After Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced that 41% of math books submit to the state Department of Education were rejected, Democrats have demanded the state release the specific content in the texts that excluded the books, Politico reports.
In a Monday afternoon address, DeSantis stated that there was “impermissible” materials that were “indoctrinating” children, which if you think about, is what a math textbook is supposed to do for mathematical principles. DeSantis, however, claims that the 54 books are teaching students how to be gay and anti-white, which is patently absurb.
“You do have things like social and emotional learning, and some of the things that are more political in there,” DeSantis said of the textbooks, most of which were for grades kindergarten through fifth grade.
Democrats have demanded examples of the offending material, but Florida Republicans have been unable, or unwilling, to disclose it. To try to defend DeSantis’s decision, his press secretary, Christina Pushaw, tweeted a homework assignment for an English class related to Maya Angelou’s past as a prostitute and pimp.
“So instead of having a hissy fit because @GovRonDeSantis banned CRT math textbooks, ask yourself why CRT is being injected in math instruction to begin with?” Pushaw wrote on Twitter over the weekend. “I promise you, in China kids aren’t learning about pimping in math class.”
The problem with Pushaw’s claim is that Missouri is not in Florida, and the problem was not from a textbook, but was constructed by a specific teacher.
DeSantis “had three days to provide basic info on the 54 math books he banned from schools for allegedly ‘indoctrinating’ kids with CRT,” Democratic state legislator Carlos G. Smith tweeted. “The best his propaganda machine could do was deflect to a Missouri district that apologized for a homework assignment they didn’t approve.”
It’s possible that the publishers of the textbooks could sue to identify what material cause Florida to cancel them from curricula. It could also make a case if it’s found that Florida is directing purchase agreements to right-wing publishing houses that specialize in disinformation to keep students uneducated.