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Texas: Rightwing Lt. Gov. Wants to Abolish Property Taxes and Public Schools

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2024 //
11

Chris Tomlinson, a columnist for The Houston Chronicle, writes here about the audacious, mendacious plan of Lt. Governor Dan Patrick to destroy public schools. Patrick was a talk-show host like Rush Limbaugh before he entered politics. In Texas, the Lt. Governor has more power than the Governor, so his actions must be closely scrutinized.

Dan Patrick hates public schools. He wants to abolish them and replace them with vouchers.

Tomlinson explains Dan Patrick’s malevolent plan:

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s fantasy of abolishing property taxes would set the state up for financial failure and end public education as we know it by placing a greater burden on low- and medium-income Texans.

The most powerful man in Texas politics wants you to believe he’s looking out for homeowners, but there’s always an unacknowledged goal for significant initiatives like this one. You need only look at who deposited $3 million in Patrick’s campaign account and who gave the record $6 million donation to Gov. Greg Abbott to boost private religious schools.

As lieutenant governor, Patrick appoints the leaders of Senate committees, sets their agendas and decides whether a piece of legislation gets a vote. Patrick also rewards senators who appease him and punishes those who don’t with his fat campaign war chest.

Last week, the lite guv ordered the Senate Finance Committee to “determine the effect on other state programs if general revenue were used to fully replace school property taxes, particularly during economic downturns.”

Rising property taxes are directly correlated to the growing cost of housing in Texas. When home or apartment values go up, so do taxes, and the two combined create a crisis across the country.

Median property taxes in Texas rose 26% between 2019 and 2023, according to data from real estate research firm CoreLogic, and first reported by Axios, an online news agency. In four years, the median payment rose to $4,916 from $3,900 as property values nationwide grew 40%.

Texas has crazy property taxes due to a convoluted system that protects the wealthy and pushes the burden of paying for government services onto low- and middle-income families.

To understand how and why, Texans must remember that we pay for schools through property taxes levied by school districts. The state is forbidden from collecting a property tax, so the Legislature depends primarily on sales taxes and severance taxes levied on oil and gas production.

The Texas Constitution also forbids an income tax, perpetuating the myth Texas is a low-tax state. The wealthy, who spend less of their income on retail purchases and real estate, get off easier than in other states. But the half of Texans who struggle to make ends meet pay a higher proportion of their income in sales and property taxes.

Most states rely on the proverbial three-legged stool of income, property and sales taxes to fairly charge families and businesses based on their ability to pay. Texas relies on only two legs, and Patrick is talking about kicking away one of them.

Patrick’s command comes less than a year after the Legislature took $18 billion from sales taxes and oil and gas severance taxes to pay down school taxes. Most of that money came from high crude oil and natural gas prices and a roaring economy that generated huge sales tax returns. The move marked the first tax reduction paid by most property owners in decades.

Ending property taxes is part of the Republican Party of Texas platform, but it would require collecting $73.5 billion from the remaining leg of the stool, the sales tax.

The state sales rate is 6.25%, while local authorities can collect up to 2% more. The Texas Taxpayers and Research Association in 2018 calculated the sales taxes would need to reach 25% to replace property taxes.

Right-wing fantasists will point at Texas’ colossal budget surplus last year as proof that lawmakers will only need to raise sales taxes a tiny bit. However, anyone who’s lived in Texas for a decade or more knows the fossil fuel business goes through boom-and-bust cycles.

During a bust in 2011, Texas lawmakers slashed school funding by $4 billion. When the money runs out, the Republicans who control every lever of power in Texas do not hesitate to sacrifice public education to avoid raising taxes. Even with last year’s windfall, they refused to give teachers a raise.

This is where school vouchers and property taxes collide. The billionaires backing Abbott and Patrick believe public schools are Marxist, woke indoctrination factories. They want to give parents vouchers to choose Christian nationalist indoctrination factories exempted from state or federal oversight.

The vouchers, though, are insufficient to cover private school tuition, so families must pay the difference. The GOP hopes to create a system in which the state pays a defined amount and normalizes parents’ paying the rest.

Don’t be fooled by promises of lower taxes; this is about killing public schools by underfunding them and shifting more of the burden onto young families and off the wealthy.

