Hijacked? How Politics Replaced Purpose in America’s Classrooms

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Mira la izquierda, mira la derecha, ¿qué ves? Where are you in this ever-changing world? What will you do next? Welcome to The Next Steps Show, your starting point for discussion y un poco de dirección.

Buenas tardes, ladies and gentlemen. Guess who’s back? It’s me, Peter Vazquez—the conservative neorecon, la voz de libertad. Today, we continue the conversation on faith, family, education, and the Vanboolzalness Crisis.

Joining me is Project 21 Ambassador Dr. Linda Lee Tarver with the National Center for Public Policy Research. She reminds us that God, country, and family are not partisan slogans—they are the foundation of our republic.

Education has become a battleground. New York spends more per student than almost any state in the nation, yet outcomes rank near the bottom. Rochester City School District, one of the highest-paid school boards in America, posts some of the lowest reading and math scores. Officials blame “urban issues,” but the real problem runs much deeper.

There is an intentional effort to keep people ignorant, particularly the poor and minorities. Entire systems profit from dependency and despair. People literally get paid off the illiteracy of our children. It is a modern form of slavery. Detroit students even sued for the right to read in 2016, and the state quietly settled during the pandemic. Imagine having to sue simply to learn.

Historically, it was once illegal to teach a slave or an Indigenous person to read. Those same motivations remain alive today, dressed in modern progressive language. Frederick Douglass once said, “Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.” Education is liberation. Teach a person to read and you empower them to think critically, to question authority, to dream bigger. That is why those who seek control undermine it.

My own father, a humble man from Puerto Rico with a third-grade education, taught me that freedom means being self-reliant—owning a home, protecting your family, and pursuing truth. Proverbs 22:6 tells us to “train up a child in the way he should go.” Education begins in the home, not in the bureaucracy of government.

Socialism thrives on control. To build its false utopia, it must first remove God, keep people ignorant, and make them dependent. When people cannot think critically, they are easily manipulated. The enemy uses deception, and we see it in policies that call evil good and good evil—teaching children gender confusion, sexualizing them early, and defending pornographic content in schools. It is spiritual warfare played out through politics.

Ezekiel 22:7 says, “Her officials are like wolves tearing their prey, shedding blood and destroying lives to make unjust gain.” That is what we see today in our cities, where liberal ideology and greed merge into one destructive force.

Women have a vital role in this fight. In her book Died in the Wool: A Biblical Guide for Republican Women, Dr. Tarver reminds us that God calls His daughters to lead. The daughters of Zelophehad fought for property rights and God honored their faith. Today, women must rise again—not as activists for chaos, but as advocates for truth, family, and freedom. Project 21’s Blueprint for a Better Deal for Black America lays out a plan rooted in liberty, dignity, and responsibility—principles that uplift every American.

For such a time as this, as the Book of Esther says, women are powerful.

In the second half of the show, we expose how America’s classrooms have been hijacked. Project 21 Ambassador and veteran educator Priscilla Rahn joins the conversation. With thirty-two years in the classroom and years of union leadership, she has seen firsthand how politics replaced purpose.

Teachers are leaving in record numbers, not because of pay, but because teaching has become secondary to ideology. They face overwhelming behavioral issues, oversized classes, and administrative bloat. Instead of focusing on literacy and critical thinking, they are forced into social engineering. Many conservative teachers—almost forty percent of union members—feel silenced.

Unions once stood for fairness. Now they exist for politics. In New York, nearly ninety-five percent of teachers are unionized. The state teachers’ PAC raised over fourteen million dollars, ninety percent of which went to Democrats. That money is not helping children—it is buying influence. Union leaders earn half a million dollars a year while classrooms crumble.

If that money truly served students, every child would be a Rhodes Scholar by now. Teachers must ask themselves, “Am I getting a return on my investment?” There are alternatives, such as the Teacher Freedom Alliance, offering free liability coverage without forcing teachers to fund political agendas.

The numbers in Rochester are heartbreaking—only sixteen percent of students are proficient in reading, fourteen percent in math, and over seventy percent are chronically absent. The district’s goal is to raise proficiency to forty percent by 2029. That is still failure by any honest standard. Billions have been spent for worse results.

The solution is clear: smaller classrooms, phonics-based literacy, discipline, parental authority, and a return to faith and family values. Without these, education will continue to fail.

Dr. Linda Lee Tarver and Priscilla Rahn prove that courage and conviction still exist in education. If you care about your children, your community, and your country, you must care about what happens in the classroom.

Be informed. Get involved. And remember—be a leader, be a voice for liberty. God bless these United States of America.