Please Take a Minute Today to Call Both of Your Senators to Oppose Confirmation of Betsy DeVos
The U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP ) Committee’s confirmation hearing on Betsy Devos, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Education, is scheduled for this coming Wednesday, January 11.
Today I am privileged to be part of a small group who will deliver a statement from a number of organizations to the local offices here in Cleveland of U.S. Senators Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman. I am delighted we’ll have the opportunity to talk with a staff person in our Senators’ local offices about why we believe Betsy DeVos is the wrong person to lead the U.S. Department of Education.
This blog has covered extensively all the reasons why Betsy DeVos—a billionaire philanthropist who has devoted her life and her money to opposing public schools and lobbying for school privatization through expanding vouchers and unregulated charter schools—should not be confirmed to lead the U.S. Department that oversees Title I, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, and the Department’s Office of Civil Rights.
Even if you have signed onto one of the many online petitions that are circulating to oppose the DeVos nomination, please make a phone call today to the offices of your two Senators. Tell the person who answers the phone that you oppose the confirmation of Betsy DeVos, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Education. The staff people in these offices are counting the phone calls they receive to support or to oppose confirmation of each nomination by President-elect Trump.
Make the phone call even if your Senator does not serve on the Senate HELP Committee, which is conducting this week’s hearing. DeVos’s confirmation will come before the entire U.S. Senate for a vote.
The Network for Public Education’s Campaign to Say ‘No’ to Betsy DeVos provides a toolkit including the phone numbers of the offices of all U.S. Senators. In the Network for Public Education’s toolkit, you will also find a couple of short sample scripts to help you when you make the call.
I will share that when I asked my own adult children who now live in other states to make calls to the offices of their Senators to oppose the DeVos confirmation, they didn’t even accuse me of nagging. They attended public schools and graduated from a public high school to which they are very loyal. They are determined that Betsy DeVos must not threaten public education, the institution that has been so important to them. They even asked some of their friends and colleagues to make calls.Please Take a Minute Today to Call Both of Your Senators to Oppose Confirmation of Betsy DeVos | janresseger:
