There He Goes Again…
Gov. Glenn Youngkin seems to have a very public, barely restrained flirtation going with Jim Crow. Every time you think, well, he certainly doesn’t mean to embrace century-old views on slavery, race and equality, he lets loose another one.
Consider last week’s Washington Post observation about Youngkin’s persistent efforts to rid the English language of the word, equity.
"It was hard to miss the thread running through the race-related policies Gov. Glenn Youngkin purged from the Virginia education system last week for being 'divisive': Almost all featured some version of the word 'equity.'"
"'Resource equity' — gone. 'Responsibility to advance racial, social and economic equity' — gone. 'Virginia’s Equity Audit Tool' — gone. The effort echoed Youngkin’s push to rename the state’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion as the Office of Diversity, Opportunity and Inclusion, which the General Assembly rejected but which the administration has enacted on the state website anyway."
And the governor’s highly tuned political sensibilities surely made him aware that he was directing his assault on “equity” in the waning days of Black History Month.
Add to this Youngkin’s war on Critical Race Theory (CRT) in public schools--which we all know isn’t really a thing--unless your sixth grader is studying for the Bar Exam, followed by threats to defund any school that resists his nonsensical CRT ban (how do you resist a ban on something you aren’t teaching?). And then there is his twisted notion of banning “divisive concepts” (but only if they pertain to race, not if they are to discuss Donald Trump’s Big Lie).
Make no mistake, this has little to do with Virginia. Our governor is blowing these dog whistles as loudly as he can so as to be heard all across the country, to attract the kind of far-right funding and support required to mount a campaign for the White House.
We call on voters and elected representatives to contact the governor’s office demanding that he restrain his ambition long enough to serve one term in Richmond. He took an oath, which he should fulfill, to be governor of the entire Commonwealth, not merely the few loudest and wealthiest on the extreme right.
