The “national shutdown” to get “ICE out of everywhere!” descended on major metropolitan cities last week. In all 50 states, more than 1,000 organizations joined together to engage in 300 “actions” — “this was just the beginning,” the website warns.
These are not new. “No Kings” rallies, Ukraine war supporters, and pro-Palestine protestors have become a mainstay on the steps of many state Houses. But here in Texas, the Pink Dome found itself surrounded by a curious cadre of demonstrators — school-age children.
Armed with signs (some silly, others edged with cynicism), hundreds of kids marched through the streets of downtown Austin as part of the demonstration tied to the growing anti-ICE obsession that has grown so furiously among the progressive-political left.
While law enforcement and school authorities monitored the situation on the ground, the walkouts clustered into gatherings of students, teachers, and a broader network of activists who quickly enveloped themselves into localized demonstrations as part of a larger, coordinated political spectacle.
In an email to parents, Austin ISD denied that the walkout was “sponsored or endorsed” by the district. However, videos from the protest across social media appeared to show badged staff walking alongside the students. And while the notice opined about the “desire” to keep kids in the classroom and how the ISD takes on the “responsibility” for the “safety” of kids “regardless if they are on our campus,” it readily admits that administrators and police remained with them during the anti-ICE protest.
And other student walk outs across the Lone Star State had many questioning the supposed organic nature of it all.
State Rep. Brad Buckley said it was “at least de facto endorsement of the walk out.” And Rep. Tom Oliverson was shocked that allowing this to happen is not already against the law — “bill filing will be here before you know it.”
Gov. Greg Abbott declared an investigation by TEA Commissioner Mike Morath: “Our schools are for educating our children, not political indoctrination.”
Across much of the K–12 system, an ideological orthodoxy is already well entrenched.
Classrooms are staffed by educators trained to transmit progressive moral frameworks as settled truth. The long march through the institutions begins early, with introducing students to political conclusions that are insulated from serious challenges.
Meanwhile, schools continue to fail our children. A decade-long slide in high schoolers’ reading and math performance has persisted as 12th graders’ scores dropped to their lowest level in more than 20 years. And the downward drift across grade levels and subject areas continues with rapid concern.
No wonder. After all, the goal for the progressive educator is not academic performance. In reality, many educators believe social justice should be the goal. They approach education with the mind that students should embrace anti-capitalist, anti-Western, and anti-racism activism and seek to embark on ideological projects of reorienting American life.
Austin ISD has remained among the most conspicuous offenders in this regard. Just a few years ago, it was providing students with information about “Police Free Schools” and “Let’s Talk Genders and Sexualities” and supplying documents that give praise to Kimberle Crenshaw and the Southern Poverty Law Center for their work on “intersectionality theory” and “how to respond to everyday bigotry.”
The mask of neutrality has now dropped — with little pretense of objectivity. The result is an educational environment in which activism is loudly encouraged and judgment is subordinated to compliance with prevailing progressive orthodoxies.
And while Texas lawmakers continue to pass statutes banning critical race theory, DEI, and gender ideology from K–12 classrooms, the deeper problem remains largely untouched.
The fact is, K-12 education has been occupied by those with radical worldviews. The anti-ICE protests are just the latest example. But after the brutal assassination of Charlie Kirk, those who adhere to the radical left-wing ideology (like many of our teachers) were more than eager to share their hatred online.
Victimhood culture and fetishizing transgression are just a means to the end for their destruction of Western culture. This all has seeped so deeply into the fabric of daily life that even those tasked with carrying out the average, everyday functions of our American life are willing to do whatever it takes to achieve these goals.
Thankfully, the left’s twisted goals were on full display last week. Maybe now something can finally be done about it.
