The Weekly Memo is an email from Progress NC Action featuring messaging, talking points, and links of interest for the week ahead.

Anti-education zealot Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson joins extremist group Moms for Liberty as they hold advocacy day at NCGA

Members of the extremist anti-government organization Moms for Liberty met outside the North Carolina General Assembly earlier this week for its Legislative Days lobbying event and brought a special guest - Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson.

The right-wing anti-education group held a press conference on Wednesday morning where, among other things, they urged state lawmakers to make all North Carolina students take a U.S. citizen or naturalization test – in English – before they are allowed to graduate high school.

Robinson, the Republican gubernatorial candidate, was on hand to complain about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), "indoctrination," and "woke ideology,” issues that he preaches are prevalent in our schools.

“It's not diversity, equity, inclusion. It's what we used to search for in this country and what we used to search for in this country was discipline, excellence and intelligence," Robinson said, according to Spectrum News. “And in our schools, there are certain subjects and certain things that have no place. … They're supposed to be taught to read and write and do mathematics."

According to Robinson's past comments, those "certain subjects" appear to be science and social studies, among other topics.

“In [K-5th grade], we don’t need to be teaching social studies,” he wrote in his memoir. “We don’t need to be teaching science. We surely don’t need to be talking about equity and social justice.”

Brooke Weiss, the chair of the Mecklenburg County chapter of Moms for Liberty, explained to reporters why the group wants to require students to take a citizenship test.

“I think that people don’t even know what it means to be an American anymore. Rather than focus on diversity, we want to focus on what makes us all Americans,” Weiss said, apparently unaware that our diversity is exactly what makes America unique.

A spokesperson for Attorney General Josh Stein, who is running against Robinson, responded to the Moms for Liberty event with the lieutenant governor in a press statement.

“Our teachers deserve our respect and appreciation. Mark Robinson calls them ‘wicked people’ and ‘demons.’ He just wants to fight job-killing culture wars. Josh Stein understands the importance of strengthening public education and as Governor, he will fight for badly-needed investments that support teachers and students and help strengthen North Carolina’s future.”

Weiss said Moms for Liberty's mission "is to empower parents to stand for their own beliefs and their own rights."

Tamika Walker Kelly, president of the North Carolina Association of Educators, had a different view than Weiss, Moms for Liberty and Robinson.

“We need professional educators in charge of curriculum requirements, not politicians that peddle divisive conspiracy theories and want to ban science and social studies from our schools," she said.

While Robinson is more than happy to show up somewhere and yell for an hour about “wokeness”, he doesn’t like having to answer questions. As is often the case, neither he nor his campaign would answer any questions from the gathered news media.

NC Newsline reported that “Robinson’s sighting at the Legislative Building was relatively unusual” because even though it's his job as lieutenant governor to preside over the Senate, "unlike his predecessors in recent decades, [he] has rarely presided over Senate sessions during his three-and-a-half years in office."
Snip.
More...including hot links from the memo body here:
https://progressncaction.org/2024/06/anti-education-zealot-lt-gov-mark-robinson-joins-extremist-group-moms-for-liberty-as-they-hold-advocacy-day-at-ncga/
Sign up for the weekly memo here:
https://progressncaction.org/#Header