Freshly-confirmed Education Secretary Betsy DeVos greeted an anxious-seeming assembly of her staff at the Education Department headquarters with reassuring remarks Wednesday afternoon. On an unseasonably warm day in Washington, the assembly hall was hot and stuffy, only more uncomfortable as department staff members filled the standing room and jostled against reporters.
Members of the press, no less sensitive to bureaucratic shifts than actual bureaucrats, groused about being grouped in a “press pit.” The department’s Obama-era communications team ushered reporters to the back of the hall rather than actually section them off—but the core of the old team, rumor has it (and Twitter confirms it), has joined the #Resistance.
Secretary DeVos’s inaugural remarks to the department alluded, unavoidably, to the public rancor surrounding her confirmation and the press coverage that eagerly amplified it. But only passingly. Whatever murmurings emanate from the “the pit” won’t sidetrack a leader called to serve.
A public-school-style handout, a grainy xerox at one point amended with ball point pen, told us which career bureaucrats would join DeVos on the stage. Phil Rosenfelt, acting secretary until DeVos’s swearing in, got a cheerful ovation for his defense of the department: “The best place to work, not to put a plug in.” A successful transition so far, he said, portends a coming harmony. “I know with Secretary DeVos we will be one family together.”
And as if to confirm the dissent would settle down, DeVos’s remarks—boilerplate pleasantries having established she was “humbled” and “thankful”—turned, charmingly, to the challenges of her confirmation. And more precisely to the group grousing in the back of the class: “So, let’s turn to recent headlines.” (At that, a huffy chortle rose from the back half of the press pit.)
“For me personally this confirmation process and the drama it engendered has been a bit of a bear,” she went on—in reference to a heavily memed moment from her Senate confirmation hearing, when she’d ventured that a Wyoming school beset by grizzly bears might need a gun on hand. At her allusion to the widely ridiculed exchange, a fuller laugh rippled around the room.
I’ve had to check my recording a couple of times: The published text of her remarks reads, “When we do disagree, let’s set an example by being sincere and honest, passionate but civil, while never losing sight of our shared mission. To everyone on this team, my challenge to you is simple: Be bold, think big, and act to serve students.” But I could have sworn she said “let’s set an example by being sincere and honest” and then put the challenge to everyone in this room, rather than “everyone on this team.” I heard wrong.
She’s not going to respond to a press that pilloried her, in other words. Because it’s too important that she address a department uncertain of what’s to come and overwhelmed by an unaccustomed swell of attention. Her rhetorical focus on coming together, open to each other’s bold ideas, and what looked like a warm and friendly receiving line afterward altogether painted a promising contrast to the small band of protesters who’d been marching around the department headquarters and chanting outside, “Welcome to your first day, we will not go away.” Nice day for it—but there’s a cold front coming and a winter storm in the forecast; presumably, they will go away fairly soon if they haven’t gone already.
