It is somehow fitting that during National School Choice Week Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer let loose on education department nominee Betsy DeVos, a long time champion of school choice.
The Wall Street Journal notes that the intensity of the assault "might have made Harry Reid blush, and it deserves notice as a sign of the political times." Here is a snippet:
“The president’s decision to ask Betsy DeVos to run the Department of Education should offend every single American man, woman, and child who has benefitted from the public education system in this country. Public education has lifted millions out of poverty, has put millions in good paying jobs,” Mr. Schumer declared in a statement. “Betsy DeVos would single-handedly decimate our public education system if she were confirmed. Her plan to privatize education would deprive students from a good public education, while helping students from wealthy families get another leg up.”
Of course DeVos does not want to destroy public schools but she does want parents to have more choicse and is a supporter of charter schools (which, by the way, are public schools).
As for putting the interests of the wealthy above other Americans, that is just Democratic boilerplate, which has become more and more meaningless, if not downright ludicrous, as the Democratic Party has transformed itself into the party of celebrities and the bicoastal rich.
Schumer's absurd charge denies that the truth that charters and vouchers help low-income families, whom Schumer apparently would like to keep in failing schools to satisfy the teacher union, a big Democratic donor. Vouchers and charter schools are aids to upward mobility, while failing public schools cheat not the wealthy but those kids have fewer choices.