LANSING, Mich. — Seven Republican state senators added their signatures to Sen. Jim Runestad’s letter urging the Michigan Association of School Boards (MASB) to withdraw its membership and affiliation from the National School Board Association (NSBA) following the organization’s push for the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute parents as “domestic terrorists.”
“Like you, we care very deeply about the future of our students, our families, and Michigan’s education system. We are especially concerned about the direction of local schooling, as well as the role that parents should be playing in their children’s education,” read the letter sent Monday to MASB Executive Director Don Wotruba.
“The NSBA’s disrespectful and antagonistic actions against parents — including the urging of federal authorities to probe and potentially prosecute parents as ‘domestic terrorists’ — raises serious concerns about the organization, its leadership, and its ability to advocate on behalf of local education in general.”
Several state school board associations, including those in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, have already voted to break ties with the NSBA, while others have publicly denounced the group’s Sept. 29 letter to President Biden insisting that parents protesting at school board meetings be investigated under the Patriot Act.
“Although the NSBA scrambled to publicly apologize for its appalling Sept. 29 letter, its more recently illuminated behind-the-scenes efforts to encourage the Biden administration to weaponize the federal government against parents amounts to an unforgivable attack on the principals of our constitutionally protected republic,” said Runestad, R-White Lake. “I understand the MASB has expressed its hesitancy to withdraw from the national association, but I do hope its members will ultimately do what’s best for students, parents, and our entire public education system.
“Furthermore, I encourage parents to continue to not shy away from their constitutional right and moral duty to peacefully advocate on behalf of their children against questionable school curriculums and policies. Parents are the ones who know what is in their children’s best interest, not government agents or boards.”
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