The Department of Education (DOE) released a “toolkit” laying out its plans to use taxpayer funds to turn out young voters who are likely to vote blue.
The Biden administration has sought to use federal agencies — and their federal dollars — to conduct a “get-out-the-vote” scheme that appears designed to boost the president’s chances of reelection.
Biden signed Executive Order 14019 within weeks of taking office. The order, as President of the Foundation for Government Accountability Tarren Bragdon explained in a 2022 column for The Federalist, “directs all federal agencies to do what they can to increase voter registration and turnout, including by working with a select group of third-party organizations ‘approved’ by the White House.”
The DOE is now using these “Bidenbucks” to set up voter recruitment and indoctrination activities.
“Our education system plays a critical role in promoting and supporting participation for all students in the electoral process – from providing civic education during a student’s elementary and secondary school years to facilitating the voting process during a student’s postsecondary education,” wrote DOE Secretary Miguel Cardona.
Part of the plan includes urging colleges and universities to “identify additional communication opportunities” to help “encourage students” to register, creating a “broad coalition of interest groups” to be involved in voter registration work. According to Tufts University, more than 6 in 10 voters aged 18-29 voted for Biden in 2020.
Columbia College Chicago has already launched its own voter registration initiative to help students “motivate their peers about the importance of the youth vote and assist them in registering to vote and requesting vote-by-mail ballots.”
The plan resulted in 72 percent of students voting in the 2020 election, slightly higher than the nationwide student voting rate of 67 percent. Columbia College Chicago primarily hosts left-leaning students, according to Niche. College clubs include groups like “Students for Justice In Palestine” and “Trans Fam,” while any student groups based on politically conservative interests are notably missing.
The DOE guidance also suggested colleges and universities provide drop box locations and early voting sites for students.
But the administration doesn’t stop their efforts to turn out youth voters at college-aged students, most of whom likely meet the age threshold to vote. Rather, they’re expanding their efforts with your tax dollars all the way down to 5-year-olds who are still learning the alphabet!
Bidenbucks in the Kindergarten Classroom
The DOE suggests K-12 schools “provide opportunities in the classroom and through extracurricular activities for students to learn about our system of government and how they can participate.”
One of the “resources” provided by DOE for increasing civic engagement links back to a Tufts University page that says teaching kids about so-called disinformation “must be a key part of civic education.”
“Media literacy education teaches critical civic skills at a time when overwhelming amounts of content and rampant disinformation characterize the media landscape,” says Tufts’ Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, citing the “Covid-19 pandemic.”
The media and the left censored and committed outright character assassination of anyone who suggested the virus leaked from a lab, that masks provided little to no health benefits, or that students should be back in the classroom, characterizing such speech as mis- and disinformation. Concerns about students losing valuable time in the classroom were dismissed, with one of the largest teacher unions in the country, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), donating $1 million to the left-wing Senate Majority PAC in 2021 after Democrats voted against reopening public schools despite the negative effects on student’s education.
The DOE’s toolkit also recommends schools help students under the age of 18 to register to vote if state law permits.
Meanwhile, the two largest teacher’s unions, the AFT and the National Education Association (NEA), have donated millions to left-wing groups and organizations. The NEA and AFT devoted significant resources in 2022 to targeting conservatives, with the NEA labeling parents who spoke out at school board meetings against critical race theory as “extremists” and promoting literature about kneeling for the national anthem.
The Biden administration’s effort to use schools to increase turnout of likely Biden voters isn’t the first time the DOE has engaged in political meddling. In 2021, the National School Boards Association sent a letter to the Biden administration urging Attorney General Merrick Garland to investigate parents showing up to protest at school board meetings under “domestic terrorism” laws. The letter was later revealed to have been instigated by Secretary Cardona.
Brianna Lyman is an elections correspondent at The Federalist.
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