Parents whose mission it is to protest public school policies on race, gender and COVID-19 blasted Attorney General Merrick Garland for promising to “discourage” and prosecute “harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence” against school boards, administrators, teachers and staff.
Garland’s “mobilization of [the] FBI against parents is consistent with the complete weaponization of the federal government against ideological opponents,” Nicole Solas, a mother who is fighting against race-related curriculum, told Just the News.
“It ought to be the parents that need protection,” civil rights veteran Bob Woodson added.
President Trump said he was “somewhat surprised” by Garland’s move, but “nothing surprises [him] too much anymore.” He said parents were “very wounded by what’s taken place by, in many cases, radical left school boards.”
In a memo Monday night, Garland said the FBI and U.S. attorneys would have meetings with federal, state and local leaders to form “strategies for addressing threats.”
The Justice Department said in a press release that it would create “specialized training” for school boards and administrators to identify threats, report it to law enforcement and “capture and preserve evidence” to aid in prosecutions.
This comes after a letter from the National School Boards Association which claims that school boards face “domestic terrorism and hate crimes” from critics of mask mandates and promoters of “propaganda purporting the false inclusion of critical race theory.”
A coalition of parent activists responded: “The association of legitimate protest with terrorism and violence reveals both your contempt for parents and your unwillingness to understand and hear the sincere cries of parents on behalf of their children.”
“We will not be bullied,” they said. “We will not have our speech chilled.”
The Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism requested Garland ensure “any measures taken by the federal government will be fully authorized, appropriately tailored, and consistent with the broad civil and constitutional liberties” guaranteed to activists.
“[We] are confident that state and local law enforcement will use their legal authority to address” unlawful conduct, the group said. It added that a majority of concerned parents are “engaged in peaceful and lawful conduct.”
