Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters is saying that Trump’s move is exactly what students, parents and the entire country need right now. (AP Photo | Sue Ogrocki/iStock | Evan Vucci/AP)
Walters said that rather than helping to implement effective education systems, the Department of Education had long been co-opted by radical teachers’ unions like the American Federation of Teachers, which he said has been pushing diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and other leftist ideologies in states, including Oklahoma.
"The disruption of education was the federalization of education and the unionization of education. That's what got us away from the concept of schools that valued the community, value the family, value the individual," he said. "You have thousands of bureaucrats that are up there that are pushing a left-wing agenda, the most radical agenda the country has ever seen. They're teaching kids to hate the country. They're teaching kids to hate their faith."
"You can talk to teachers about the types of trainings the feds were requiring them to go to," he continued. "These were not helping them drive student achievement in their classroom. It was to push a left-wing agenda on kids."
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Walters said that "all the test scores have shown that they've all gotten worse since this disruption occurred." (iStock | Getty)
Walters anticipates that cutting the Education Department will free up huge sums of funds that, instead of paying bureaucrats' salaries, will instead go straight to students’ education and teachers.
He pointed to cuts he made to the Oklahoma Education Department in which he reduced the state’s bureaucracy by 150 employees, which he claimed saved millions, creating opportunities for tutoring programs and offering more competitive salaries to hire top-talent teachers.
"You're going to see that, times a thousand with the federal Department of Education," he said.
Meanwhile, Tiffany Justice, co-founder of the parents’ rights group "Moms for Liberty," assured parents that "your children's education will not be affected by any of these things."
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Tiffany Justice, co-founder of the parents’ rights group "Moms for Liberty," assured parents that "your children's education will not be affected by any of these things." (Fox News Digital )
"Don't believe the union talking point, fearmongering lies," Justice said in an interview with Fox News Digital. "Abolishing the Department of Education or dismantling it, cutting back on half the staff, only means more power to the parents, which is why the unions are concerned."
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"Since the creation of the Department of Education, student achievement has only declined," she said. "We've got a real crisis on our hands. I think the fact that the majority of American children are not learning to read is one of the biggest national security threats that we face as a nation."
"If you're watching mainstream media or the fake news, as President Trump likes to say, you're hearing those union fearmongering talking points. They're saying, ‘Oh, this is going to hurt teachers. This is going to hurt services.’ Nothing could be further from the truth," she went on. "Every state has a department of education, and I think every state and every state leader should really be looking at this as an opportunity to be able to show what their vision is for education, and then to execute on that vision and really make sure that kids in their states are learning."
Nearly two dozen Democrat attorneys general are currently suing the Trump administration to stop the cuts to the Department of Education.
Speaking with Fox News, Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, said it is "outrageous" that the Trump administration is "set on gutting the Department of Education." She claimed that this move amounts to "neglecting our students, and our parents, our communities and… the future of this country."
Peter Pinedo is a politics writer for Fox News Digital.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/education-leaders-say-trump-dismantling-key-government-agency-saved-education