“I love the poorly educated.”

– Donald Trump

I dropped out of the Democratic party in 2017 during my second run for an LAUSD School Board seat. Frustrated by local Democratic clubs who ignored the party’s positions on public education and unions to endorse my opponent, Monica Garcia, I registered with the Green Party. With their stated opposition to charter schools, members of this party understood the dangers posed by these publicly funded private schools and were more supportive of my candidacy. Supporters of the Green party’s Congressional candidate, Keneth Meija, even distributed my literature as they canvassed within the shared parts of our districts.

Local Democrats were emboldened to support the privatization of education by the policies of the party’s leader, Barack Obama. His Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, was a hero of the Education “Reform” movement who heralded Hurricane Katrina as “the best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans” because it allowed charter schools to take over the entire education system in that city. Duncan also expanded the use of corporate standardized tests and pushed through Common Core without getting any input from education professionals.

There was a similarity between these education policies and those of the Republicans. Despite Trump's campaign pledge to repeal Common Core, it remained in place through the end of his presidency, probably because his Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos, strongly supported the program. The Amway heiress was chosen for this position despite her not having any professional education experience primarily because of the money she had spent supporting vouchers, charter schools, and other ways to defund public education.

This is not to suggest that the two parties were equivalent. As bad as Democratic education policies have been, the Republicans have been completely hostile toward anything to do with public education. While the party did not bother to publish a platform in 2020 beyond “the Republican Party has and will continue to enthusiastically support the President’s America-first agenda,” this year’s document promises “to close the Department of Education”. This would be devastating to the enforcement of civil rights laws in schools and would leave students with Special Education needs with fewer protections than they have now.

If Trump were to win a second term, the Project 2025 blueprint for his presidency details drastic changes to how education is approached. This includes:

• Eliminating Head Start child care programs that serve about 833,000 low-income children. This would greatly impact rural areas and young children with disabilities.

• The elimination of regulations that protect people from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

• Scaling back the federal school meals program so schools could no longer qualify without getting applications from each student.

• Shifting the $14.2 billion in federal money sent to schools for the education of school-aged children with disabilities to “no-strings” block grants to individual states.

• Convert the $18 billion in Title I funds that support the nation's poorest students to unrestricted block grants to the states and then eliminate it after ten years.

The nomination of Kamala Harris brings hope that the Democrats will finally break away from the Republicans and become defenders of Public Education students need. As Attorney General of California,  Harris was willing to take on the Charter School Industry’s powerful lobby and hold these private schools accountable for the public funding that they receive. This culminated in a lawsuit against the for-profit online charter school operator K12 Inc. alleging that the charter school operator “misled parents to induce them to enroll their children in K12 schools,” submitted inflated student attendance numbers, and entered into contracts with non-profit charter schools that were unfavorable and “put them deep in a financial hole.” This resulted in a $168.5 million settlement.

Joining Harris on the ticket is Governor Tim Walz, a former public school teacher and high school football coach. As governor of Minnesota Walz has signed a $2.3 billion education budget into law, provided Minnesota students free breakfast and lunch at school, and created thousands of new pre-k seats. This stands in stark contrast to 14 Republican governors who turned down federal money to feed low-income kids in the summer, depriving 10 million children with food insecurities of desperately needed assistance.

Having two defenders of public education on the ballot provides an opportunity to move away from the privatization efforts that have been embarked on by politicians from both major parties. Having one of their own on the ballot has resulted in endorsements, and financial support, from the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and the National Education Association (NEA). Hopefully, it will also mean that the future of education is taken away from corporate interests and given back to parents and teachers.

Carl Petersen is a parent advocate for public education, particularly for students with special education needs, who serves as the Education Chair for the Northridge East Neighborhood Council. As a Green Party candidate in LAUSD’s District 2 School Board race, he was endorsed by Network for Public Education (NPE) Action. Dr. Diane Ravitch has called him “a valiant fighter for public schools in Los Angeles.” For links to his blogs, please visit www.ChangeTheLAUSD.com. Opinions are his own.