following then-Senator Kyrsten Sinema into a bathroom in October 2022.
Browder’s husband, John Andrew Covarrubias, has been a writer and producer for multiple networks, including Prime Video and Amazon Studios, Starz, the CW Network, Marvel Studios, NBC Universal, and CBS Television Studios according to LinkedIn. Per his Facebook, Browder has also worked for Paramount Studios.
Browder was scheduled to be a headline performer at Phoenix Pride Festival next week, as first reported by ABC 15.
Phoenix Pride’s board of directors issued a statement condemning the allegations. The organization also disputed the validity of online claims that they created a December 2023 event featuring Browder called “Holiday With the Queens,” which they said never existed.
“Phoenix Pride remains committed to creating safe, affirming, and empowering spaces for our LGBTQ+ community,” said the organization.
Phoenix Pride named Browder’s drag persona, Aubrey Ghalichi, the winner of the 2022 Mayor Phil Gordon Spirit Award — though for both the 2022 and 2020 honorees of that award, the organization put a description of another LGBTQ+ activist, Adonias Arevalo-Melara.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Apr 28, 2024 | Education, News
By Staff Reporter |
A University of Arizona assistant professor who moonlights as a drag queen, Harris Kornstein, pushed children to support Hamas during a recent drag story hour with Valley Families for Palestine, arranged by Queer Storytime for Palestine.
Kornstein encouraged the crowd of children to chant “Free Palestine!” as a response to: “If you’re a drag queen and you know it…” during a performance this week.
Palestinians don’t tolerate LGBTQ+ individuals, especially Hamas. Anyone involved in those lifestyles in the area risks persecution and violence at minimum, even death.
Valley Families for Palestine, an activist coalition located in the Connecticut River Valley, privatized their social media accounts after Kornstein’s video went viral.
Also involved in the drag story hour were Sarah Prager, an LGBTQ+ author; Hannah Moushabeck, a queer author and Palestinian supporter; Jewish Voice for Peace Western Mass; Booklink Books; MassEquality; Parasol Patrol at Western Mass; and Western Mass Mask Bloc.
Kornstein, who goes by the drag name “Lil Miss Hot Mess,” often does his drag performances for minors in other states in addition to drag story hours.
Kornstein is also a board member for Drag Queen Story Hour, and author of two books marketed to children normalizing drag lifestyles: “The Hips on the Drag Queen Go Swish, Swish, Swish,” and “If You’re a Drag Queen and You Know It.”
Drag Queen Story Hour is a national organization with state chapters that emerged from Michelle Tea, a leftist author from San Francisco who launched it out of her desire almost 10 years ago to raise her toddler in “queer culture.”
In a 2021 research paper, Kornstein defended the creation of Drag Queen Story Hour as a means of allowing children to explore “queer pedagogy” and engage in “queer imagination” from a young age. The latter term, Kornstein said, enhanced child development through play as praxis, aesthetic transformation, strategic defiance, destigmatization of shame, and embodied kinship. Kornstein noted that drag queen engagement with children would lead to normalization of the practice.
“Within this complex political landscape, [Drag Queen Story Hour] seems to uniquely thread the needle between queer activism and broad cultural acceptance,” said Kornstein.
At the University of Arizona, Kornstein taught in the College of Humanities Public & Applied Humanities. Up until he went on research leave last year, Kornstein served as an assistant professor for the Institute for LGBTQ+ Studies, School of Art, School of Information, and Graduate Interdisciplinary Program in Social, Cultural, and Critical Theory.
Kornstein was able to go on leave thanks to a $60,000 grant from the Biden administration’s National Endowment for the Humanities. That funding is going toward a book project theorizing queer and transgender strategies of countering “surveillance capitalism” through observations of drag queens, transgender taxi drivers, cruising gay men, witchcraft, “mystical intuition,” and “gay hanky codes.”
Last December, the University of Arizona awarded Kornstein the Chatfield Impact Award — an honor for exemplary teaching, research, and service — for which he received $5,000.
Kornstein auctioned his books for a “Books for Palestine” fundraiser last November.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Corinne Murdock | Jul 24, 2023 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
A crowd of Tucson parents protested against a drag queen story hour hosted at Bookmans, a local bookstore chain, this month.
Bookmans hosted the event in coordination with Drag Story Hour Arizona. Event organizers withheld the exact location until the day before the event, and only released it to registered attendees.
The Bridge Tucson, a local multi-location church, organized the protest. Church members behind the protest noted that the drag story hour event organizers were saving preferential seating for children so that protesting adults couldn’t take all the seating.
Bookmans attempted to host another drag queen story hour back in March, but the organizers canceled due to protests.
