Success Academy CEO Mocks Protesters Rallying Against Trump
HARLEM — The head of Success Academy charter schools openly mocked protesters as they rallied against her apparent support for Donald Trump Wednesday.
As a crowd gathered outside her East Harlem home, Moskowitz came out with her family, wished the crowd a "Happy Thanksgiving," then posed smiling with a sign that read: "Success Academy Threatened to Call 911 on 1st Graders. #GotToGo."
The stunt drew hisses from protesters who were angry that she gave Ivanka Trump a tour of one of her Harlem schools.
“And you wonder why we’re angry,” said Zakiyah Ansari, the advocacy director for the Alliance for Quality education who organized the rally with other nonprofit organizations.
Ivanka Trump visited Success Academy Harlem 1 charter school last Friday, apparently surprising even staffers there.
The tour was given a day after Moskowitz quashed rumors that President-elect Trump would tap her to be head of the Department of Education in his cabinet.
Ansari said she was appalled by the visit by the President-elect’s daughter because of the “the rhetoric and hate [President-elect Trump] has spewed for 18 months” against minority communities, particularly Muslims and Latinos.
“She had the audacity to bring this person into that school, which is 90 to 95 percent black and Latino,” she said.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, with whom Moskowitz has often sparred, said earlier this month Trump’s White House is linked to white supremacists following the hiring of Steve Bannon, the chairman of Breitbart Media, as a senior adviser.
Moskowitz's stunt Wednesday was also personal for Fatima Geidi, who pulled her son out of Upper West Success Academy two years ago.
“This is funny to her, but it is not funny,” Geidi said.
“What am I supposed to tell my black son?”
Geidi was a part of a PBS documentary on Success Academy and spoke out against the school.
Earlier this year, she filed a federal complaint against the school alleging discrimination and mistreatment against her son, who has special needs.
Others said Moskowitz should be doing more to quell anxiety brewing from the election.
“What are the conversations like in the school?” said one woman at the rally.
A representative from Success Academy did not respond to request for comment.Success Academy CEO Mocks Protesters Rallying Against Trump - East Harlem - DNAinfo New York:
