Tennessee House Speaker Mulls Rejecting US Education Money

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — One in every of Tennessee’s most influential Republican lawmakers says the state ought to cease accepting the practically $1.8 billion of federal Okay-12 schooling {dollars} that assist present help for low-income college students, English learners and college students with disabilities.

Home Speaker Cameron Sexton advised The Related Press that he has launched a invoice to discover the thought throughout this yr’s legislative session and has begun discussions with Gov. Invoice Lee and different key GOP lawmakers.

“Mainly, we’ll have the ability to educate the children how Tennessee sees match,” Sexton stated, pointing that rejecting the cash would imply that Tennessee would now not have “federal authorities interference.”

Thus far, no state has efficiently rejected federal schooling funds at the same time as state and native officers have lengthy grumbled about among the necessities and testing that at instances come hooked up to the cash. The thought has additionally come up elsewhere in latest months amongst GOP officers, together with in Oklahoma and South Carolina.

Many Republican politicians and candidates on the federal stage have additionally made a behavior of calling for the outright elimination of the U.S. Division of Schooling.

Based on Sexton, Tennessee is presently within the monetary place to make use of state tax {dollars} to interchange federal schooling funds. He pointed to the $3.2 billion in new spending outlined in Gov. Lee’s latest finances proposal for the upcoming fiscal yr as proof that the state might simply cowl the federal authorities’s portion.

Federal {dollars} make up a small slice of Tennessee’s Okay-12 schooling funding, which had an nearly $8.3 billion finances as of fiscal yr 2023. But the federal cash is seen as a key instrument to supporting faculties in low-income areas and particular schooling.

Sexton says he has been mulling the proposal for some time, however this week, he publicly touted the thought in entrance of a packed room filled with lawmakers, lobbyists and different leaders on the Tennessee Farm Bureau luncheon on Tuesday.

“We as a state can lead the nation as soon as once more in telling the federal authorities that they’ll hold their cash and we’ll simply do issues the Tennessee method,” Sexton stated on the occasion. “And that ought to begin, at the start, with the Division of Schooling.”

Spokespersons for each Gov. Lee and Sen. Randy McNally appeared open to entertaining Sexton’s proposal.

“Though we haven’t seen the small print of the laws but, the governor is all the time interested by working with the speaker to make sure Tennessee college students have the very best entry to a high-quality schooling,” stated Lee’s spokesperson, Jade Byers.

McNally stated he was open to the proposal, saying that “federal mandates within the space of schooling will be overly burdensome.”

“McNally thinks a dialogue about forgoing this cash, a comparatively small a part of total schooling funding, to be able to preserve extra management over how we educate our Tennessee college students is a constructive dialog to have,” spokesperson Adam Kleinheider stated.

Democratic Rep. Bo Mitchell stated he had a number of issues about forgoing federal schooling funding, significantly understanding that the cash presently goes to help college students with disabilities and low-income college students.

“I’m involved about their rights and Tennessee having the ability to present these companies and uphold their rights,” Mitchell stated.

In Republican-dominant Tennessee, GOP lawmakers have more and more grow to be extra skeptical and combative over what’s taught inside public school rooms — significantly over race and gender points — and the insurance policies surrounding what companies faculties supply to college students.

To push again in opposition to these assaults, advocates have usually leveraged numerous federal funds the state receives as grounds to dam or problem numerous school-related bans. This has resulted in state and federal schooling officers usually being at odds with one another.

For instance, final September, the U.S. Division of Schooling reprimanded Tennessee for the way it was finishing up statewide testing, saying its issues “affect the state’s capacity to offer clear and clear info to the general public about college efficiency, but additionally consequence within the state utilizing info that isn’t comparable throughout faculties.”

In the meantime, Tennessee was among the many states to sue President Joe Biden ’s administration over a U.S. Division of Agriculture college meal program that prohibits discrimination based mostly on sexual orientation and gender id.

The lawsuit got here after the USDA introduced in Could that it will embrace discrimination based mostly on sexual orientation and gender id as a violation of Title IX, the sweeping 1972 regulation that ensures fairness between the sexes in “any schooling program or exercise receiving Federal monetary help.”

And in 2021, the federal division opened investigations into Tennessee and 4 different Republican-led states which have banned or restricted masks necessities in faculties, saying the insurance policies might quantity to discrimination in opposition to college students with disabilities or well being circumstances.

But it’s unclear whether or not Tennessee would have fewer conflicts with the federal authorities if the state selected to forgo the schooling funding. Whereas the U.S. Structure says public schooling is a state duty, states are nonetheless required to comply with federal legal guidelines.

Individually, in January, Tennessee sparked nationwide consideration when state’s Division of Well being introduced it was strolling away from practically $9 million in federal funding designed to stop and deal with HIV.

In a letter despatched to suppliers, the state introduced that it believes “it’s in the very best curiosity of Tennesseans for the state to imagine direct monetary and managerial duty for these companies.”