OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Republican leaders across the U.S. are encouraging chapters of the conservative political group Turning Point USA in all public high schools in the wake last year’s assassination of co-founder Charlie Kirk, an effort they describe as countering the oppression of conservative voices in education.
The group’s endorsement by Republican governors — at least eight so far — has stirred debate about free speech in America’s schools, with
critics arguing many of the same conservative leaders have sought to silence others with measures to restrict what teachers can say on sex education, LGBTQ+ issues and other topics.
Adding to the divisions has been some governors’ invocation of Christian religion in their support of the clubs.
At her news conference last month announcing a partnership with Turning Point USA, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said God had worked through Kirk to grow the conservative group and that she hoped it would spark “the exact type of civic engagement that we want to see” among high school students.
“It’s never too early to learn the values of faith and freedom that power our country,” she said.
For Fayetteville High School student Lily Alderson in Arkansas, that crossed a line. Alderson, president of the school’s Young Democrats club, said the governor’s endorsement violates the requirement that governments not favor a particular religion.
“We’re a public school,” Alderson said. “We shouldn’t be a school — or a state, even — that is telling people what they should believe in.”
At the same high school, Lukas Klaus leads the local Turning Point USA chapter. As he sees it, the Republican governors are ensuring conservative voices like his are allowed to be heard.
“I’ve heard numerous other stories from around the states of Club America chapters trying to get started where they’re having serious problems with the administration straight-up saying ‘no,’ ” said Klaus. He said he has never heard of a public school disallowing a Young Democrats club.
In recent months, the Republican administrations of Nebraska, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Montana, Florida, Tennessee and Indiana have each announced partnerships with Turning Point USA to promote school chapters, called Club America, in every high school in those states.
Already, there are nearly 3,400 Club America chapters across the 50 states, according to Turning Point USA, which says it has more state partnerships in the works.
While the partnerships don’t require schools to establish the conservative clubs, they do make clear that efforts to start the clubs can’t be rejected by school administrators.
Turning Point USA got its start in 2012 on college campuses, promoting itself as a hub for young people committed to conservative values. Kirk was the co-founder and the face of the group, known best for his “ Prove Me Wrong ” events on college campuses where he invited students to challenge his conservative views on political and cultural issues. Kirk was killed by a sniper in early September while speaking on a college campus in Utah.
While Kirk was praised by conservatives as a champion of free speech, he was also criticized for comments that many other Americans found hateful toward LGBTQ+ communities, non-Christians, people of color and women.
Some of those critics faced a backlash from Republicans who saw them as dishonoring Kirk, leading to firings by universities, sports teams and media companies. Florida’s education commissioner also promised to investigate teachers over objectionable comments about Kirk. In Texas, a teachers union has sued the state’s education department, accusing it of an improper “wave of retaliation” against public school employees over their social media comments following the assassination.
The governors’ endorsements of Turning Point USA, to the exclusion of other student clubs, has come under criticism from teachers unions and civil liberties groups.
Tim Royers, president of the Nebraska State Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, said he could only imagine how Republican leaders would react if a Democratic governor announced they were calling for a democratic socialist club in every high school.
“They would be running to the press to talk about how awful that is,” Royers said. “How is this fundamentally any different?”
The American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas said the state’s support for the clubs amount to “differential treatment based on the content or viewpoint of the clubs, and a problem under the First Amendment.”
Turning Point USA spokesman Matt Shupe called objections from the ACLU hypocritical, noting the civic organization’s mission to protect free speech rights.
“The state of Arkansas is not forming our chapters; they’re not doing our job or our students’ jobs for us, nor are they saying other groups can’t be formed,” Shupe said in an email. “They’re simply stating students cannot be blocked from forming a Club America or a TPUSA college chapter when students want to start one.”
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Akbarzai reported from New York. ___
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