This malicious proposal could be politically palatable. There are some five million public school students in Texas. There are more than six million privately owned homes. The population of Texas is majority-minority, like the public school students. The Republican-dominated legislature is overwhelmingly white. Do the math. The people with the power, the people who pay the most property taxes, are white. Do they want to pay property taxes for other people’s children?

Award-winning opinion writer Chris Tomlinson writes commentary about money, politics and life in Texas. Sign up for his “Tomlinson’s Take” newsletter at houstonhchronicle.com/tomlinsonnewsletter or expressnews.com/tomlinsonnewsletter.

Categories Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, Evil, Extremism, For-Profit, Funding, Ignorance, Privatization, Religion, Republicans, Texas, Vouchers

Are Fetuses People, with the Rights of Other People?

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2024 //
60

The next frontier of the abortion debate is rapidly approaching. It is the movement to legislate that life begins at the instant of conception, and that fetuses in the womb (or stored in a tank in an In Vitro Fertilization clinic) are human beings, with the same rights as other human beings. Thus, to kill a fetus for any reason (e.g., to save the life of the mother, or because the pregnant girl is a 10-year-old victim of rape, or because the fetus has fatal abnormalities) is murder.

Are fetuses “natural persons?” Some people think so. They have the right to believe whatever they want, but they should not have the right to impose their beliefs on others.

But they are trying.

One-third of states have laws defining “fetal personhood.” In Georgia, individuals can claim a $3,000 tax deduction for an unborn child. The deduction applies even if there is a stillbirth or miscarriage. State auditors may have to dig into medical records to verify claims.

Critics complain that the state of Georgia is hypocritical: “This was not necessarily a good faith attempt to support people in pregnancy because, at the same time as this was being passed, we were still fighting to expand Medicaid coverage for pregnant people beyond 60 days after delivery,” [Kwajelyn Jackson, executive director of the Feminist Women’s Health Center in Atlanta] said. She also stressed the need to improve Georgia’s maternal mortality rates, which are the worst in the country, and address systemic racism within health care, which results in Black maternal mortality rates being twice as high as white women in the state.”

In Texas, a woman who was given a ticket for driving alone in the HOV lane claimed that she shouldn’t have to pay the ticket because she was 34 weeks pregnant. But Texas has not yet passed a fetal personhood law, so she was required to pay the ticket.

In several high-profile murder cases, men have been charged with a double homicide when they killed their pregnant wife.

Planned Parenthood is keeping watch on Republican efforts to pass a federal law recognizing “fetal personhood.”

Similar to what we’ve seen on the state level, anti-abortion members of Congress have pushed ”fetal personhood” attacks for years, and fights are expected to continue this spring. Federal lawmakers trying to ban abortion have tried to embed personhood language in maternal health bills, birth control bills, tax codes, child support laws, college savings plans, COVID-19 relief packages, and essential safety-net programs like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. And they aren’t stopping. Like other personhood attacks, if taken to its most extreme, this language could affect birth control — including the pill, IUDs, and emergency contraception.

Currently, 125 members in the House, including Speaker Mike Johnson, support the Life at Conception Act, a federal personhood bill that would extend all inalienable rights afforded to Americans by the Constitution to apply at all stages of life, including to fetuses and embryos. Last year, during the first full Congress since Dobbs, as many as 166 members signed on as co-sponsors.

This attempt to legally define when personhood begins would make all abortion illegal nationwide. And, like the legislation proposed at the state level, would have grave implications for a range of sexual and reproductive health care, including some forms of contraception, infertility treatment, and miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy management. This language could also, in some circumstances, subject health care providers to criminal charges. “Personhood” language in our federal code would take away people’s ability to make safe and healthy choices about their reproductive futures and well-being. 

Laws of this kind are troubling because they turn religious beliefs into legal mandates. They inject Big Government into the most intimate details of people’s private lives. And, they are profoundly hypocritical. The states that insist on “fetal personhood” are the very ones that oppose almost every federal or state program to improve the lives of children. They are states that reject the expansion of Medicaid, leaving large numbers of people without medical insurance; they are states that weaken child labor laws, allowing teens to work long hours in dangerous jobs. They are states whose elected representatives oppose extending the child tax credit, which cut child poverty in half during the year in which it was in effect. Almost any legislation you can think of that would have improved the lives of born children has been opposed by the same people who insist on “fetal personhood.”

