Former President Donald Trump says he supports parents protesting at local school boards against administrators who seek to teach Critical Race Theory while denouncing claims that those doing the demonstrating are ‘terrorists.’
‘I’ve been watching the school board hearings more closely than I ever have, to be honest, and it’s so interesting,’ the former president told Fox News on Saturday.
‘The parents are incensed. They’re not terrorists. They’re people that are just so upset.’
Trump was commenting on the controversy surrounding the Loudoun County school board in Virginia, where a parent whose child was the victim of a sexual assault was dragged out of a meeting and arrested after administrators refused to believe his claims.
A judge later ruled that his daughter was indeed assaulted in a school – prompting the head of the school board to apologize.
The former president said parents are also mobilized to prevent schools from teaching racial content.
‘They’re angry. They’re hurt. They’re crying because their children are being taught things that – in our opinion, in my opinion, in the vast majority of the people in this country’s opinion – they don’t want their children to hear about this stuff,’ Trump said.
Former President Donald Trump says he supports parents protesting at local school boards against administrators who seek to teach Critical Race Theory while denouncing claims that those doing the demonstrating are ‘terrorists’
Trump was commenting on the controversy surrounding the Loudoun County school board in Virginia, where a parent whose child was the victim of a sexual assault was dragged out of a meeting after administrators refused to believe his claims. A raucous school board meeting was held in Loudoun County on June 22
‘They want to go back to reading, writing, and arithmetic, and they want to hear that black people are good, and they want to hear that white people are good.
‘This is the division that is being caused by these programs.’
Trump predicted that the controversy surrounding the schools would boost Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin’s chances of winning Tuesday’s election.
Youngkin is running against the Democratic former governor, Terry McAuliffe.
‘I think he’s going to do very well,’ Trump said of Youngkin.
The former president hit out at McAuliffe for saying that parents should have no say in what their children are taught in school.
‘McAuliffe made a tremendous mistake. It’s not a tremendous mistake from his standpoint,’ Trump said.
‘He believes it.’
Trump said McAuliffe’s statement would be just as ‘bad’ as Hillary Clinton’s infamous comment calling supporters of the former president ‘deplorables.’
‘I think this is going to cause him tremendous problems come Tuesday,’
Trump predicted that the Democratic strategy of linking Youngkin with him would backfire.
He said that if ‘my base’ turns out on Tuesday, the GOP candidate will win. Polls currently show Youngkin with a slight lead over McAuliffe.
The school board meetings have turned into political battlegrounds nationwide as a group of GOP-aligned parents stage protests claiming their children are being indoctrinated with progressive ideology.
A Minnesota school board chairwoman stirred outrage last week after she demanded that parents announce their home address if they want to speak at public meetings – the latest flashpoint in the ongoing battle over the right to question administrators about COVID restrictions, CRT curriculums or any other controversial topics.
Jodi Sapp, the chairwoman of the Mankato school board, opened the meeting on October 18 by telling parents they cannot ask any questions unless they revealed their home address, according to the now viral video.
‘Each speaker is asked to state his or her name and home address for the record. Failure to do so will result in an individual not being allowed to speak,’ Sapp read aloud.
Trump predicted that the controversy surrounding the schools would boost Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin’s (left) chances of winning Tuesday’s election. Youngkin is running against the Democratic former governor, Terry McAuliffe (right)
‘Each speaker is allowed three minutes to speak, and the board will alert the speaker when their time is up. Failure to stop speaking (in time) will result in the ability to participate in future open forums.’
John Wicklund, a dad who at first refused to give his personal information before finally having to cave in, asked Sapp: ‘Do you consider us terrorists? Like a couple members have said online.’
‘Seems like we are, especially with the opening statements.’
The father’s question was in reference to a memo sent last week by the National School Boards Association that likened some parents of school children who have protested their child’s curriculum to domestic terrorists
The group has since apologized for the letter but not before Attorney General applauded the missive and called for the FBI to investigate such parents.
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Pictured: chairwoman of the Mankato school board Jodi Sapp, who can be seen in the viral video telling a man that he cannot speak unless he announced his home address during an October 18 meeting
Mankato resident John Wicklund, pictured center with cap, was forced to publicly state his home address in order to speak during the school district’s open forum on October 18
Wicklund, voiced his objections, but eventually provided his home address after attempting to negate doing so by citing concerns that his home could be targeted for vandalism.
‘My name is John Wicklund and I live in Mankato,’ he began.
‘Could I get your address please, John,’ Sapp responded.
‘I’d rather not, since I get so much property damage and eggs and everything else from… fun people and their friends.’
‘John you need to give your address,’ she repeated.
‘I live on 5th Street,’ he reluctantly said, before being allowed to ask questions.
‘How many acts of violence (have occurred on school grounds)? How many sexual assaults have happened in this school district?’
‘You can say the (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) are making you do this, but the government knows better.’
