Charlie Kirk Debates Teacher on Department of Education: Why Federal Control Is Failing American Students

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[00:37] All right, Charlie. So, I ran for I ran

[00:40] for state senate because our government

[00:42] doesn't work well. There's a lot of

[00:43] waste. There's a lot of bloat. And yet,

[00:45] the things that you're advocating about

[00:47] going against are what help people.

[00:50] Everybody here is Everybody's here

[00:52] because they support freedom. Because,

[00:54] as you say, we want a freer market. We

[00:55] want a freer place. And yet these

[00:57] policies like destroying the Department

[00:58] of Education, which I'm a teacher for,

[01:00] hurts our ability to uh take power in

[01:02] the marketplace, it just adds to the few

[01:04] rich people owning all of us. Right now

[01:07] in America, the top 0.01% have an

[01:09] average $600 million of wealth. The

[01:11] bottom half have an average $7,000. And

[01:14] by showing the Department of Education,

[01:16] the Center for Budget, the uh Consumer

[01:18] Protection Bureau that is actively

[01:20] helping those rich people take all of

[01:22] our money. Prove me wrong. Okay. So,

[01:26] Trump's been president for six weeks.

[01:28] Sure. Right. So, we had an oligarchy as

[01:30] Donald Trump was becoming president.

[01:32] Yes. We had all these agencies. How did

[01:34] they prevent the oligarchy? They didn't.

[01:36] No, we have a bad oligarchy. But Trump

[01:38] is increasing our oligarchy. He had Jeff

[01:40] Bezos. He had Tim Cook. He had the

[01:42] richest people on the earth who have

[01:43] more money than the bottom half of the

[01:45] country combined sitting right behind

[01:47] him. And Elon Musk is helping those

[01:49] regulations get destroyed so they can

[01:51] takeaway as an attendee. But let's go

[01:53] through one. donated to it. So, let's go

[01:56] one by one. Let's first go the

[01:57] Department of Education. So, the

[02:00] Department of Education, which I'm

[02:01] guessing you're in favor of like $47

[02:02] million going to improving learning

[02:04] outcomes in Asia. Yeah. Because helping

[02:07] other Whoa. helping other people, excuse

[02:11] me, helping other people helps us. I'm a

[02:13] teacher. When other people don't match

[02:16] our economy, when they can't participate

[02:18] in it, everybody's hurt by that. So, I I

[02:20] I do have a question, though. We're not

[02:22] even helping ourselves. Why should we

[02:24] help other countries? You're right. We

[02:25] should help ours You're right. We should

[02:27] help ourselves more. And the question is

[02:28] funding the Department of Education. The

[02:30] question is Let me Let me finish. You're

[02:32] How does one help oneself? Have Have

[02:34] educational outcomes gotten better or

[02:36] worse since the creation of the

[02:38] Department of Education, the bloated

[02:39] Department of Education. You are right.

[02:41] We're spending way too much money on

[02:42] administration. That money needs to be

[02:43] go to funding school meals. That needs

[02:45] to be reducing class sizes. Sound like a

[02:46] Doge. No, cuz Doge is not doing that. By

[02:49] destroying the Department of Education,

[02:50] they're not funding title one

[02:52] classrooms. If we funded title

[02:53] classrooms with the money that we

[02:54] promised, every single classroom would

[02:56] get a uh paraprofessional, which would

[02:58] help my students immensely. They are

[03:00] failing. And as you were saying before

[03:02] that Florida's the most equitable state,

[03:04] it's not. The richest students get 2,000

[03:06] more dollars to their schools every year

[03:08] than the uh fourth quartile of students.