What’s the lesson in all this? Each of us may see it differently.

Here’s what I conclude:

Republicans care passionately about fetuses and unborn children. Once they are born, the children are on their own.

Categories Extremism, Gender, Georgia, Privacy, Religion, Science

Steve Ruis: Why I’m Starting to Hate All Religions

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2024 //
137

Steve Ruis writes a blog called “Uncommon Sense.” In one of his recent posts, he explains why he is starting to hate religion, all religions. I think he is on to something. I was born Jewish. My children are Jewish, as are my grandchildren. But I am non-practicing. I am secular. I am sick of religious hatred, as Steve is. Yet I know that there seems to be something in human nature that causes people to hate others. I remember many years ago reading a book called “Idols of the Tribe: Group Identity and Political Change” by political scientist Harold R. Isaac. Isaac wrote about “the psychology of minor differences.” He gave example after example of groups that fought each other to the death, because “the other” was different. It might be religious or racial or ethnic or something else. One young person must kill another, drop bombs, for reasons long forgotten. Because.

Ruis writes:

I don’t want to hate anything . . . but . . .  I was recently watching a rather nice three-part BBC documentary on Persia and Iran. In college I took a course in ancient near eastern history but I only learned a smidgeon about Persia, so this was an opportunity to fill in the gaps in my understanding of history. Persia, one the first major empires, became over time a doormat for invaders, many, many invaders.

About 500 years ago an Islamic general decided to conquer Persia and made war and accomplished that goal. He was not conquering Persia to convert that country to Islam. Persia had been conquered by Arab invaders centuries before who had converted the entire country to Islam, essentially relegating Persia’s native religion, Zoroastrianism, to the dustbins of history. (As religions go, Zoroastrianism, to my tastes, was a superior religion, but . . . it still conferred the “divine rights of kings” onto their rulers, etc. There are an estimated 110,000–120,000 Zoroastrians left in the world from the millions previously.)

Back to the invasion of 500 years ago. The general, who made himself King of Persia, wasn’t converting the country to Islam, he was converting it from Sunni Islam to Shia Islam. For this many, many people died, economies were disrupted, buildings destroyed, etc. Then the people were forcefully converted from Sunni Islam to Shia Islam. Yes, that Islam, the religion of peace, whose holy book clearly states that no one is to come to Islam by force.

Never judge a religion based upon what they say, always look to what they do. Religions represent a terrible cost to human beings. Instead of focusing on things that make people’s lives better, wars are fought over imaginary differences. Religions make people stupid.

Obviously this is not the only case I base my conclusion upon. Currently Palestinians and Israelis are fighting a religious war. And the “Troubles” in Ireland are not that far in the past, the Nazi efforts to exterminate Jews and Gypsies, and then, the Croats and Serbs went at it . . . and then . . . there are myriad examples of religion being at the heart of wars and human misery.

The current actions of Christian nationalists here in the USA are part of the same picture.

Yes, I am an a-theist, and now I am an anti-religionist. If you are requesting special privileges because of your religion, I am against it. If you do not want your churches to pay taxes, I am against you.

A pox on all religions and their imaginary solaces and real damage they offer. If you are one who wants to convert the USA into a “Christian Nation,” fuck you and the horse you rode in on. You are just paving the way for turning us into an Islamic nation.

Categories Bigotry, Evil, Extremism, Religion

James Talarico: “There Is Nothing Christian About Christian Nationalism”

By dianeravitch
April 15, 2024 //
12

This is a beautiful statement by James Talarico, a Democratic member of the State Legislature of Texas.

I wish I had the time to transcribe it. The video is on Twitter. It is also here. I hope you can see it.

A brief paraphrase:

Jesus called on us to love our neighbors.

Not just our Christian neighbors.

Not just our straight neighbors.

Not justour male neighbors.

Not just our white neighbors.

Not just our rich neighbors.

All our neighbors.

Categories Religion, Texas

Bob Shepherd: A Review of a Review of “Slaying Goliath”

By dianeravitch
April 9, 2024 //
16

Forgive me for posting two reviews of my last book, which was published on January 20, 2020.

