On this Salcedo Storm Podcast: Lynn Davenport is an education analyst and Executive Director of Families Engaged. She travels the state teaching parents and citizens how to exercise parental rights and use the law to fight lawlessness in government schools.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Most of you know by now that I am a supporter of parental school choice and education, freedom. And there’s a big reason why my mantra is the worst mistake we ever made was allowing the government to educate our children. Because the government typically has its own agenda.
It serves to perpetuate itself. And last, and big government bureaucracies are the reason why the bureaucracy was founded to begin with. You see it all over the United States, you see it with every agency in the federal government, from the FBI to the Department of injustice to all of these agencies where you become just a number.
And government grows to satisfy itself to make sure that it never ever, ever gets pared back. And these people look at government as some sort of a security blanket, a never ending job opportunity where performance is always secondary, and I think, sometimes tertiary. And I think gov Ed typifies this, the United States spends the most per capita for those of you who are recently gov educated.
That means per student, we spend more money per student than any other nation on the planet yet, academics, which is the only real measure of of education, academics, we are somewhere near the bottom of the middle of the pack among the industrialized nations. That’s absolutely absurd. And the reason is, is there has been a huge de emphasis on actual education, rather, indoctrination has been the focus of debate as of late, whether it be the LGBTQ ABCD EFG Cultural Marxism agenda, which again, they just use that particular subset of our people as a something to divide us.
Same thing with critical race theory teaching white kids to hate their skin color and teaching black and brown kids to hate YT. That’s why we call it the hate YT program. This has become the emphasis of Gov Ed. Also, an emphasis in gov Ed is the hatred and the denigration of Western civilization as led by the United States, hatred of our country, hatred of the West, and I think we’ve seen this manifest and the the myriad, multifaceted. Lots and lots of people showing up for these anti Israeli protests. And what do they call them?
Well, they call them occupiers they call them somehow colonizers, even though it was the Jewish state that was there, you know, going back 3000 years ago, but somehow they’re the colonizers. The reason why they call anybody who’s Western, whether it be the United States of America, whether it be Europeans, whether it be Israel, the reason why they get they come up with these pejorative names, is because really what they’re after is the the disintegration of Western civilization, which is this ideal of we the people rule.
What these people and on the left are about is the rule of an elite over the majority. And this is what they’re after at bottom, Bill Maher, who has been a creature of the left all these years finally coming on round to recognizing, hey, this is a, this is a battle for civilization. Listen.
“And finally know for all the progressives and academics who refer to Israel as an outpost of Western civilization like it’s a bad thing. Please note, Western civilization is what gave the world pretty much every goddamn liberal precept that liberals are supposed to adore. individual liberty, scientific inquiry, rule of law, religious freedom, women’s rights, human rights, democracy, trial by jury freedom of speech, please, somebody stopped us before we enlightened again.”
Yeah. By the way, folks, that’s that’s what used to be universal in the American experience. Not anymore. Now you have left wingers arguing, arguing against all of that, because of, I would argue 20, 30, 40 years of complete leftist control over our education system.
“And since one can find all these concepts in today’s Israel and virtually nowhere else in the Middle East, if anything, the world would be better place if it had more Israel’s, of course, this message falls on deaf ears to the current crop who reduce everything to being only victims or victimizers. So Israel is lumped in as the toxic fruit of the victimizing West, the irony being that all marginalized people live better today because of western ideals, not in spite of them.”
Now, hold on, hold on, folks. Did you get that? Now we used to teach our children universally, that Western civilization’s western values the Judeo Christian ethic of which, you know, Bill Maher spent, let’s beat let’s not kid ourselves, he spent most of his career Pooh poohing the Judeo Christian ethic which did give us the all the rights and liberties and, you know, the pursuit of science and the rule of law.
That that was the Judeo Christian ethic that gave us all of this and and the left wingers because it empowers you over a centralized governing authority. The leftists have been opposed to it all these years, and they’re finally figuring out ways to unwind everything.
“Martin Luther King used Henry David Thoreau’s essay civil disobedience to help shape the civil rights movement. The UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights owes its core to Rousseau and Voltaire.”
Yeah, Western civilization under attack courtesy I would I would posit to you, courtesy of left wingers occupation of gov ED. Now I have said I support universal school choice. I support the idea of education freedom. Now there are those who see the need for reform who don’t who say on one hand, yes, Gov Ed is failing. But they don’t like the idea of what I am proposing universal school choice, and education freedom.
They see the specter of government worming its way into private education in homeschooling using that mechanism. One of those individuals called me out on Twitter over this and in a not so flattering way. So this podcast, we don’t just basically talk to individuals who are singing from the same prayerbook we we do like the debate, folks. So that comes your way next on the Salcedo storm podcast.
