#CivilRights advocates, #historians & #Black political leaders sharply rebuked #Trump on Friday for his order, entitled “Restoring Truth & Sanity to American History.” They argued that his #ExecutiveOrder targeting the #Smithsonian Institution is his admin’s latest move to downplay how #race, #racism & #BlackAmericans themselves have shaped the nation’s story.
Today in Labor History March 22, 1886: Mark Twain, who was a lifelong member of the International Typographical Union, gave a speech entitled, “Knights of Labor: The New Dynasty.” In the speech, he commended the Knights’ commitment to fair treatment of all workers, regardless of race or gender. “When all the bricklayers, and all the machinists, and all the miners, and blacksmiths, and printers, and stevedores, and housepainters, and brakemen, and engineers . . . and factory hands, and all the shop girls, and all the sewing machine women, and all the telegraph operators, in a word, all the myriads of toilers in whom is slumbering the reality of that thing which you call Power, ...when these rise, call the vast spectacle by any deluding name that will please your ear, but the fact remains that a Nation has risen.”
#workingclass #LaborHistory #KnightsOfLabor #solidarity #union #MarkTwain #writer #author #books #fiction #race #gender @bookstadon
"Public schools have always been the epicenter of the right-wing culture war since the Supreme Court ruled segregation was unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education. Abortion, feminism, and LGBTQ+ rights were eventually added to the never-ending list of right-wing grievances."
~ Wajahat Ali
#Trump #Republicans #DepartmentofEducation #education #PublicEducation #PublicSchools #FederalGovernment #integration #race
https://thelefthook.substack.com/p/make-american-kids-dumb-and-segregated
“The only way fascism works, the only way authoritarianism works, is if the country is in chaos and mis-educated. So year after year, attacks on public education were not by accident. They were by design, they were strategic.”
~ Jamaal Bowman
Returning control of education to the states will assure poorer education, and also religious intrusion in the educational process.
#Trump #DepartmentofEducation #education #Project2025 #race #income #disability
/6
https://zeteo.com/p/deportations-and-dumbing-down-trump-attacks-education
"The politics of shutting down the Department of Education is another massive leak in his boat."
~ Dan Pfeiffer
#Trump #DepartmentofEducation #education #Project2025 #race #income #disability
/5
https://www.messageboxnews.com/p/trumps-politically-insane-decision
"The bulk of the education department’s budget is made up of federal grant and loan programs, including the $18.4bn Title I program that provides funding to low-income K-12 schools and the $15.5bn Idea program that helps cover the education costs for students with disabilities."
~ Jem Bartholomew
#Trump #DepartmentofEducation #education #Project2025 #race #income #disability
/4
"The governors who were there to cheer on this latest attack on public education all have one thing in common beyond their party affiliation: they are all pursuing disastrous education privatization schemes in their states."
~ David Pepper
Returning total control of education to the states will not only assure poorer educational outcomes, but will speed privatization.
#Trump #DepartmentofEducation #education #Project2025 #race #privatization
/3
https://davidpepper.substack.com/p/the-giveaway-trumps-anti-education
"In Trump’s America, quality education will be the prerogative of people who are wealthy, people who are white, people who are neurotypical. If your kid needs service for English as a second language or special education, you’re going to be out of luck if the administration gets its way."
The word "federal" linked to "education" has stuck in the craw of Trump's white Southern base since the integration period.
#Trump #DepartmentofEducation #education #Project2025 #race #class #income
/2
An article on the Defense Department website devoted to Jackie Robinson’s military career disappeared and then reappeared, generating significant backlash. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/sports/2025/03/21/baseball/mlb/jackie-robinson-bio-deleted/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #baseball #mlb #jackierobinson #usmilitary #us #donaldtrump #losangelesdodgers #race
The Way Texans Elect School Board Members Plays a Key Role in What Students in Diverse Districts Learn
—
In six Texas districts that used at-large voting systems, ideologically driven conservatives successfully helped elect school board members who have moved aggressively to ban or remove educational materials that teach children about diversity.
https://www.propublica.org/article/texas-school-boards-richardson-keller-at-large-voting?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
"The story the evangelical movement tells about itself is that it is a Bible-honoring rebuke to mainline churches that were absorbing progressive values and abandoning the historic tenets of the faith. In actuality, the evangelical movement became a vehicle driven by a culture war agenda that used its religion mostly to grant theological justification for its political ambitions."
