The Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction, Ryan Walters, announced a new education policy for the state on Thursday, which includes the allegation that there were “discrepancies” in the 2020 election, which President Donald Trump baselessly claims was stolen from him.
The new academic standards for social studies for the coming school year state that students should “identify discrepancies in 2020 elections results by looking at graphs and other information, including the sudden halting of ballot-counting in select cities in key battleground states, the security risks of mail-in balloting, sudden batch dumps, an unforeseen record number of voters, and the unprecedented contradiction of ‘bellweather county’ trends.”
This comes after the Oklahoma Senate declined to take action on a resolution that would reject the election denial language in the social studies standards, The Oklahoman noted earlier this week.
Walters lobbied against the resolution, and the far-right group Moms for Liberty issued a letter threatening to challenge any Republican lawmaker who voted for it.
Three new board members of the Oklahoma State Board of Education have said that Walters has been dishonest by making late changes to the standards without telling them or the public and by saying that the standards had to be approved during a meeting in late February, when they could have been put forward to the legislature for approval this week.
“Questions exist regarding the transparency of the subject matter standard adoption process,” the resolution states.
Last month, new board member Michael Tinney told The Oklahoman that there were differences in the standards he had downloaded from the website of the State Department of Education and what Walters had sent to him.
The section regarding students identifying “discrepancies in 2020 elections results” was among the differences.
Chris VanDenhende, also a new member of the education board, requested during a board meeting on April 24 that Walters share “change documents” to show the changes he had made to the standards. Walters rejected the suggestion, saying, “That’s completely irrelevant.”
During the meeting, Walters said it was his decision what goes into the standards, even as new board members pushed back. They couldn’t stop him as he decides what appears on the meeting agendas for the board.
On April 29, after the Oklahoma Senate chose not to take action on the resolution, Walters wrote on X that “Today is a major victory for Oklahoma families and for the truth. After months of Democrats and the teachers unions lying and attacking, the most unapologetically conservative, pro-America social studies standards in the nation are moving forward.”
“For nearly a year, we engaged in a thoughtful, transparent process to deliver standards that teach students factual history, including the realities of the 2020 election, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the threat posed by Communist China,” he added. “These reforms will reset our classrooms back to educating our children without liberal indoctrination.”
Moms For Liberty shared a letter on X on April 28 opposing the possible rejection of the standards, which they said were “truth-filled, anti-woke, and unapologetically conservative.”
“This is not about flawed standards; it is about political interference and media manipulation,” the letter stated. “Oklahoma’s adoption process for academic standards has been consistent, legal, and transparent.”
Oklahoma City state Senate Democratic Minority Leader Julia Kirt said that the chamber “had an opportunity to check Superintendent Ryan Walters’ power, and our Republican colleagues would not step up to put our kids first,” according to The Oklahoman.
“Parents, teachers and bipartisan community members throughout Oklahoma have reached out to us, calling on the Senate to reject teaching children these politically divisive, inaccurate, and age-inappropriate topics,” she added.
Meanwhile, Democratic state Rep. Cyndi Munson argued that the standards “insert an extremist political agenda into our public education system that will only cost Oklahomans more taxpayer money.”