[03:10] So I I I am curious though that the

[03:13] Department of Education, we've seen

[03:15] standards go down. They want to send it

[03:17] back to the states. Definition by

[03:20] definition we have the department of

[03:21] education 11 million people are teach

[03:22] are are in education like yourself 11

[03:24] million of them 6.7 million are

[03:26] administrators 6.7 million are

[03:29] administrators can we agree we should

[03:30] fire most of those administrators it

[03:32] would look I can't say that because I

[03:34] don't know what those administrators do

[03:36] I think we have way too much money

[03:37] you're a teacher time out I got to

[03:38] interrupt you are you a teacher yeah

[03:39] what do the administrators in your

[03:40] school do they help us out a lot I mean

[03:42] do you think I could manage my classroom

[03:43] if I you are wrong I could not manage my

[03:47] classroom unless I had an administration

[03:49] helping me out. You need five

[03:51] administrators or one teacher. That's

[03:52] the ratio. Do you That's bad. You're

[03:54] right. That's bad. Okay, but that's the

[03:55] current ratio. 5 to1. But secondly, let

[03:57] me ask you, this is very important. Be

[03:58] reduced. But it's showing the Department

[03:59] of Education is not the answer cuz then

[04:01] you hurt the American economy by not

[04:02] allowing people to build up their human

[04:04] capital. Time out. We already have the

[04:05] evidence- from the the advent of

[04:08] Department of Education. We are now 26

[04:09] in education. We were top five when it

[04:11] started. We're the lowest in reading,

[04:13] math, arithmetic in the Western world.

[04:15] Department of Education has made our

[04:16] standard substandard. and we spend $250

[04:18] billion a year on the Department of

[04:20] Education and yet our kids can't we

[04:21] can't find a single kid that can read at

[04:24] grade level in a Baltimore public school

[04:25] or that can do math in a Chicago public

[04:27] school yet we keep on spending billions

[04:29] of dollars on so maybe the solution is

[04:30] crush the current system send the money

[04:33] back to the states empower families and

[04:34] parents moms and dads to spend the money

[04:36] as they see fit more choice more

[04:39] competition and make it localized not

[04:41] federalized so here's the problem the

[04:42] state of Florida introduced a bill my

[04:43] opponent introduced a bill to uh provide

[04:46] $7,000 for school choice boys in uh in

[04:48] Florida. That's government waste. Most

[04:50] of that, a lot of that money is going to

[04:52] Disney, to cruises. That's increased

[04:54] waste. It's also every dollar is taken

[04:56] out of the Florida uh public education

[04:58] system, given to private families. 75%

[05:01] of that is going to families no school

[05:03] choice. 75% I'm not against school

[05:05] choice as long as we fund education

[05:06] properly. But 75% of the money is going

[05:09] to families that can already afford an

[05:10] education, which means my students are

[05:12] getting $3 billion taken out of their

[05:15] education to go directly to the richest

[05:17] Flidian. Hold on. I just want to make

[05:18] sure I understand. So you're against the

[05:19] money going to homeschooling? Like what

[05:20] do you mean by this Disney thing? You're

[05:22] you're talking way too fast. Like So we

[05:24] need money going to where it's needed to

[05:26] school meals. What is your critique?

[05:28] You're saying $3 billion going to what?

[05:29] I'm not. So, $3 billion is being taken

[05:32] out of the public education system and

[05:34] given directly to the people can already

[05:36] afford a private education. For what

[05:37] reason? To help people get their private

[05:39] education. The problem is there also

[05:41] weren't restrictions on that to limit

[05:43] what the private school to raise their

[05:45] tuition by. You're totally wrong. I got

[05:46] what you're saying. What you're saying

[05:47] though was because show me the facts.

[05:48] It's their taxpayer dollars that are

[05:50] coming back as a refund. Right. It's

[05:51] also the public taxpayer dollars that

[05:53] put their public money and they were

[05:54] given back to private individuals. Now

[05:56] they're going to the public system. It's

[05:58] their own paid for rich people stealing

[06:00] our tax. Hold on. It's easy to say like

[06:02] the rich people, right? The the 75% of

[06:05] the money is going to private define

[06:06] rich. By the way, how much money can

[06:08] afford a private education, which is

[06:09] anywhere from 15,000 to $40,000 a year,

[06:12] you are rich. And 75% of the money going

[06:14] to the private edalf

[06:18] of all Americans are living paycheck to

[06:20] paycheck. If you can afford $40,000,

[06:23] you're richer than most people. Now 75%

[06:26] 75% of the money that is going uh from

[06:30] uh the public education system into the

[06:31] private uh system is going to those who

[06:33] can already afford private education.

[06:35] What is the number one predictor of

[06:36] student success? Uh how many years a

[06:39] teacher has been an educator? Yeah.

[06:40] Actually the quality of this teacher. So

[06:41] do you can we agree at least because

[06:43] we'll not agree on everything that we

[06:44] should be able to fire teachers at will?

[06:46] At will is what do you mean at will? For

[06:49] what cause? If you're a bad teacher.