Sapp did not answer the dad in the video, giving him a curt ‘thank you, that’s the end of the open forum’.
The open forum’s policy change came after the school board’s October 4 meeting, where a number of parents criticized the school district mask’s mandate and vaccination policies, causing audience members to loudly applaud the community speakers.
School board meetings nationwide have become the battleground for parents and district officials in recent months, with many parents using the board meetings to protest the teaching of critical race theory and other controversial educational topics.
The Mankato meeting remained civil despite the testy moment between Sapp and Wicklund, however outrage did spill over onto social media after the video of their exchange went viral.
‘John you need to give your address,’ Sapp told the man. ‘I live on 5th Street,’ Wicklund reluctantly replied
The open forum’s policy change came after the school board’s October 4 meeting, where a number of parents criticized the school district mask’s mandate and vaccination policies
‘Time for the people of Mankato to remove all of the fascist school board members’ one person tweeted.
‘Payback is a b**** , right fascist Mankato MN school board dictator Jodi Sapp? You forced a parent to reveal their address so they could be doxxed & harassed. Hopefully people feel free to contact you now too,’ another wrote.
‘Looks like Mankato School Board needs a house cleaning. They forget that they work for the people of Mankato. I would suggest they start their house cleaning with that Jodi person,’ a third person tweeted.
‘In what universe is it okay to treat parents this way?! The school board works for the parents, not the other way around. Mankato parents need to start a recall petition for any school board member who support this kind of treatment of parents,’ another critic of the school board wrote.
‘None of the Board members list their home addresses on the Meet the Board site,’ one person tweeted, while providing a link to the website.
Meanwhile on Wednesday, Garland defended his memo which responded to threats aimed at school officials, while pushing back on criticism from Senate Republicans at a Judiciary Committee hearing.
The memo, Garland said, ‘responds to concerns about violence, threats of violence, other criminal conduct.’
‘Looks like Mankato School Board needs a house cleaning. They forget that they work for the people of Mankato. I would suggest they start their house cleaning with that Jodi person’
‘Payback is a b**** , right fascist Mankato MN school board dictator Jodi Sapp? You forced a parent to reveal their address so they could be doxxed & harassed’ one person tweeted
‘Time for the people of Mankata to remove all of the fascist school board members’ another tweeted
‘None of the Board members list their home addresses on the Meet the Board site,’ a third wrote
‘In what universe is it okay to treat parents this way?! The school board works for the parents, not the other way around,’ another person tweeted
‘That’s all it’s about, and all it asks, is for federal law enforcement to consult with, meet with local law enforcement to assess the circumstances, strategize about what may or may not be necessary to provide federal assistance, if it is necessary,’ Garland said in response to a question from Republican Senator Chuck Grassley.
Grassley’s fellow Republican Senator Tom Cotton tore into Garland during testimony, telling him to ‘resign in disgrace.’
‘Thank God you are not on the Supreme Court,’ the Arkansas Republican said, bringing up the touchy subject of Garland’s failed confirmation to the high court in 2016. President Obama appointed him and then-Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked his confirmation because it was an election year.
‘You should resign in disgrace,’ Cotton told Garland.
The senator was questioning Garland over a directive the Justice Department issued earlier this month promising more law enforcement resources for schools amid a rise in tensions and threats at school board meetings over matters like critical race theory, coronavirus precautions and transgender bathroom policies.
Cotton asked about a Loudoun County father who was dragged out of a school board meeting and arrested as he tried to tell the room his 15-year-old daughter had been raped by a boy dressed in a skirt at Stone Bridge High School in the girls’ bathroom.
Scott Smith says Loudoun County schools went out of their way to protect the child – ‘a sexual predator’. The school, which Smith accused of covering up the incident to protect its new policy allowing students to use the bathroom they identify with, still has not commented.
The incident reportedly took place on May 28 and Scott was arrested on June 22.
Two months after the incident, the boy – who has not been named because he is a juvenile – was arrested for forced sodomy.
‘Thank God you’re not on the Supreme Court, you should resign in disgrace’: Tom Cotton eviscerates Merrick Garland over new school board policy
Sen. Tom Cotton tore into Attorney General Merrick Garland during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, telling him to ‘resign in disgrace.’
‘Thank God you are not on the Supreme Court,’ the Arkansas Republican said, bringing up the touchy subject of Garland’s failed confirmation to the high court in 2016. President Obama appointed him and then-Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked his confirmation because it was an election year.
‘You should resign in disgrace,’ Cotton told Garland.
The senator was questioning Garland over a directive the Justice Department issued earlier this month promising more law enforcement resources for schools amid a rise in tensions and threats at school board meetings over matters like critical race theory, coronavirus precautions and transgender bathroom policies.
Cotton asked about a Loudoun County father who was dragged out of a school board meeting and arrested as he tried to tell the room his 15-year-old daughter had been raped by a boy dressed in a skirt at Stone Bridge High School in the girls’ bathroom.
