Ahead of the first night of the Republican chaos convention, the Michigan Democratic Party held a virtual press conference with AFT President David Hecker, Congressman Andy Levin, State Representative Sheryl Kennedy, and MSU student Eric Meyer.
During the call, they highlighted how Trump’s toxic record has created a school reopening crisis and forced chaos on Michigan families. For six months, Donald Trump has failed to contain COVID-19, and because of that teachers and parents are forced to make impossible decisions about their safety this fall. Trump and DeVos insist schools must reopen while the pandemic continues to rage and the administration still has no plan to address it.
“As our school year nears, Donald Trump is being careless with educators, school support staff and our students,” said AFT Michigan President David Hecker. “He and Betsy DeVos have shown nothing but reckless disregard for us while insisting our K-12 schools and universities reopen, no matter the threat. Instead of real plans, we got dictates by tweet. But it didn’t have to be this bad. With real leadership in Washington, six months into this pandemic, our state’s leaders wouldn’t be forced to scramble to get our students the education they deserve, or have to choose between staff and student safety and in-person education. That’s why we need Joe Biden.”
“Donald Trump’s response to COVID-19 is the greatest failure of executive leadership in the modern history of the presidency,” said Congressman Andy Levin. “And his enablers in the US House and Senate share full responsibility for this. Since we passed the HEROES Act, 4.2 million more Americans have been infected and 89,000 more have died. Yet Donald Trump is still denying billions in aid to our state governments and schools to help them reopen. Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell are sitting on their hands and doing nothing while denying students and teachers a safe reopening. Joe Biden’s leadership in crisis shows us he will get this pandemic under control, take education seriously, and get our kids back to school.”
“Our Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has failed us on school reopening,” said State Representative Sheryl Kennedy. “We want to return to school, but it is key that we do it safely- safely for our teachers, students, staff, and parents. Our state has turned to Betsy DeVos for a plan and guidance and all we heard were crickets. DeVos and Trump are not doing their jobs. And now, there’s no confidence for going back to school because this administration doesn’t have a plan. They’ve ignored science, ignored the experts, and have failed to communicate with local school leaders.”
“Donald Trump did not take the steps we need to control this pandemic, and now students like me are suffering the consequences,” said MSU student Eric Meyer. “He’s had six months to fix this crisis and come up with a plan, but instead he has ignored the warnings. Now, because of this failure, Michigan State has been forced to go virtual. It’s hard to describe how badly this has ruined the upcoming school year. The beautiful campus that originally drew me to Michigan State is now eerily empty. There won’t be students on campus, there won’t be football, there won’t be that community that makes MSU special. If we had a president who showed leadership here and got this under control, we might have been able to have students on campus, or maybe even college football. Instead, we’re looking at a semester ruined because of the chaos created by Donald Trump.”
