EPIC: 427,000 Parents Respond to National School Board Association Labeling Them ‘Domestic Terrorists’ By Gwendolyn Sims
Last week, PJ Media covered the hysterical and threatening letter written by National School Boards Association (NSBA) president Viola Garcia. In the letter sent to none other than President Joe Biden, Garcia accused America’s concerned parents of threats, intimidation, and even “hate crimes” rising to the level of “domestic terrorism” for having the gall to speak up at their local school board meetings. The NSBA also requested “federal assistance to stop threats and acts of violence against school board members, school officials, and teachers.”
This week, however, the leaders of almost two dozen parent organizations fired back with a scathing letter of their own—and it is epic. The letter, written on behalf of members of several parent organizations, made clear that the NSBA’s claims of “hate” and “terrorism” were shameful:
NSBA cites a tiny number of minor incidents in order to insinuate that parents who are criticizing and protesting the decisions of school boards are engaging in, or may be engaging in, “domestic terrorism and hate crimes.” NSBA even invokes the PATRIOT Act. The association of legitimate protest with terrorism and violence reveals both your contempt for parents and your unwillingness to understand and hear the sincere cries of parents on behalf of their children. To equate parents with terrorists dishonors the thousands of victims of actual terrorism around the world. Have you no shame?
The parent organizations pointed out that the NSBA’s call for the federal government to use its power against parents was in itself a menacing and “thinly veiled threat, intended to intimidate into silence and submission the very constituents that [the NSBA] members ostensibly represent.” I mean, what else would you call asking the president to sic the Department of Justice, the FBI, Homeland Security, the Secret Service Assessment Center, and the Postal Service on America’s parents?
By contrast, America’s parent organizations “unequivocally oppose violence” and are made up of, not “domestic terrorists,” but “concerned citizens who care deeply about their community’s children – and who are concerned by the direction that America’s schools have taken.” It’s no secret many parents across the country are angry with what is happening (or not happening) in our taxpayer-funded schools:
Citizens are angry that school boards and school officials around the country are restricting access to public meetings, limiting public comment, and in some cases conducting business via text messages in violation of state open meetings laws.
They are angry that schools are charging them thousands of dollars in public records requests to view curriculum and training materials that impact their children and that should be open to the public by default.
They are angry that pandemic-related learning losses have compounded the already-low reading, writing, and math proficiency rates in America’s schools.
Parents are ultimately angry that rather than working to improve student achievement so our children actually learn in our country’s schools, “large numbers of districts have chosen to fund, often with hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money, ‘social justice’ and ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion’ programs with finite resources.”
It is very revealing that instead of listening to and addressing the concerns of parents, the NSBA chose “to smear their constituents rather than engage with them in good faith.” The concerns of parents are, of course, due to the leftist policies embraced and implemented by the school boards that are supposedly accountable to the parents of their respective districts.
“It is appalling that [NSBA] would choose to threaten your fellow Americans for having the courage to hold you accountable for your failures,” said the parent organizations. “We will not be bullied. We will not have our speech chilled. We have a constitutional right to petition our elected officials, and we will continue to do so” in order to “address and improve the quality of America’s public education system for all children.”
Bravo to America’s “parents, grandparents, and concerned citizens” for not being intimidated by the NSBA’s shameful tactics and for putting America’s children first in the face of blatant leftist bullying.
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