Written by by REAGAN REESE at dailycaller.com
President Joe Biden summed up his education vision last year with a few words.
“There is no such thing as someone else’s child. No such thing as someone else’s child. Our nation’s children are all our children,” Biden said while honoring the 2023 teacher of the year.
Biden’s remarks triggered a firestorm among Republicans, education activists and parents alike.
Now those Biden critics are strategizing for a potential second Trump administration. Priorities have been outlined, shortlists have been drawn. Some are preparing to join the administration.
But it’ll be up to Trump to make his pick for the unheralded but critical cabinet spot of education secretary.
“It’s pretty much impossible to overstate the importance of the education secretary. Not just to Americans today, but to America’s future,” Angela Morabito, spokesperson for the Defense of Freedom Institute, told the Daily Caller.
“It is not a secret that our country is falling behind while we’re spending more per student on education than nearly anywhere else on Earth. And yet, our results are mediocre to put it generously,” Morabito said.
There’s been no shortage of anonymously sourced conjecture on who might take other cabinet roles. But the Secretary of Education has flown under the radar despite being a hot-button issue for Republican voters — and a position that influences the future of the country in a way that’s unique from any other.
The issue of education has exploded into the spotlight during Biden’s term after accelerating at a slow burn during the Obama years, which prompted a pendulum swing under Trump. Conservatives now have a set of priorities ranging from reeling in Title IX to rooting out bias from academia and teacher training.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced students into their homes and onto their computers for months of remote learning. In the summer of 2020, the killing of George Floyd sparked racial outrage throughout the country. In response, higher education institutions raced to affirm their anti-racism and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) bona fides.
The takeover runs deep — in just a handful of years of full-blown DEI capture of higher education, universities have churned out a generation of insubordinate anti-American bureaucrats, Orwellian tech overlords and a protester industrial complex. The ideological opponents of conservatives virtually all share one common trait: they were trained and equipped on American college campuses.