Marco Rubio bill targets ‘racially hostile’ schools, critical race theory

Marco Rubio.

Despite the lack of any notable primary challenge, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio filed some new red-meat-message legislation.

Filed Friday by Rubio and two Republican colleagues, Indiana’s Sen. Mike Braun and Iowa’s Sen. Joni Ernst, the bill’s goal is to “protect students from racially hostile school environments caused by critical race theory.”

Students would be allowed to complain to the federal Department of Education, should they believe they’ve been taught they are “innately part of an oppressor class,” as the media release contends.

“Critical race theory is Marxist-inspired indoctrination and has absolutely no place in our schools,” Rubio said. “Teaching students that they are innately part of an oppressor class or oppressed class is part of the Left’s radical agenda to rewrite the history of America. We need to protect students and parents who are willing to stand up to critical race theory and the profound repercussions it has on our schools.”

Rubio’s bill wouldn’t affect Florida education in any meaningful way. Florida’s Board of Education banned critical race theory and other left-leaning attempts “to indoctrinate or persuade students to a particular point of view.”

The Protecting students from racial hostility legislation, if in the unlikely event a Democratic Congress passed it and Democratic President Joe Biden signed it into law, would compel the U.S. Department of Education to probe allegations about “curriculum, teaching, and counseling that promote divisive concepts and foster racially-hostile school environments.”

“The legislation would require OCR to enforce Title VI protections of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 when a complaint is brought forward by parents or students impacted by critical race theory curriculum. In order to increase transparency and enforcement, the legislation would require OCR to provide an annual report to Congress on the nature of these complaints, and report complaints to state Attorneys General offices,” a media release contends.

Rubio has been messaging on critical race theory as “indoctrination” all summer.

“I think this is hysteria. Part of a broader hysteria. But also a concerted effort to rewrite the history of America,” Rubio said in June.