[06:51] What do you mean by a bad teacher? I

[06:52] mean you're you're you're out. What do

[06:54] you mean by bad teacher? Yeah, someone

[06:56] who doesn't listen to their students,

[06:57] doesn't have is not good at what they

[06:59] do. Graded by other teachers for cause,

[07:01] not at will. Yes, we should fire

[07:03] teachers for cause. Okay, but I think

[07:05] that do we have do we have too many

[07:06] teachers or not enough teachers? We have

[07:08] in Hillsboro County alone, we're missing

[07:10] 12 uh 1,200 across the premise across

[07:14] that's 50,000 students without an

[07:16] educator. You asked me a question. Let

[07:17] me finish. We need We need better higher

[07:19] paid teachers. Yes, absolutely. And

[07:21] Florida has the 48th lowest average

[07:24] teacher. Why do you think that is?

[07:25] Because we have a Republican controlled

[07:26] state for the past 30 years that are

[07:28] increasingly taking away money for

[07:30] teachers. But hold on. If I'm not

[07:31] mistaken, Florida is in the top five, if

[07:33] not the number one, on educational

[07:35] outcomes for students, right? On them

[07:37] passing, not actual outcomes on them

[07:39] passing. So that's number one in the

[07:40] country, I think, though, right? And it

[07:42] was like number 30 or 40 back before

[07:44] school choice was. So I'm I'm just

[07:45] curious at your complaint here, but it's

[07:47] fine. Let's just kind of go back to your

[07:48] thing. We'll go to the next question.

[07:49] the Department of Education. Why should

[07:51] the federal government have any role in

[07:52] education? Because that spending that

[07:54] money on helping people helps the entire

[07:57] econom

[07:59] helping people helps the entire economy.

[08:02] People when you let people fall through

[08:04] the cracks, it destroys our economy.

[08:06] It's more expensive. When you take away

[08:08] the Consumer Protections Bureau, that

[08:10] helps $16 billion of scams go back to

[08:13] the American people. That helps our

[08:15] economy because then they can take place

[08:16] in the marketplace. What you're

[08:18] advocating for is to reduce the things

[08:19] that push people into the marketplace to

[08:22] increase the barriers and to destroy the

[08:24] freedom of our marketplace. Again, you

[08:26] have not answered the question. Let's

[08:28] just reiterate it. Department of

[08:29] Education that that answer it helps

[08:31] people started in 1979.

[08:33] The same sort of nice sounding stuff we

[08:35] started to do over the last 354 years

[08:37] and we have the lowest standards ever

[08:39] had. We have childhood poverty all over

[08:41] the place. We have broken public schools

[08:43] because spending money from DC does not

[08:45] solve the problem. Empowering parents

[08:47] does parental agency is the solution not

[08:50] more not bureaucratic empowerment.

[08:52] Spending money on spending the federal

[08:55] government got to get to the next one.

[08:56] One second. The federal government

[08:57] spending money based solely on test

[08:59] hurts people because then we don't get

[09:02] the money going to critical thinking

[09:03] which your misinformation machine uh

[09:06] succeeds on. Cuz when people can't

[09:08] critically think they accept assertions

[09:11] of reality. So last question. Hold on

[09:13] hold on hold on. So you would say I'm a

[09:15] misinformation machine. That's fine.

[09:16] Yeah. Fine. You're a teacher. Yes. What

[09:19] is a woman? What is a woman?

[09:23] Oh, buddy. All right. So, we define

[09:26] gender as a set of preferences that you

[09:28] have. Excender.

[09:33] [Applause]

[09:36] Gender is a set of preferences we have.

[09:39] Woman.

[09:41] Woman is a social construct that we've

[09:43] agreed upon. Typically, we imagine

[09:45] womanhood as makeup or whatever it is.

[09:52] There is a difference between the word

[09:54] woman and being a biological female.

[09:58] Woman is a social construct that we use.

[10:01] Listen for a second. I'm telling you

[10:03] what it means. Woman. Woman is a social

[10:06] construct. We agree on these set of

[10:08] preferences. If I tell you that I'm a

[10:10] man is because I want you to know that I

[10:12] like these set of preferences. If I tell

[10:14] you I'm a woman, it's cuz I want you to

[10:16] know that I agree with these set of

[10:17] preferences. Can men give birth?

[10:20] Can men or can males? Cuz males can't.

[10:24] These listen for a second. If if you

[10:28] listen to your bio professors, you would

[10:29] understand there's a difference between

[10:31] biology and what we think. So, I want to

[10:33] thank you for proving a great point. You

[10:35] are why we should eliminate the

[10:37] Department of Education. Thank you very

[10:38] much.