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The U.S. House of Representatives on March 24 passed H.R. 5, the Parents’ Bill of Rights Act.
The bill passed the lower chamber in a 213–208 party-line vote.
Republicans easily defeated a Democrat measure to recommit the legislation to committee.
H.R. 5, the fulfillment of Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) long-promised “parental bill of rights,” would do several things, each with the overarching goal of ensuring that parents know what’s going on in their children’s classrooms.
The bill comes after COVID-19 restrictions led many parents to receive a better glimpse into their children’s education, as they were learning at home via their computers. Many parents learned in this setting about the far-left ideology being pushed in the classroom.
In turn, parents across the nation began showing up to school board meetings to protest the curriculum.
Later, Attorney General Merrick Garland was caught in an Oct. 4, 2021, memo offering federal resources and legal aid to states days after the National School Boards Association wrote a letter to President Joe Biden saying the country’s “public schools and its education leaders are under an immediate threat” from these parents and called verbal confrontations and other incidents at local school board meetings across the country “domestic terrorism and hate crimes.”
Since that memo came to light, McCarthy has vowed to deliver legislation to ensure that parents’ control over their children’s education is legally protected.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, made the issue his campaign’s primary concern. Voters rewarded Youngkin by giving him a wide-margin victory over his Democrat rival in the blue-leaning Dominion State.
The main component of the bill would require schools to publicly disclose the contents of their curriculum and library materials to parents. Currently, many schools teaching radical ideology do so without the parents’ knowledge.
Additionally, the bill would establish the right of parents to see their kids’ schools’ expenditures.
“Public schools are paid for by taxpayer dollars,” Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) said of the measure during a House Rules Committee hearing on the bill. “Mothers and fathers deserve financial transparency and to see how their money is being used.”
The bill would also ensure that parents are notified of, and give consent to, any medical procedure performed on their child on school grounds.
A similar provision would require that parents be notified of any violent activity on school grounds.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) said that the bill would establish new “checks and balances” for parents over their children’s education.
