During a recent appearance on Matt Serra’s podcast, UFC veteran Al Iaquinta opened up about showing up to local school board meetings on Long Island. He talked about his experiences attending hearings, interviewing attendees, and one tense confrontation that nearly pushed him to his limit.
The topic came up when Serra mentioned seeing clips of Iaquinta at the Massapequa school board hearing, a meeting centered on a policy banning transgender students from using bathrooms aligning with their gender identity.
“Long Island’s like the center of a lot of national stuff that’s going on,” Iaquinta explained. “Massapequa High School was big. They banned transgenders from going in the bathroom of their identity and they were forcing them to go in the bathroom of their birth gender.”
When Serra asked him to explain what he was doing at these events, Iaquinta described his approach as straightforward and non-confrontational, at least initially.
“I just want to like, I’m just kind of like a fly on the wall,” he said. “Like what do you think? How did that go in there? Like why do you think the way that you think? And some people I can kind of understand it. Some people I can’t understand it at all. But just giving people a microphone and letting them tell their thoughts about what’s going on, it’s always entertaining and it’s always fun.”
He noted that many of the LGBTQ activists who showed up were not local residents. “They went to this hearing, a lot of them, most of them weren’t from Massapequa. They just came like, bring them in to cause a ruckus or whatever.”
Things took a sharp turn during one interaction that Iaquinta described as testing his patience. He recalled approaching someone after a Charlie Kirk event connected to the hearing.
“I was like, you’re a dude in a dress,” Iaquinta said. “It took every ounce of my being not to just smack the crap out of this person.”
Serra, laughing, recalled watching the clip and seeing Iaquinta’s reaction afterward. Iaquinta didn’t hold back on his feelings about the confrontational tone some attendees brought with them.
“These people, they’re just talking like they’re using words without any repercussion,” he said. “And that’s where they could be dangerously wrong.”
Despite the tension, Iaquinta maintained that he goes into these situations calmly and with respect, only reaching his limit when others cross a line first.
“I always see you levelheaded,” Serra noted, “but don’t be disrespectful to Raging Al. You’ll see that guy that wrecked those hotel rooms and knocked out f**king Ross Pearson come right back out.”
