The Justice Department also said it would begin “a series of additional efforts in the coming days to tackle the rise in criminal behavior against school personnel,” including a task force that will include the offices of US attorneys, the FBI, the Criminal Division, the Department of Homeland Security and department for civil rights.
During oversight hearings last month, Republicans viewed the effort as an attack on parents who criticized issues such as mask requirements, race curriculum, and gender policy. As the debate gets hotter, fights, arrests, hooliganism and threats against school officials appear in the headlines.
Some Republicans said the memo was clearly political as it was released days after public school leaders wrote to President Biden to address school safety concerns. The educators who wrote the letter later apologized for some of his inflammatory language, including comparing protesting parents to local terrorists.
Several Republicans on the House and Senate judiciary committees have said the harassment and threats directive – especially the one related to the department’s counterterrorism division – echoes the very wording that the faculty discarded and could have a chilling effect on parents who want to speak out. complaints, even if it was not the intention.
Garland denied creating his initiative to pacify the White House, and he reiterated on several occasions that his directive is only intended to address violence and threats of violence, and that the department will not pursue freedom of speech.
However, a Justice Department whistleblower recently shared the bureau’s memorandum on the new threat with Republican lawmakers, Ohio MP Jim Jordan, the main Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, wrote to Mr. Garland on Tuesday.
Republicans speculated that a memo directing the FBI’s counterterrorism department to use the label when investigating possible incidents of school violence showed that Mr. Garland was not entirely accurate when he testified to them last month.
