Democratic Rep. Jahana Hayes of Connecticut leveled Education Secretary Linda McMahon during a tense exchange at the House Education and Workforce Committee on Wednesday.
Hayes slammed McMahon’s attempts to separate Holocaust education from African American studies within what she considers to be diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.
“They are DEI programs!” Hayes said, explaining that both are essential programs for students to understand the diversity of their environments.
“You're talking out of both sides of your mouth,” she continued. “You can't support one without supporting the other, and looking at what happens in the schools and actually deferring to teachers, parents who are on curriculum committees, local boards of education, and states who actually do the hard work, and listening to what they say would be incredibly helpful in this role.”
Then fellow Democrat Rep. Mark Takano of California jumped in, trying to get McMahon to expand on her paper-thin definition of diversity.
“Does refusing to hire a Holocaust denier as a member of Harvard’s history department faculty count as an ideological litmus test?” he asked.
“I believe that there should be diversity of viewpoints relative to teachings and opinions on campuses,” McMahon answered.
McMahon has repeatedly refused to clarify whether President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting diversity applies to Black history and similar curricula, drawing well-deserved scorn from educators.
If she was angling for a better showing this time around than the one she gave on Tuesday in front of the Senate, she failed miserably.
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