Critics of the show you don’t need to be a supporter of mine or agree with me to be on this program. I enjoy the debate I want to get to the bottom of solutions to issues and it helps when you have somebody of like mind who may be either center or right leaning to offer a different perspective. So those perspectives are welcome here. Let me bring on Lynn Davenport is an education analyst and executive director of families engaged, she travels the state teaching Parents and Citizens how to exercise parents rights, and use the law to fight lawlessness in government schools. Lynn, welcome to the program.
Thank you, Chris, I appreciate the opportunity to talk with you.
Yes, ma’am. Let’s let’s start here, quote, Chris Salcedo has a very shallow understanding of the school choice Trojan horse. And if you probe him on the details of the banking schemes he can’t deliver, and neither can you and you’re making reference to the two representatives I had on the Newsmax show, discussing parental school choice and education freedom. So in your mind, where am I going wrong?
Well, the devils in the details. And that’s why I said you have a shallow understanding, because I know that I’ve listened to your show many times, and I understand your talking points. And those are shallow talking points. And if you really look at the mechanism, and the details in the financing of the school choice, dollars and the banking schemes, then you see the devil is in the details. And they’re really not only are they unconstitutional, but they set up a whole other a whole new avenue for fraud, waste, and abuse that actually grows government. And so I think most of the low information voters and those who like the the idea of taking the money and letting the money letting the money follow the child. That sounds great. But when you look at what it really means it’s deceptive semantics.
Well, what is it? What is it really so so tell me what it really means when when parents get to determine where that money which institution, it goes to? Why why is that not correct, in your view?
Well, because not only does the education savings account set up a new private vendor, up to five vendors can collect up to 5%. And actually can they can collect up to 10%. But the way that House or Senate Bill one was written by Senator Brandon Creighton, that allowed for the vendors to collect up to 5%. And then it runs through the Comptroller, which is another 3%. The bill actually grows government and that’s that’s fine, then my criticism of the the right, suppose it conservative right, is because they’re the big spenders in the legislation. I mean, the legislature, were the ones doing all the spending.
And when I’ve had lawmakers on the program, when I have I have said, look, to me, it’s a rather simple equation. You have a money that’s dedicated that every single but that sits in that seat inside of a gov ed school. They get money deposited for every but in that seat, correct. They get money from the state. So my contention is that money should go be transferred into a bank account. Under the parents name for the parents a direct once institution, it goes to with no strings attached. You can’t ask for qualifications. And again, I’m going to get into the constitutional argument you made here in a minute, because I think that’s fascinating, too. But every lawmaker that I’ve spoken to as I said, it’s got to be that simple. You’ve got to make it that simple. And I know that there have been proposals out there the Senate bill isn’t universal choice. Anyway. It’s it only impacts what one to 3% of kids if that. So it’s not even universal school choice as it is. So I know that’s not perfect. And I know that they’re not even doing any work on this over on the house. I haven’t seen a final bill which to give an analysis yet because it’s in constant state of flux. But I’ve said basically what I want and when I think every parent wants is the money that is directed toward the child that can right now only be cashed in a government institution that needs to be made available to any institution that parents sees fit and it’s really that simple. So talk to me about the constitutionality aspect.
So well okay, first of all, Article Seven For in the constant Texas Constitution makes provision for public free education. So the problem lies in the details of Article Seven where you propose a bill the two are incompatible, because you are to make for public free schools.
Now, how are they? How are they incompatible, because remember, you are to provide the schools which the state has done. And a parent can either go to that school that teaches critical race theory or LGBTQ ABCDEFG Cultural Marxism, that also breaks Texas laws like the ban on CRT, they can go to that school that defies Governor Abbott’s lawful orders and a prohibition of masks or the parent can go to another school. It’s it’s not the states denying the funding, the parents are given the choice as to whether or not the child goes there. So the funding is there for them. If they qualify, yes.
And we do have choice. I mean, a parent has the the right to send their child wherever they want. Now, what you’re really getting down to is do they have the money to send them there? Correct. So going back to the the constitutionality, you know, we are a representative form of government. And so these private entities, institutions, they don’t have the elected bodies, like the public schools do. So you’re talking about diverting funds into private hands. And once a private school, let me propose this, once a private school or homeschool family accepts the money that school is no longer private. If you accept the state dollars or the federal dollars doesn’t matter. They’re still tax dollars, there has to be accountability. And we’ve even heard the governor said over a year ago, he was at a you know, the big press thing. He does the big, like a stage for him. He was down in South Dallas. And he he said there will be accountability measures. Talking about school choice dollar.
Right. And I talked to the governor. I talked to the governor about that too. And several other proponents of the legislature saying look, under no circumstances can the state get their meat hooks, either into private schools or into homeschooling? There can’t be those types of strings attached and everybody I’ve spoken with again, there’s no final bill. So I can’t tell you whether or not they’ve they’ve adhered to that promise. They have insisted that they that there will be no strings attached. And I don’t there’s no such thing as government money. You and I both know that Lynne it’s it’s taxpayers money.
