Opposition grows over Senate confirmation of Betsy DeVos, Trump’s education nominee
DeVos Hearing 1/11: UPDATED Senate HELP Committee Members. Call today. - Network For Public Education
Public education was not much of an issue during the 2016 presidential campaign — but it sure is now as opposition grows to the Senate confirmation of Michigan billionaire Betsy DeVos, President-elect Donald Trump’s education secretary nominee, who once called the U.S. traditional public school system a “dead end.”
The confirmation hearing by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions had been set for Wednesday, but late Monday it was postponed until Jan. 17, with panel leaders releasing a statement saying the date was changed “at the request of the Senate leadership to accommodate the Senate schedule.” They did not note that Democrats had been pushing for a delay because an ethics review of DeVos has not been completed.
DeVos, a leader in the movement to privatize the U.S. public-education system, has quickly become a lightning rod in the education world since her nomination by Trump in November 2015.
Supporters say that as education secretary she would work to expand the range of choices that parents have in choosing a school for their children and that she is dedicated to giving every child an opportunity to succeed. Her critics say that her long advocacy for vouchers and her push for lax regulation of charter schools reveals an antipathy to public education; they point to an August 2015 speech in which she said that the traditional public education system is a “dead end” and that “government truly sucks.”
Thousands of people have signed petitions, started Twitter campaigns and called congressional offices urging that DeVos not be confirmed. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), expressing concern about the nomination, sent DeVos a long list of questions she wants answered, while Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), who has worked alongside DeVos on some school reform issues, said in a December interview with the 74, a news website, that he had has “serious” issues with her confirmation.
A coalition of more than 200 national nonprofit organizations on Monday sent a letter (see text below) to the Senate Education Committee accusing DeVos of seeking “to undermine bedrock American principles of equal opportunity, nondiscrimination and public education itself.” The Opposition grows over Senate confirmation of Betsy DeVos, Trump’s education nominee - The Washington Post: