Biden Justice Department spent $100 million on DEI, ‘restorative justice’ grants to schools
The Department of Education, which is part of the Biden Administration, doesn’t give out all federal grants for diversity, inclusion, and equity.
Parents Defending Education released a report on Thursday that revealed the Department of Justice has given more than $100 Million in federal grants in support of concepts such as DEI and “restorative Justice” for K-12 education between 2021-24.
The findings are less than one month after the organization released a report revealing that the Education Department spent more than $1 billion on grants to fund DEI hires and programs, as well as “mental health/social-emotional learning” under the Biden administration.
Erika Sanzi is the director of PDE’s outreach. She said, “[W]e also looked at the Department of Justice & found that they too spent over $100,000,000 pushing garbage initiatives which made schools less secure.”
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The DOJ awarded 102 grants worth $100,113.942 between 2021 and 24 to schools, universities, non-profit groups, and other organizations. These grants were designed to promote the concept of charged learning in nearly 950 districts across 36 states.
The report stated that nearly half the funding (or $45 million) went to programs “that mention social emotional learning or restorative practices in general” while $32 millions went to DEI related efforts.
A further $20 million was spent on hiring outside consultants who promote “divisive concepts like critical race theory, queer theory and critical gender theory”, while over $10 million went towards hiring a “new administrator” such as a facilitator of restorative justice.
Minnesota Department of Education received nearly two million dollars to “create safe environments where anti-racism, anti-oppression practices are embedded.”
The report stated that Bowling Green State University, in Ohio, was awarded $1.85m “to develop student-centered mental health curriculums in rural and poverty-stricken districts.” This included “mindfulness mediation, yoga and knitting circles.”
Penn State has received $1.78M for a project that aims to reduce cyberbullying among central Pennsylvania schoolchildren by promoting “equity and violence prevention” in order to include “People of Color, women, people with disabilities and the LGBTQIA+ Community.”
The DOJ offers STOP Grants since 2018 as part of the STOP School Violence Program. This program aims to “improve school climate by implementing innovative solutions.”
Report: The goal of improving the school climate is to phase out “exclusionary disciplines,” such as student suspensions and expulsions, and replace them with “restorative practice and social emotional learning.”
Restorative approaches often disrupt class time by bringing together both offenders and victims to talk about what happened and “repair the harm.”
The report stated that social emotional learning was “more insidious” than it might sound.
The parents’ group said that while SEL was initially intended to teach skills such as self-awareness and self-management and goal setting, a definition shift to ‘Transformative SEL,’ prioritises equity and ‘the Collective’. It has become another way to bring DEI to the classroom.
Back-to-back reports reveal that spending on the $8-billion DEI industry increased under the Biden Administration, but recent events suggest that the federal gravy-train may be coming crashing to a stop.
Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy and the other billionaires who have been selected to lead the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) proposed by Donald Trump, are already interested in taking on DEI’s grant system.
In a statement released on Thursday, PDE President Nicole Neily said that “this grant program, like so many others under Biden’s administration, was hijacked by activists to fund their priorities and undermine congressional intent.” “It’s little wonder the American people voted for change in November–bureaucrats beware, because DOGE is coming.”
The Washington Times contacted the Justice Department to get a comment.
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