So well, let’s speak to that. So I’ve actually testified before the House and the Senate talking about this. Why don’t you just propose a clean bill? Why don’t you have a bill where the money never leaves your property taxes? They won’t do that. And that’s because this is an agenda. This is a Trojan horse. This is it’s a global agenda. It’s not just something that we’re talking about in Texas. They’ve been trying to propose this bush in 1994. We’re going on nearly 30 years where they’ve brought vouchers or some sort of school choice to the legislature every session, it sucks out the oxygen in the room. It takes all the energy, it creates an Please tell me you know about the galleon dialectic problem reaction solution, or since synthesis? This I’ve heard the argument. Yes. Yeah. So it creates the polarization. I’ve watched this for years.
And you have to hold on, let me stop you there. Let me stop you there the polarization. Because you it is in my mind, a difference between those who want to imbue in an elite few, all the decision, the power, the money, and those who want to distribute that power and that money among the many. So it isn’t centralized in one in one area. I don’t believe in an all powerful centralized governing authority over anything in this country, much less than education. So as you look at gov Ed’s administration of of what up where they have what they’ve done with all this unconditional money, it is a dumpster fire. Government is the worst possible investment for education that we could be making. Well, okay, it is the word. Can you win? I agree on that. It is the word Yeah, putting these educrats in charge. Again, you’ve got these this perversion being taught in in gov Ed, that racism being taught in gov Ed and teaching white kids to hate their own skin color and teaching black and brown kids to hate white people. That’s happening. We just talked about the the manifest the alleged Manifesto of the of the shooter up in Nashville and regurgitating all of these, these left wing talking points that these people are learning inside of Gov Ed. And it’s it’s a it’s an absolute dumpster fire with all them all the taxpayer money going to a centralized governing authority and letting them just make all these policy decisions. That’s it Not working. So my question to you Lynn is if what I’m proposing and what others are opposing education freedom and parental school choice isn’t the solution. What is?
Well, we we’ve got what I think that the since we’ve got the power and the majority in the legislature we have for decades. Well, I don’t know about. Yeah, well, look, I mean, I watched them get a bill through House Bill six, you know, five, and that was a technology vendor bill. And we had the votes to kill it, because it was a $2.44 billion. Bill, this is just in the last session, and you got Digg, weakly and TLR. Behind it, you’ve got TPPs. And all the policy logs are behind it. And the lobbyists and people like Dan Uberti, who used to be in the legislature, they’re all behind it, and they’re all gonna get paid. If it passes. Well, it did pass. And it passed with 100% of the Republican senators, with the exception of Bob Hall. And why so why are Republicans growing government? Why are they passing these bills? Education law.
I’m gonna ask the money guy, I’m gonna ask you again. Because look, if if parental school choice, universal parental school choice isn’t the answer. Then what is the achievable goal that that those who are I guess, I will submit to the beast, that’s what I’m saying.
That’s what I’m getting at. Well quit spending the money and we are in control. We got Mike morass at the helm of the TDA. He was appointed by the governor Don Huffines. was singing his praises at his his swearing in ceremony when he was what do you call it when they’re installed? Yeah, I can’t think of the term but yeah. Okay. So you got the right that I mean, government is key is the government and ask Brian Harrison, why are all these people so enamored with Mike morass, who is by all accounts of an educrats in a in a bureaucrat and a, he’s even a Marxist? I mean, the way he operates Now, I understand ground I know, I guess, Sally’s growing government, and this is coming from the right, they love him. So growing your patient.
Let me let me go back to your solution, which is starve the beast? What does a starve the beast Bill look like?
Okay, so you would repeal? Well, first of all, you would never send money to the federal government. So you would repeal ESA so we get our Texas legislature? I mean, our our US that you gotta get the Congress. You got to get everybody on board with it. I’ve heard louie Gohmert talk about this. We need everyone talking about this. Instead, all I talk about is those local school districts and CRT and I mean, it’s the same old talking point. Yeah, yeah. Okay, great that exists. But how do you starve the beast, you quit funding all of this from the top down, you get rid of the TA, we need to defund the TA we shouldn’t even have a TA we shouldn’t have a federal Department of Education. We’ve got to repeal the bills are in existence that drain the money from the taxpayers. Okay. So and we have to honor I don’t want to miss it was my one.
Hold off about it with my shallow understanding of of education. Let me just let me just see if I’m reading it, right, that you think our efforts should be getting rid of the Department of Education, which, by the way, isn’t a storied organization, it was only it was cursed upon this country by Jimmy Carter in the 1970s. And which I which I agree with, it’s a redundancy, it is another way for government to get its meat hooks into our people. I would if it went away tomorrow, I wouldn’t I wouldn’t shed any tears. You also say we need to get rid of state education. So what I’m hearing from you is government has no place in education.
