Education Secretary Betsy DeVos' guns-in-schools proposal is landing like a lead balloon. Just about everybody who thinks that taxpayer dollars Congress has designated for public education should pay for education instead of guns is panning the proposal, but especially Democrats and, you know, actual teachers.
House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi didn't mince words, calling it "one of the most egregious, short-sighted and dangerous executive branch abuses of our education system in modern history," and accusing DeVos of leading an "anti-student and anti-teacher campaign on behalf of special interests and the NRA." Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, one of the party's leaders on gun violence since the Sandy Hook tragedy in his home state, immediately offered an amendment to a spending bill to block this misappropriation of funds. "The Secretary of Education cares more about the firearms industry's bottom line than the safety of our kids, and that should scare parents to death," he said.
Speaking on behalf of educators, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, followed suit, slamming DeVos for "trying “to do the bidding of the National Rifle Association and gun manufacturers. […] She wants to turn the U.S. government into an arms dealer for schools. That’s insane."
It's insane and it's more lawsuit fodder from this administration. Martin West, professor of education at Harvard University, explains Congress’ intent in passing the 2015 Every Student Success Act, the funding that DeVos wants to use for guns. "It seems very hard to imagine that members of Congress drafting Title IV envisioned that the funds would be used to arm teachers," he said.