Sen. Tom Cotton questioned AG Merrick Garland over a DOJ memo promising to address a ‘rise in crime’ at school board meetings
Scott Smith says Loudoun County schools went out of their way to protect the child – ‘a sexual predator’. The school, which Smith accused of covering up the incident to protect its new policy allowing students to use the bathroom they identify with, still has not commented.
The incident reportedly took place on May 28 and Scott was arrested on June 22.
Two months after the incident, the boy – who has not been named because he is a juvenile – was arrested for forced sodomy.
And in October, he was arrested again on different charges for allegedly assaulting a different girl, at a different school. He is now in a juvenile detention center.
‘Do you apologize to Scott Smith and his 15-year-old daughter, judge?’ Cotton asked Garland. Cotton said that controversy had prompted the DOJ’s stepping in.
Garland went on to say rape is ‘the most horrific crime I can imagine’ and that Scott is ‘entitled and protected by the First Amendment.’
‘This is shameful. Your testimony, your directive is shameful. Your performance is shameful,’ Cotton shot back.
At the meeting on June 22, Loudoun County School Superintendent Scott Ziegler said the school had never had any form of incident inside a bathroom or locker room involving a transgender child.
Scott Smith was arrested at a Loudoun County school board meeting on June 22 after his daughter, 15, was allegedly attacked by a boy in a dress
Smith was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after the June 22 meeting. He said he was trying to contain himself after listening to school board staff say they’d never had a report of a sexual assault in a bathroom, when that is what his daughter reported weeks earlier
‘To my knowledge, we don’t have any record of assaults occurring in our restrooms,’ he said first.
But a newly unearthed email reveals that on May 28, the day the alleged rape happened, he sent this email to colleagues confirming that it had been reported. ‘This afternoon, a female student alleged that a male student sexually assaulted her in the restroom,’ it read.
The Justice Department’s memo promising to step up enforcement against violence in school board meetings came after the National School Boards Association sent a letter to President Biden asking for help. The letter claimed that clashes between the school board and parents could amount to domestic terrorism.
The attorney general then applauded the letter, while calling for the FBI to investigate such parents.
But weeks later, the NSBA apologized for comparing parents to domestic terrorists.
‘As you all know, there has been extensive media and other attention recently around our letter to President Biden regarding threats and acts of violence against school board members,’ the NSBA wrote in a memo.
‘We wanted to write to you directly to address this matter.’
‘On behalf of NSBA, we regret and apologize for the letter,’ the NSBA said, noting that ‘there was no justification for some of the language included in the letter.’
The NSBA had called for the use of measures like the PATRIOT Act, which is typically used to address terrorism.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., asked Garland if he had any ‘second thoughts’ about his directive.
Scoot (left) and Jess Smith (right) are suing Loudon County under the provisions of Title X after their 15-year-old daughter was allegedly raped by a ‘skirt-wearing male student’ in a ‘gender fluid’ restroom at Stone Bridge High School in Leesburg, Virginia on May 28
‘I assume you’re going to revoke your extremely divisive memo that you said was instigated because of that letter?’ Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, also asked.
‘The letter that was subsequently sent does not change the association’s concern of violence or threats of violence. It alters some of the language in the letter … that we did not rely on and is not contained in my own memorandum,’ Garland said.
Garland said that he was not only concerned about school boards, but a ‘rising tide’ in violence against judges, prosecutors, election administrators, and others.
At one point, Cotton walked out of the hearing in a huff as Garland said he was ‘only trying to investigate violence.’
‘I’m done,’ Cotton said as he abruptly walked out of the room.
Garland’s memo, which prompted backlash from Republicans, promised to address the ‘rise in criminal conduct’ from parents directed at schools.
‘The Department takes these incidents seriously and is committed to using its authority and resources to discourage these threats, identify them when they occur and prosecute them when appropriate,’ the memo read.
‘In the coming days, the Department will announce a series of measures designed to address the rise in criminal conduct directed toward school personnel.’
Last week during a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Garland denied that the memo had anything to do with the Loudon County controversy, and argued nothing in the department’s memo infringed on free speech rights.
Garland was left aghast when GOP Sen. Marsha Blackburn asked him if conservative parents protesting ‘woke’ school board meetings are comparable to domestic terrorists like the ones who blew up a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995.
‘I have to tell you that it is with much disappointment that I have watched the DOJ be so politicized,’ the Tennessee Republican said. ‘The way things have been carried out when you look at the memo to parents, you heard a lot about that today, and it’s because we’re hearing a lot about that, and I just have to ask you, knowing that you really helped bring to justice those that caused the Oklahoma City bombings, would you really, honestly put parents in the same category as a Terry Nichols or a Timothy McVeigh?’
The Oklahoma City bombing was the deadliest terrorist attack before 9/11, and killed 168 people. Nichols and McVeigh were indicted as co-conspirators in the attack.
‘My god, absolutely not,’ Garland said at the suggestion.
Source: Daily Mail
