In a prime example of how expanded government power gets abused, a national association representing local school boards is now asking the Biden administration to look into parents and criticism school boards have received in recent months over Covid-19 restrictions and potentially controversial curriculum changes using federal anti-terrorism laws. That’s right, the group of concerned moms and dads waiting patiently in line for the public comment time at their school board meeting might be fermenting terrorism.
Many parents, due to the advent of Covid disrupting the education system since March of 2020, have finally woken up to the reality that most local school boards, in many urban and suburban areas, are controlled by left-wing activists intent on using the public education system to impose a left-wing agenda in the classroom. As a result, enrollments in private schools and parents opting for homeschool alternatives have been at record highs since 2020.
In many localities around the country from Texas to Virginia, among others, local school board meetings have been contentious as parents confront their school board officials over issues like pornographic materials in school libraries, forced masked mandates, and the potential that some schools wish to integrate Critical Race Theory teaching into every grade level and subject.
As a result, and as parents are ignored by their elected school board officials, the movement has grown and has become a campaign issue around the county, especially in the race for Governor in Virginia.
Now, a group that represents local school boards is pushing back on parents and asking the Biden administration, as a veiled threat to parents all over the country, to see if it can prosecute them with the Patriot Act, or other domestic terrorist laws:
A group representing local school boards says the federal government should review violence and threats involving schools to see if they violate federal statutes about domestic terrorism and hate crimes, amid ongoing tension and anger about COVID-19 policies.
In a Wednesday letter to President Joe Biden, the National School Boards Association says statutes like the Gun-Free School Zones Act and the USA PATRIOT Act, a law passed shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon designed to halt terrorism, should be enforced if necessary against crimes and acts of violence targeting K-12 officials. The school board group says the classification of these acts could be “the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes.”
As noted, by the National School Board Association (NSBA), whenever a school board meeting has become heated, and the need for an arrest was necessary, local law enforcement was on hand to ensure the safety of everyone involved. That fact, however, doesn’t seem to be enough for the NSBA which wants the federal government to intervene:
Asked by Education Week whether his group thought arrests and charges by local law enforcement were an insufficient response to the situation, Slaven said that “safety and deterrence” are NSBA’s main goals in seeking federal assistance. The circumstances call for a coordinated response at the local, state, and federal levels to ensure school officials can focus on their jobs, he said.
“These incidents are beyond random acts. What we are now seeing is a pattern of threats and violence occurring across state lines and via online platforms, which is why we need the federal government’s assistance,” Slaven said in an email.
This issue is an example of trying to intimidate parents from associating with their local communities of other concerned parents who wish to express their displeasure at the direction of the local public school system. If an individual threatens violence or commits an act of violence against anyone, they should be arrested and charged to the fullest extent of the law, no sane-minded individual or disgruntled parent disagrees with that. Concerned parents want to be heard and respected, not see violence against their local school board officials.
What the NSBA president ignores are stories like this, from Virginia, where parents were being harassed and target by school board members and labeled as “racist” if they dared question the board:
A group of teachers and others in Loudoun County, Virginia, compiled a blacklist of parents who they felt disagreed with the school’s teaching of critical race theory (CRT), in an effort to humiliate them online.
The blacklist was in part to “infiltrate,” to use “hackers” to silence parents’ communications and to “expose these people publicly,” the Daily Wire first reported.
According to the Daily Wire, Loudoun County school board member Beth Barts recommended in a Facebook posting last week for members to “call out statements and actions that undermine our stated plan to end systemic racism.” The recommendation quickly devolved into members compiling a list of parents who may not be supportive of the school system’s focus on CRT.
The list included dozens of parents, many times where they lived, their employers, and spouses’ names.
“They [also] erred on the side of accusing the innocent,” the Daily Wire reported. “In response to one name added, another member asked, `Why is she on this list? I haven’t seen her support anti-CRT?’”
The response: “I put a question mark next to her bc I’m curious about some of her comments re the Dr. Seuss nonsense and racial equity generally. Happy to remove if I’m off the mark.”
The vast and overwhelming majority of concerned parents attending a school board meeting have been there, patiently waiting in line for several hours, to get their chance to speak for sometimes just 60 seconds. Many of these parents have organized and built small communities of like-minded parents to create a network and communicate more effectively.
In short, parents should be encouraged to be more involved in their local school boards. Many parents who have never attended a board meeting in their life started doing so after school boards began imposing undue burdens on students with draconian mandates and controversial curriculum changes.
Part of the issue has been that many local school boards tend to fall constantly on the side of progressive policies and label parents who so much as question those policies as “racist.” In that kind of environment, where dissent is not allowed, school boards are fermenting situations where parents are being ignored and disillusioned by the people they’re paying to run their local school system.
As a result of all this, with more media coverage, more parents are getting involved, some are launching campaigns to replace school board members who they feel are unresponsive or dismissive of parental concerns. The sleeping giant has been awakened thanks in part to Covid-19 disrupting public education since last year.