As I explained in the previous post, I did not see either of these reviews until long after they appeared in print. Slaying Goliath appeared just as COVID was beginning to make its mark, only a few weeks before it was recognized as a global pandemic. In writing the book, I wanted to celebrate the individuals and groups that demonstrated bravery in standing up to the powerful, richly endowed forces that were determined to privatize their public schools through charters or vouchers.

America’s public schools had educated generations of young people who created the most powerful, most culturally creative, most dynamic nation on earth. Yet there arose a cabal of billionaires and their functionaries who were determined to destroy public schools and turn them into privately-managed schools and to turn their funding over to private and religious schools.

Having worked for many years inside the conservative movement, I knew what was happening. I saw where the money was coming from, and I knew that politicians had been won over (bought) by campaign contributions.

Publishing a book at the same time as a global pandemic terrifies the world and endangers millions of people is bad timing, for sure.

But the most hurtful blow to me and the book was a mean-spirited review in The New York Times Book Review. The NYTBR is unquestionably the most important review that a book is likely to get. Its readership is huge. A bad review is a death knell. That’s the review I got. The reviewer, not an educator or education journalist, hated the book. Hated it. I found her review hard to read because she seemed to reviewing a different book.

I was completely unaware that Bob Shepherd reviewed the review. I didn’t see it until two or three years after it appeared. He wrote what I felt, but I, as the author, knew that it was very bad form to complain, and I did not.

So I happily post Bob Shepherd’s review of the review here.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Civil Rights, Common Core, Corporate Reform, Corruption, Curriculum, Dark Money, Democracy, DFER, Disruption, Education Industry, Failure, History, Hoax, Lies, Network for Public Education, Parent Groups, Privatization, Propaganda, Race to the Top, Racism, Religion, Segregation, Unions, Virtual Charter Schools, Vouchers, Walton Foundation

What Did Trump and Biden Do on Easter Sunday?

By dianeravitch
April 1, 2024 //
21

Thanks to our friend Rick Charvet for sharing this very interesting clip from “Morning Joe,” in which Mika B. describes how Trump and Biden each spent Easter.

Trump apparently did not go to church and didn’t have much time for his family. Instead, he spent the day posting comments on his social media platform Truth Social. He posted 77 times. Seventy-seven times. He even posted notes from members of his cult likening him to Jesus.

In what ways is he like Jesus? Jesus was a teacher, a man beloved for his kindness, humility, compassion, and love for those in poverty, those in greatest need.

From Matthew:

Jesus told him, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

But when the young man heard this, he went away sad, for he had many possessions.

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “I tell you the truth, it is very hard for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. I’ll say it again—it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God!

What did Biden do? He went to church with family.

Categories Biden, Billionaires, Education Reform, Religion, Trump

“Cabrini”: A Wonderful Film

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2024 //
17

I recently went to see “Cabrini,” the story of America’s first saint. It’s a wonderful film, and I highly recommend it.

Mother Cabrini, as she was known, founded an order of sisters in Italy that created orphanages and homes for poor children. She longed to launch a mission to China but the Pope denied her request and told her to go to America instead, where there were large numbers of impoverished Italian immigrants.

She and several of her sisters traveled by ship to New York City in 1889 and immediately established residence in the Five Points, a congested and dirty neighborhood teeming with indigent Italian immigrants. The sisters opened a home and school for vagrant children living in squalid conditions.

Mother Cabrini was always in frail health but she had an iron will and surmounted every obstacle that blocked her desire to serve. She was a fearless feminist. The Archbishop of New York was not welcoming but she overcame his opposition. The Mayor of the city tried to close down her orphanage and frustrate her plans to grow, but she persisted.

She was ingenious. She sought out a reporter for The New York Times, brought him to see the living conditions of her district, and he wrote about her work. Children were “living worse than rats,” in sewers under the streets, he wrote. Anything to stay alive. Mother Cabrini ran a school where they learned English but sang songs in Italian. She wanted them to fit into their new homeland but not to lose touch with their ancestral home.

Let me emphasize that while the story centers on a nun with an iron will, there is no religious propagandizing. None. It’s a movie about courage, dedication, kindness, and a fierce desire to help the neediest. Mother Cabrini eventually established orphanages and hospitals around the world.

