Vice President Mike Pence and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos Wednesday visited a North Carolina private school that has resumed in-person classes as part of the Trump administration’s pressure campaign on public schools to reopen.
Pence and DeVos, both maskless during their visit, spoke to fourth-grade students about the importance of education and met with school administrators, according to the Raleigh News and Observer. Before the visit, Pence tweeted, “To Open Up America Again is to open up schools again!”
As public schools nationwide announce that students will begin the fall semester online, the Trump administration has used visits like Wednesday’s to push public systems to adopt strategies already implemented by many private and religious schools. The school Pence and DeVos visited Wednesday, Thales Academy, is part of a network of classical schools that opened in mid-July with increased social distancing requirements.
These include frequent handwashing, daily temperature checks, and mask requirements for students older than 11. A staffer at one of the schools tested positive for the coronavirus in the first week back. But according to school officials, the areas with which the teacher had come into contact were disinfected, and classes would continue as normal. Pence praised students for their conduct during this “challenging time.”
Pence has been vocal about the need for reopening, recently saying that there are “greater risks” to children not being in school.
In the past month, private schools have advertised their relative freedom from coronavirus restrictions as an out for parents not wanting to keep their children home in another round of closures. Religious schools also may be protected from state-imposed closures, according to officials in Texas, where in mid-July Attorney General Ken Paxton stated that such schools can operate “free from any government mandate or interference.”
Paxton cited the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which prevents governments from treating religious institutions unfairly, as his justification. Many churches invoked RFRA in the spring when suing governors for suspending in-person church services. Religious liberty advocates said that they have already heard from religious schools preparing to make similar cases to remain open.
In California, where in mid-July Gov. Gavin Newsom required many schools to shut down for the fall, Jeremy Dys, an attorney at the legal nonprofit First Liberty Institute, said that as the restrictions stand now, it’s “constitutionally problematic” for the government to close schools yet at the same time allow businesses such as day cares to operate.
During a press conference last week, President Trump used the fact that many private and religious schools are reopening as leverage against states where public schools are hesitant to do the same.
“If schools do not reopen, the funding should go to parents to send their child to public, private, charter, religious, or homeschool of their choice,” Trump said of a school relief package likely to pass Congress. “The key word being ‘choice.’ If the school is closed, the money should follow the student so the parents and families are in control of their own decisions.”
Trump concluded that parents should be free to make the school decision that’s “best” for themselves and their children.