“Bookmans is committed to allowing men dressed in women’s clothing to dance and sing and read books to children while exploring sexual themes with children and providing a ‘queer’ influence in their life,” stated the Bridge Tucson. “Bookmans is committed to grooming our children and it is pure evil. It has always been society’s job to protect children, and this is one of those moments in time to take a stand. We made it very clear that if Bookmans re-scheduled their Drag Queen Story Hour, we would reschedule our protest. So it’s on!
Drag Story Hour Arizona formed in 2019. In addition to Bookmans, the group collaborates with AzTYPO, Virtual Arizona Pride, Free Mom Hugs Arizona, and Phoenix Pride.
Ahead of the March story hour cancellation, Bridge Tucson members claimed retaliation. Their members reportedly emailed the bookstore to protest the event and claimed that their email addresses were then signed up for porn site email listings.
In response to the protest, State Sen. Justine Wadsack (R-LD17), commended the local parents for withstanding the temperatures that afternoon, which reached around 110 degrees. Wadsack also included an allusion to the controversial child sex trafficking awareness movie, “Sound of Freedom.”
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
by AZ Free Enterprise Club | Sep 4, 2022 | Opinion
By the Arizona Free Enterprise Club |
Public schools are out of control. And it’s going to get worse if we don’t do something about it. Unfortunately, for far too long, school board elections have been some of the most ignored around our state. But whether you have kids in public school, private school, or homeschool—whether your kids are out of school or you don’t have kids at all—this year’s school board election will affect you.
How? Take a look at some of the worst abuses in public school districts in the past year.
A Financial Mess
As a taxpaying citizen, you probably care a lot about where your dollars go. But most school districts don’t share your same concerns. Mesa Public Schools (MPS) is one of them. Back in March, MPS failed to explain where over $32.3 million of their federal emergency funds slated for COVID-related expenditures went—which should’ve resulted in an audit by the State of Arizona.
But Mesa isn’t the only problem…
>>> CONTINUE READING >>>
by Corinne Murdock | Aug 23, 2022 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
On Sunday, Secretary of State and gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs announced that she booked the drag queen who’s spoken out against her opponent, Kari Lake, over their past friendship.
Social media posts by the drag queen, Richard Stevens, went viral in June for showcasing his past friendship with Lake as well as her support and enthusiasm for the drag queen lifestyle.
Stevens spoke out in mid-June after Lake criticized the normalization of drag queens publicly. He called her a hypocrite, claiming that he did a drag queen performance for her birthday with children present years ago, and that she attended his performances at various Phoenix bars.
As proof, Stevens posted photos of Lake standing alongside two drag queens, one of them being him. In one of the photos, Lake was dressed as Elvis Presley and posing alongside Seville dressed as a blonde female with a sugar skull face. It’s unclear whether whether Lake intended to dress as a “drag king,” which is cross-dressing for a woman, or merely intended to wear a costume for a themed party.
“Now that @karilake has waded into the war on drag queens, know she is a complete hypocrite,” wrote Stevens. “Kari was a friend of mine, and I stood by her when she turned to the right. I reached out (and she responded repeatedly) when she took a public drubbing.”
Lake served Stevens a cease-and-desist letter. Incidentally, Stevens was preparing to perform for a “family-friendly” drag show brunch when he received the letter.
In response, Stevens’ lawyer Thomas Ryan called Lake a “bully” and threatened to provide evidence that Lake hired Stevens to perform for a news anchor friend’s baby shower.
“Now Kari is a bully, and the reservoir of goodwill she had built up over the years as a cherished news anchor — well, that’s been drained to the point where we might as well just refer to her now as Kari Puddles,” wrote Ryan.
The Arizona Senate Republican caucus pledged in June to introduce legislation banning child attendance at drag shows. The leaders said that drag shows sexualized and groomed children. They noted that they were working with several other states to draft the legislation.
“If men want to dress as women, and if adults want to participate in watching these hyper-sexualized performances, they have the freedom to do so. It crosses the line when kids are subjected to these drag shows,” wrote the caucus. “We will be damned if we won’t fight like hell to protect the most innocent from these horrifying and disturbing trends that are spreading across the nation now that extremist Democrats are currently in control of our federal government.”
Their announcement followed a series of reports on the controversies following drag shows across the state. In May, a Tucson high school counselor who organized a drag show for students was arrested for having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old student. In June, a Phoenix museum hosted a drag show open to children.
Studies have linked youth exposure to sexually explicit material with risky sexual behaviors, intimacy disorders, sexual violence and misconduct, and sexual deviancy.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