The lesson that I took away from the film was about the hard life of immigrants and the valor of those who reached out to help them survive. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, there were no government services. People came pouring in and had to make it in their own or die from hunger and disease.

Mother Cabrini’s love for the immigrants of her time stand in sharp contrast to the political rhetoric of today, when they are vilified as rapists, drug dealers, murderers, invaders. Even the children.

As I watched the film, I found myself wishing that Trump might see it. I know he never will. Its message is not religious. It’s about kindness, compassion, dedication, and selflessness. He would say that Mother Cabrini was a radical socialist, a Communist, a sucker, a fool, and not his type.

In addition to the story line, I loved the depiction of early New York City (even though the credits say the film was made in Buffalo).

Categories Character, Courage, Creativity, Ethics, History, Media, Religion

Jemar Tisby: Three Years Ago, We Stopped the Publication of a “God Bless the USA” Bible

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2024 //
17

Jemar Tisby is an author, educator, historian, and faith leader. He graduated from Notre Dame, joined TFA, taught in Mississippi, became involved in religious work, and has written several books about religion and race.

As I researched his writing, I was impressed by a post called “Now We Call It White Christian Nationalism. It Used to Just Be Called the KKK.”

He writes here about his work with colleagues to a stop religious book publisher from issuing the “God Bless the USA” Bible in 2021.

He writes:

During Holy Week, Donald Trump posted a video promoting sales for the “God Bless the USA” Bible. 

The name is borrowed from a 1984 song of the same name by country singer, Lee Greenwood. 

Trump’s shameless peddling of God’s word for profit garnered intense backlash and commentary online, but the saga of the “God Bless the USA” Bible goes back further than the former president’s ad. 

Three years ago I was part of a group of Christian authors who successfully lobbied our publisher Zondervan, a division of Harper Collins publishing, to refrain from entering into an agreement to print the “God Bless the USA” Bible. 

HarperCollins Christian Publishing division, which includes Zondervan Publishing, owns the licensing rights to the New International Version (NIV) translation—the most popular modern English translation of the Bible. 

The company, Elite Source Pro, petitioned Zondervan for a quote but never entered into an agreement. Nevertheless, marketing for the “God Bless the USA” Bible advertised it as the NIV translation. 

Hugh Kirkpatrick heads up Elite Source Pro and spearheaded the effort to produce the “God Bless the USA” Bible. 

In an article at Religion Unplugged, where this story first broke in May 2021, Kirkpatrick explained the origins of this custom edition of the Bible. 

The idea began brewing in fall 2020 when Kirkpatrick and friends in the entertainment industry heard homeschool parents complain that public schools were not teaching American history anymore— not having students read and understand the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.

“We noticed the divide in the public where some people started seeing pro-American images like the flag, the bald eagle, the statue of liberty as weaponized tools of the Republican party, and we didn’t understand that,” Kirkpatrick said.

Then in the height of Black Lives Matter protests, activists began tearing down or destroying statues and monuments they connected to racial injustice.

“In past civilizations, libraries have been burned. Documents torn down. We started seeing statutes coming down and we started seeing history for good or bad trying to be erased,” Kirkpatrick said. “That’s when we started thinking, okay how far does this erasing of history go? Love it or hate it, it’s history. But how far does it go…? Part of having these statues … is so that we don’t repeat those same mistakes.”

A custom Bible inspired by reactionary sentiment opposing Black Lives Matter protests is concerning on its own. 

Kirkpatrick apparently failed to understand why Black people and many others would want to remove public homages to slaveholders and the violent rebellion they led against the United States. 

Nor did Kirkpatrick manage to spot the irony of printing a Bible that honors the United States while defending statues of Confederate leaders who attacked the Union.

Once the news that Zondervan was in talks to print this Bible came out, several Christian authors who had published with them approached me about publicly opposing the deal. 

All of my books, so far, have been published through Zondervan, including my forthcoming book The Spirit of Justice: Stories of Faith, Race, and Resistance.

I was eager to join in the protest….

The multi-year crusade to produce the “God Bless the USA” Bible demonstrates that white Christian nationalism is not going away, and its advocates have the will and the means to secure their desired ends. 

As we hurtle closer to the 2024 presidential election—likely a rematch between Biden and Trump—Christians must loudly and consistently oppose any movement to make Christianity synonymous with the political power structure. 

