On Monday, Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) said during an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity that leftists are attempting to “jam” neo-Marxism concepts like CRT into the education of Florida public schools.
“It is pure indoctrination and it’s effectively neo-Marxism,” DeSantis said. “They’re trying to jam queer theory into this. They are trying to jam concepts like CRT. And so, that runs afoul of standards. So the Florida Board of Education rejected that proposed AP course.”
“The media lied about that too,” DeSantis continued. “They tried to say that the state of Florida, they don’t want to teach you about different aspects of African-American history. When in reality our state law and our state standards require teaching all aspects of U.S. history including history involving African-Americans from slavery on. We are doing it right because that is factual history. But we are not going to let them hijack that to try to advance a left-wing agenda.”
Earlier this year DeSantis proposed legislation that aimed to “further elevate civil discourse and intellectual freedom in higher education, further pushing back against the tactics of liberal elites who suppress free thought in the name of identity politics and indoctrination,” a press release from DeSantis’ office said.
“[The] legislation will ensure Florida’s public universities and colleges are grounded in the history and philosophy of Western Civilization; prohibit DEI, CRT and other discriminatory programs and barriers to learning; and course correct universities’ missions to align education for citizenship of the constitutional republic and Florida’s existing and emerging workforce needs,” the press release added.