At least seven of the 46 Senate Democrats who voted against Betsy DeVos, President Donald Trump’s newly-minted education secretary, currently send or once sent their own children or grandchildren to expensive private schools.
DeVos, a long-time school choice advocate from Michigan, was the architect of Detroit’s school charter system and formerly led the Alliance for School Choice advocacy group. She headed the American Federation for Children — which backs school choice for poor and underprivileged families — when Trump nominated her.
As The Daily Caller noted when DeVos was nominated, Trump has called school choice “the civil rights issue of our time,” especially for African-American children, who are unequally stuck in some of America’s worst public schools.
The National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers unsuccessfully vowed to defeat DeVos and pressured Democratic senators to vote against her. The two powerful teachers unions have donated lavishly to Democratic campaign war chests.