We must oppose the “God Bless the USA” Bible as white Christian nationalist propaganda because Jesus said, “I will build my church,” not “I will build this nation.”

Please open the link to finish reading this interesting story.

Categories Elections, Religion, Trump

Trump Is Now Selling $60 Bibles: Make America Pray Again

By dianeravitch
March 31, 2024 //
24

Donald J. Trump never misses an opportunity to make money from his cult followers. A few weeks ago, he introduced a line of Trump gold sneakers, embossed with an American flag. On the web, the gold sneakers are selling for as little as $49 and as much as $5,000.

Now Trump has a new product to sell, just in time for the Easter season: a “God Bless the USA Bible,” available for only $59.99.

Trump is working in partnership with singer Lee Greenwood to promote the USA Bible. Besides a King James Version translation, it includes the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence and the Pledge of Allegiance, as well as a handwritten chorus of the famous Lee Greenwood song.

Trump posted a sales pitch for the patriotic Christian Bible on social media.

In his video on Tuesday, Trump said: “Religion and Christianity are the biggest things missing from this country and I truly believe that we need to bring them back and we have to bring them back fast. I think it’s one of the biggest problems we have. That’s why our country is going haywire. We’ve lost religion in our country. All Americans need a Bible in their home, and I have many.”

His new product will please his evangelical followers. Perhaps it will distract them from his conviction for sexual assault, his trial for paying hush money to a porn star, and his multiple indictments.

Trump holds many firsts: the first President to be impeached twice; the first President to be tried for criminal acts; the first President to monetize his celebrity.

We should not be surprised that Trump has monetized the. Bile, since he has a lifetime of branding stuff and selling it to marks like a carnival conman. Steaks, an airline, a university, wine, casinos, perfume, coins with his face on them, etc.

Trump has also dabbled in NFTs, or nonfungible tokens, and last year reported earning between $100,000 and $1 million from a series of digital trading cards that portrayed him in cartoon-like images, including as an astronaut, a cowboy and a superhero.

Categories Elections, For-Profit, Religion, Trump

Hindu “Statesman” Will Move to Florida if DeSantis Signs the Bill to Let Him Guide Students

By dianeravitch
March 21, 2024 //
14

The legislature in Florida passed a bill to allow school districts to hire religious chaplains to help students in need of counseling. The bill awaits DeSantis’ signature. Pastors, priests, imams, ministers, rabbis, and other spiritual counselors are standing by.

The Miami Herald reports:

Gov. Ron DeSantis has yet to sign a bill that would allow chaplains to offer counseling in public schools, but one colorful religious figure says he is already eager to volunteer.

He’s a self-described “Hindu statesman” from Nevada who says he would like to bring “the wisdom of ancient Sanskrit scriptures” to students — perhaps not exactly what Florida lawmakers had in mind when they approved a bill that supporters tout as a way to make up for a shortage of mental health counselors in many schools.

The offer from Rajan Zed, president of the Universal Society of Hinduism, may amount to just his latest effort to raise his organization’s profile, but it also underlines concerns from critics. Mainly, that the bill’s vague definition of “counseling” will invite religious groups — whether they are Hindu, Christian or otherwise — to use it as a door to teaching their beliefs in secular school systems.

Florida has a shortage of guidance counselors, and the religious chaplains are supposed to replace the missing counselors.

“This is the beginning … of them trying to implement religion in some type of capacity back into our schools,” said Sen. Shevrin D. “Shev” Jones, D-Miami Gardens, referring to lawmakers who support the bill. “It just opens up the gate for other things.”

Jones, whose father is a pastor, said he’s concerned that the bill may lead to some schools allowing chaplains to preach to students who may not hold the same beliefs, putting them in uncomfortable situations. 

“In the words of one of my colleagues on the floor, ‘We need God back in our schools.’ But what about the child who doesn’t believe in God? What if some of the chaplains don’t resonate with the lives of those kids?” Jones said. 

He used an example of a chaplain dealing with an LGBTQ child or a child battling depression. “Has the chaplain been trained enough? Once they hear those concerns, where do they direct that child to go to?”

Categories DeSantis, Florida, Religion, Separation of church and state
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