No, I’m saying that we were supposed to be funding our schools with our property taxes. We are supposed to have public free schools in our neighborhoods. We are supposed to have locally elected board to represent us. Well. We are supposed to have a local education of a local disk.
But well, hold on, wait a minute board. What well, wait a minute, a board is government. A board is government. And it’s these boards that is putting pornography inside of Texas schools. And they do so with impunity. And if you show up to the board meeting your call and you complain about it, you’re called a terrorist and told you can’t speak. So again, I’m with you in and making sure because I don’t believe government has any role in education. I believe it should be.
We would differ in that because we none. I was educated. Were you educated by public schools? The government run schools. Yes. Back when they were public schools back then. Well, do you understand how we got here that came through bills and legislation and federal intrusion. And this was the schools were set up to fail a long time ago. Yeah, but that’ll be failing.
They’re failing our kids and that’s Kennedy was shot. Yeah, they’re failing. They’re failing our kids. And that’s again The status quo is unacceptable. And what I hear you still you don’t like the idea of parents having this of choice, you want to go you want to you want to work within a system that is already proven to fail. And I don’t.
I wanted to strive to argue that the system actually created the best the greatest nation on Earth. The system was is not the problem. Well, I was attacked, the system was set up to fail the system was yeah, the system was set up to fail laws. And that’s what I’m telling you, bill after bill after bill right now we’re leaving, hold on.
I’m only got a little bit time left cuz I’m up against the clock. So Lynn, look, we’re at right now we are living the fruits of this system. We are living the fruits of this system. And the system is a failure. Because it takes parents out of the decision making process. It removes those who are the stakeholders in the outcome, it removes them from the process. And the only way I know as a conservative to put them back in charge is to give them the power of the purse. Once these educrats and bureaucrats have to bend the knee to the taxpayer which is a dynamic which I am in favor of, then then you start getting what we call accountability, elsewise, if they don’t have to perform Lin, to do to get their money, that you just have some Dade feeling or the next shrub who wants to come in and write blank checks, and then tune out as to what’s going on in our schools. They don’t want it, they don’t want to administer it. They don’t want to police it. But they don’t want to give parents the power to do so either. And that’s wrong. It’s absolutely wrong. So, last word to you. What, how can how can we move forward? Because the status quo is unacceptable? Go ahead.
Yeah, well, I would say that we need to repeal the bills like Senate Bill 123, get the kids off the technology 123 That that puts government character traits in the schools, we’ve got too much money spent on the infrastructure of technology, that’s where the bulk of the money goes, get the kids off the devices returned to a classical education books, paper pencils, pay the teachers with the money saved on what we’re spending on the technology and all of the the, as you say, the indoctrination and and return the money to the taxpayers.
Quickest way in my opinion, Lynn to do that is to take the money out of the hands of the educrats and the bureaucrats and those who have no incentive to listen to what you just said they have no incentive they get your money already. The system, make sure they get the money. The minute somebody starts threatening to take money out of their pockets, you get their attention. The minute a parent can tell them screw you no, I’m not going to take my child to your indoctrination center, then they’ve got choices to make.
But right now they can do that. Now we have that choice right now right now.
That’s right. They have that challenge. The butts in the seat funding pull your child out? Sure, you can do that.
Yeah. A lot of parents have a don’t take the money, because every single bill I’ve seen thus far, has had strings attached. And that’s the bottom line. You can say we can Oh, we can protect we can write that into the bill. No, they will not do it. Not one legislator has presented one bill that was cleaned that did not have strings. Every single one of them has 28 Plus pages. Well, there you go. And that’s, that’s where you and I can agree. Genda Yeah. And the government Governor won’t sign it unless it has strings because he’s a globalist. We know he’s, he’s aligned to the World Economic Forum. This is the Trojan horse. They want all children to be folded into the system, public school, private school, charter school, homeschool all children.
That’s where you and I can that’s where you and I can agree. No strings, that if we do go down this road of parental school choice, no strings. it’s going to be the parents choice. They will have the power of the purse to make the determination at the best educate their child land. Thanks so much for the debate. Appreciate it. All right, folks, that’s gonna do it for this Salcedo storm podcast. Do me a favor, visit a couple of websites Texas scorecard.com and Chris salcedo.com. Of course Texas scorecard. That’s where you find all things impacting Texas. Chris salcedo.com is where you find all things meet. So from social media to the Chris Salcedo shows, on talk radio and on television, until we visit again, my friends remember this a society’s worth isn’t measured by how much power is stolen by an out of control government. It is measured by how much power is reserved for you and me. We the People stay safe out there. My friends.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
