President Trump had harsh words for the American public education system on Friday. In a tweet admonishing public educators for being leftist indoctrinators, not educators, the president said he was looking into the tax-exempt status and federal funding of schools and universities.
"Too many Universities and School Systems are about Radical Left Indoctrination, not Education," he said in a Friday afternoon tweet. "Therefore, I am telling the Treasury Department to re-examine their Tax-Exempt Status ontinues. Our children must be Educated, not Indoctrinated!"
... and/or Funding, which will be taken away if this Propaganda or Act Against Public Policy continues. Our children must be Educated, not Indoctrinated!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 10, 2020
The president's comments come after weeks of criticism against colleges and public schools that teach political bias slanted far to the left. Many have pointed out that the rioters, looters, and protesters, most of whom are teens or college aged, have espoused extreme Marxist ideology.
In Michigan, a Republican candidate for the state senate was castigated by his own college student daughter on Twitter who implored followers not to vote for her father. Robert Regan replied graciously, saying he was happy his daughter was free to say how she felt. But he held her school responsible for the family break.
"When they go off to college, quite frankly they get involved with these Marxist, socialist universities, and they start getting indoctrinated with things that are completely polar opposite from where you raised them," he said last month after his daughter's tweet went viral.
Others have noted that the protesters seem to be lacking in even basic knowledge of American history, as they topple statues of known abolitionists, excoriate the accomplishments of the Founding Fathers, and even desecrate memorials to freed slave Frederick Douglass.
As parents have assisted their children in distance learning through the COVID-19 shutdowns, they have also seen first hand what the curriculums contain. One New York City mother was appalled when her son, the only white child in his class, was forced to listen to a two-day lecture about how his skin color made him inherently racist.
In the most recent days, parents and taxpayers have been left wondering how their education dollars are truly being spent when schools across the nation are preparing to stay closed or partially closed for the next semester. This action would leave parents, many of whom are struggling to reclaim their jobs that were taken by the pandemic, in a childcare bind they are not prepared to deal with. Other parents remain concerned that continued isolation of their children and distance learning will have dire mental health consequences.
The American Association of Pediatrics agrees. They recommended that, while schools should bear in mind the extra precautions needed to keep kids healthy, students should return full time to the classroom this fall.
"The importance of in-person learning is well-documented, and there is already evidence of the negative impacts on children because of school closures in the spring of 2020," the AAP statement read. Still, local leaders like NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio have laid out plans that shaft parents and put children on a detrimental schedule of only a few days in the classroom.
School choice advocates have railed against orders like de Blasio's, claiming that if publicly funded schools are still closed this upcoming semester, the tax money allotted for each child should be redirected to give parents the chance to best plan for their family's education and care.
As elite universities have already announced plans to close their campuses for the fall 2020 semester, the president has made moves that clearly point out that he finds this unacceptable, including the enforcement of revoking student visas for those that do not need to be in the country to learn.
Defunding the public school system would be a major win for parents who wish to send their child to the school of their choice and for kids who would rather be educated than indoctrinated.