DeVos won't undo public education
WASHINGTON — In a sometimes contentious confirmation hearing, education secretary pick Betsy DeVos pledged that she would not seek to dismantle public schools amid questions by Democrats about her qualifications, political donations and longtime work advocating for charter schools and school choice.
DeVos said she would address “the needs of all parents and students” but that a one-size-fits-all model doesn’t work in education.
But Democrats on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee grilled the wealthy Republican donor on a range of issues from sexual assault to child care, students with disabilities and making public colleges and universities tuition-free.
Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont asked DeVos outright if she would have gotten the job had it not been for her family’s political contributions. “As a matter of fact I do think that there would be that possibility,” she responded. “I have worked very hard on behalf of parents and children for the last almost 30 years.”
Sen. Patty Murray of Washington state, the top Democrat on the committee, said she was “extremely disappointed” that DeVos had not finalized her financial and ethics disclosures ahead of the hearing. She also asked whether DeVos would divest herself of any family business enterprises that may represent a conflict of interest in her job, including one student loan refinancing company.
“Where conflicts are identified, they will be resolved. I will not be conflicted. Period,” DeVos said.
Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., a former education secretary, expressed confidence that DeVos is an “excellent” choice for the job.
DeVos said that if she is confirmed, she will take a salary of only $1.
She sidestepped a question about whether she would rein in the department’s Office for Civil Rights’ work to protect students from campus sexual assault. DeVos said she would “be looking very closely at how this has been regulated and handled and with great sensitivity to those who are victims.”
What if unwanted kissing and groping, like the behavior Donald Trump once bragged about, happened in a school, Murray asked. Would DeVos consider that sexual assault?
DeVos said yes.
Asked by Sanders about her views on tuition-free public colleges and universities, DeVos said: “I think we also have to consider the fact that there is nothing in life that is truly free. Somebody is going to pay for it.”
DeVos, the wife of Dick DeVos, the heir to the Amway marketing fortune, has spent more than two decades advocating for charter schools in her home state of Michigan, as well as promoting conservative religious values.
