In response to news reports that President-elect Donald Trump has selected Betsy DeVos to serve as his Secretary of Education, Rabbi Jack Moline, President of Interfaith Alliance, issued the following response:
“Billionaire activist Betsy DeVos has dedicated years of her life and vast sums of money to undermining our nation’s public education system in favor of private, largely religious and politically conservative, institutions. She and her family have pursued these goals on parallel tracks: they directly fund conservative, private religious schools while promoting voucher schemes that would transfer vast sums of public funds into the coffers of these very institutions. That redistribution of public wealth would undermine the public school system on which the overwhelming majority of American children rely.
“The school voucher programs promoted by DeVos would also raise church-state concerns. Americans are always free to send their children to private schools and religious schools, but raiding the public treasury to subsidize private businesses and religious organizations runs against the public trust and the Constitution.
“President-elect Trump’s selection of DeVos is deeply disappointing. It suggests that he has little regard for our nation’s public schools or the constitutional principle of separation of church and state.”