Minnesota Governor Tim Walz echoed a claim frequently made by California Governor Gavin Newsom, asserting that Republican-led states have been “banning” books.
In reality, some conservative school boards and state officials are removing provocative and often explicit content from school libraries and curricula.
Curating a curriculum for age-appropriate material is not the same as “banning” books.
Left-wing activists advocate for students to be exposed to LGBTQ-themed books and concepts like Critical Race Theory.
Conservatives, on the other hand, aim to restrict sexual content, particularly for younger children, and prevent schools from promoting radical political ideologies.
This stance is not intended to ‘ban’ books but rather to ensure that educational materials are age-appropriate and free from ideological indoctrination.
Research in 2023 showed that 74% of the books that Democrats claim had been “banned” are actually still in school libraries.
Additionally, liberal states and school districts also restrict certain books from their curricula.
For example, a school district in Seattle removed Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird in 2022, and a district in California, under Governor Newsom’s jurisdiction, did so temporarily.
Furthermore, many public schools avoid teaching the Bible, even as literature, effectively leading to its exclusion from the classroom under liberal policies.
Left-wing censorship also reaches into academia and the private sector. At the University of Virginia, students attempted to cancel a speaking event by Abigail Shrier, author of Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters, which explores the challenges associated with transgender issues among girls. Additionally, Amazon has blocked advertisements for the book.
While there are cases of school districts going too far, and restricting access to books and authors that are probably good for children to read, these are debates about pedagogy, not attempts at censorship. Walz is simply wrong.
The separate claim that Minnesota was “banishing hunger” from schools has been dealt with in a separate fact check: Walz oversaw the largest COVID-era fraud in the country, as thieves stole $250 million from a child feeding program.
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