In the world of extremist politics conspiracy theories often hold sway. Some are hard to believe like 911 was an inside job, the existence of a blood drinking child trafficking ring led by Hillary Clinton operating out of the basement of a D.C. pizza parlor (which has no basement), and that Nancy Pelosi initiated the January 6 insurrection (presumably to stop the certification of the election her own party won). Others, like the idea that the JFK assassination was a coordinated effort, are easier to believe.
Among extremists today, the hard to believe conspiracy theories about local public schools abound with ideas like teachers are pedophiles and child groomers, librarians are pornographers, and schools are all teaching critical race theory. But one theory about vouchers may be a bit easier to believe.
This theory posits that Betsy DeVos, the former Secretary of Education under Trump, and Corey DeAngelis, self proclaimed “school choice evangelist” and “public figure” are part of a cabal of leaders that want to institute private school vouchers in order to usher in government control of private, religious, and home schools under a national school system. The theory seems to be picking up steam with the recent announcement that 4.7 million school children now receive billions of dollars in voucher money nationwide in order to attend religious schools.
Whether or not there is any truth to the notion that DeAngelis wants to ultimately impose government restrictions on religious schools is unknown but the fact that he is puported to be an atheist doesn’t help to quell the rumors.
The reality is, that as more religious schools are funded by the government there will likely be strings attached to the funding at some point. Those strings may ultimately impact instruction at those schools. Whether or not DeVos and DeAngelis intend for this to happen, it will likely happen anyway.
