Texas Freedom Caucus Calls on Local School Boards to Leave State Organization

On Monday, the Texas Freedom Caucus submitted an open letter to Texas independent school districts, encouraging them to leave the Texas Association of School Boards. This followed the state chapter’s refusal to leave its national organization in light of the National School Boards Association comparing concerned parents to domestic terrorists in September.

“Since the Texas Association of School Boards refuses to do the right thing to sever ties with the clearly un-American organization called the National School Boards Association, it’s time for our local ISDs to leave TASB,” the caucus stated. “Parents are under attack, and it’s time for us to stand up and send a strong message supporting parental rights by no longer forcing taxpayers to pay for or belong to organizations that accuse sincerely concerned parents of domestic terrorism.”

Brief Background

The National School Boards Association (NSBA) submitted a letter on September 29 to the Biden administration, requesting that the U.S. Department of Justice use resources allocated for counter-terrorism efforts on parents who attend and participate in local school board meetings across the nation. The letter even went as far as to suggest the use of the Patriot Act and called these parents “domestic terrorists.”

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland responded on October 4 by issuing a memorandum calling for the creation of a task force to “facilitate the discussion of strategies for addressing threats against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff, and will open dedicated lines of communication for threat reporting, assessment, and response.”