Tennessee U.S. Representative Mark Green (R-TN-07) re-introduced legislation this week that would prohibit schools that violate their state’s laws regarding materials deemed harmful to children from receiving federal funds.
This week, I re-introduced my No Obscene Teaching in Our Schools Act to fight for our children.https://t.co/W9By8vpaKg pic.twitter.com/rCyM1viqCi
— Rep. Mark Green (@RepMarkGreen) August 31, 2023
Green’s No Obscene Teaching in Our Schools Act, also known as the NOT In Our Schools Act, was originally introduced in the 117th Congress last year. However, the bill failed to make it past the committee stage.
“As millions of students go back to school, my bill protects children from the far left’s campaign to push offensive and obscene material into our schools,” Green said in a statement. “This bill puts our children first by ensuring federal funds don’t go to schools that exploit the innocence of children. Parents send their children to school to learn—not be exposed to obscene materials. If a school breaks the law, states and parents should at the very least have the flexibility to divert a child’s education funding to a 529 plan.”
“My bill respects federalism,” Green added. “States should have the power to determine what curriculum is appropriate for their students, without the federal government using education funding to get around those decisions.”
Green’s filing of the bill comes two weeks after he sent a letter to the Clarksville-Montgomery County School System (CMCSS) concerning a seminar promoted to staff about using Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion to connect with students, as previously reported by The Tennessee Star.
The seminar included a presentation about how people who are white, male, cisgender, heterosexual, or Christian are considered “privileged,” while people of color and those who are nonbinary, polyamorous, or pagan are “oppressed.” The presentation also included a section that suggested there can be “trauma from language.”
In 2021, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed a bill into law that banned K-12 educators from teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) in the classroom, including beliefs that the U.S. is fundamentally racist, one race or sex is inherently superior to another race, and that a person is intrinsically privileged or oppressed due to their race.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network.
Photo “Mark Green” by Mark Green.
