School Board Group That Called Parents 'Domestic Terrorists' Also Wanted National Guard, Military Police Deployed

A draft form of the National School Boards Association's (NSBA) September 2021 letter asking the Biden administration to investigate alleged threats and violence from concerned parents over their children's education, also asked for the Army National Guard and military police to be called in to monitor schools.

"We ask that the Army National Guard and its Military Police be deployed to certain school districts and related events where students and school personnel have been subjected to acts and threats of violence," the draft read, according to the NSBA's internal review conducted by attorney Philip Kiko and the law firm of Michael Best & Friedrich LLP. 

"The letter directly contradicts our core commitments to parent engagement, local control, and nonpartisanship," said NSBA Executive Director & CEO John Heim in a press release. "The sentiments shared in the letter do not represent the views or position of the NSBA. The NSBA does not seek or advocate for federal law enforcement intervention at local school board meetings."

The NSBA's 57-page final report on the letter sent to President Joe Biden can be viewed here. 

The organization said it is implementing a number of policy changes to ensure this does not happen again. 

The NSBA also posted its core commitments as an organization. These include:

• We are nonpartisan and are committed to using our voice to advocate for federal policies that strengthen public education.
• We advocate for local control and believe decisions about a child's education are best made at the local level.
• We are committed to parent engagement and understand that the role of parents in their child's education is paramount.

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As CBN News reported last October, the NSBA apologized for the initial letter that was sent to the Biden administration. 

"As you all know, there has been extensive media and other attention recently around our letter to President Biden regarding threats and acts of violence against school board members," the NSBA wrote in a memo.

"We wanted to write to you directly to address this matter. On behalf of NSBA, we regret and apologize for the letter," the organization wrote, noting that "there was no justification for some of the language included in the letter."

The initial 6-page letter sent on September 29, asked the administration to examine whether parental outrage at school-board members over mask mandates and "propaganda purporting the false inclusion of critical race theory" required a federal investigation.

"As these acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials have increased, the classification of these heinous actions could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes," it read.

The Washington Free Beacon reported that the letter was coordinated with the Biden Administration prior to its release. 

The backlash over the NSBA letter has led to school boards in more than 20 states leaving the association. The Texas Association of School Boards on Monday became the latest group to end its NSBA membership. The organization said after the release of the NSBA's independent investigation it found operational deficiencies and a lack of internal controls and processes within NSBA, according to a press release. 

The Biden administration initially showed strong support for the same themes raised by the NSBA. On Oct. 4, Attorney General Merrick Garland announced that the FBI was looking into what he called "a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff."

But during a contentious hearing on Capitol Hill that followed, Garland told Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) that no one at the White House had talked to him about the NSBA letter.

Garland also insisted during the hearing that the DOJ was not going to investigate parents who take issue with school board policies. 

As CBN News reported earlier this month, Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee told the Attorney General in a letter that they have further evidence that the FBI did, in fact, monitor parents who spoke up against local school board policies. 

They say the evidence came from whistleblowers within the FBI who reveal that the FBI, through its Counterterrorism Division, created EDUOFFICIALS "threat tags" to monitor angry parents at school board meetings. The FBI's leads allegedly came from an FBI-created "snitch line" used by opponents of the parents.