~ Benny Belvedere
"To maintain this charade, they have brandished the Bible like a cudgel, bludgeoning poor people, people of color, the Indigenous, women, LGBTQ+ people, and others with tales of their supposed sinfulness meant to distract, demean, divide, and dispossess."
#religion #politics #ChristianNationalism #race #gender #Trump #evangelicals #MaleEntitlement #heterosexism #WhiteSupremacy #LGBTQ #women
/3
"The Christian nationalism, exceptionalism, and white supremacy ascendant in Trump 2.0 has evolved from a long genealogy that has enabled an elite strata of mostly white Christian men to rule society and amass enormous wealth and power throughout American history.
Such Christians have always anointed themselves with the lie of divine righteousness, while insisting that they are God’s chosen representatives on Earth."
"The battle of theologies taking place right now is anything but a new phenomenon, even if it’s at an inflection point, with life-and-death consequences for our democracy, Christianity itself, and those who are God’s greatest concern."
~ Liz Theoharis
#religion #politics #ChristianNationalism #race #gender #Trump #evangelicals #MaleEntitlement #heterosexism
/1
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/trump-christian-theology-nationalism/
As Silky Shah says, the Khalil case shows how migrant justice and Palestine solidarity are tied together:
"The Trump regime is now using the immigration enforcement apparatus to target people who criticize its policies or support ideas that it doesn’t approve of.:
#Musk #Trump #Republicans #authoritarianism #fascism #democracy #race #gender #DEI #purge #migrants #Palestine
/13
"What I have tried to say over and over again to those people in my writing is that your silence will not save you. Palestinian rights, trans rights, women’s rights: these are not separate issues. Unless you are a Maga supporter at the top of the food chain, the Trump administration will be coming for you too."
~ Arwa Mahdawi
#Musk #Trump #Republicans #authoritarianism #fascism #democracy #race #gender #DEI #purge
/12
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/mar/15/mahmoud-khalil-free-speech-civil-liberties
"Populism—the deliberate creation of a 'frontier of exclusion' between friends and enemies—and unaccountable power capture the style of politics today."
~ Tom G. Palmer
#Musk #Trump #Republicans #authoritarianism #fascism #democracy #race #gender #populism #DEI #purge
/10
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/the-apostles-of-strongman-politics
"A presidential campaign built on the Big Lie, and incorporating lots of little lies, is intolerant of images, voices or evidence at odds with its worldview. It has only one vision of America in mind, much of it fanciful, and so it will erase anyone not part of that narrative."
But if it's good my 401(k)….
Many of us voted to purge others of us and I suspect the purges are just starting.
#Musk #Trump #Republicans #authoritarianism #fascism #democracy #race #gender #military #DEI #purge
/9
As Moynihan notes, pictures of the most senior Black soldier to receive awards, Charles Calvin Rogers, have been removed from the Department of Defense website.
"The Trump presidency is, as much as anything, a project of purging and erasing large parts of America, of people, ideas, capacities, and knowledge."
#Musk #Trump #Republicans #authoritarianism #fascism #democracy #race #gender #military #DEI #purge
/8
"An NIH mural featuring Anthony Fauci was removed.
More systematically, it is also the removal of women, persons of color, and trans people, following executive orders around DEI and gender. Here, the removals signal the end one form of representation that valued inclusiveness and a broader understanding and acknowledgment of people whose stories were not always told."
#Musk #Trump #Republicans #authoritarianism #fascism #democracy #race #gender #military #DEI #purge
/7
