Friends and neighbors –
Everywhere I go, I hear almost the same thing: give back the surplus. Give back the surplus. Give back the surplus.
Sadly, but not surprisingly, Senate Democrats are ignoring the public’s wishes. This week, they unveiled a giant $1.9 billion bonding proposal.
It has some worthy projects, like road and bridge funding and water infrastructure. It has plenty of questionable projects too. But what is more important is what it says about their priorities. Before giving a dime of the surplus back to taxpayers, they are racking up more debt on the state’s credit card.
It’s time for them to start putting Minnesotans first and stop playing political games. Before I can even consider supporting a bonding bill, I will need to see real action on tax relief and returning the surplus to the working folks who created it.
A controversial education proposal in the Senate
The Education Policy Committee reviewed the governor’s proposed education budget this week. It is a big bill, with a lot of controversial ideas:
- It establishes ‘ethnic studies’ with a Critical Race Theory definition, creating a damaging narrative of oppressors and victims. The bill requires ethnic studies to be embedded in all academic standards.
- It does very little to keep prevent another Feeding our Future food program scandal.
- It takes away local control and empowers the state education bureaucracy
- Grants immunity to teachers from any discipline for incorporating controversial curricula like CRT
Only about half of Minnesota students are reading at grade level. Republicans have been working to improve reading and other basic skills. But this bill ignores those important things and focuses instead on controversial and divisive social justice programs. It might make the Democrat base happy, but it won’t help students one bit.
One piece of good news is that people who have been flooding legislators’ inboxes with concerns about new homeschool reporting requirements had an impact. Democrats took that part out of the bill.
Contact me:
If you have any questions about any of these issues or any other issue the legislature is working on, please don’t hesitate to contact me any time. My email is Sen.Rich.Draheim@Senate.mn, and my phone number is 651-296-5558.
And please follow me on Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/SenatorRichDraheim/
It is a privilege to serve you.