Newly sworn-in Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R) began her term of office by signing seven executive orders, including one that bans Critical Race Theory (CRT) and another that prohibits government use of the woke term “Latinx.”
In her inaugural address, Sanders announced education reform would be “the hallmark of my administration,” and that one of her immediate executive orders would be “preventing the political indoctrination of Arkansas’s schoolchildren.”
After being sworn in, Gov. @SarahHuckabee got to work with a flurry of executive orders. From barring government use of woke term “Latinx” to rooting out CRT in education and getting TikTok off state devices, SHS isn’t waiting to deliver on her promises.https://t.co/Nkc7SzKczp
— Spencer Brown (@itsSpencerBrown) January 11, 2023
Schools, she said, should “get back to teaching, reading, writing, math, and science,” and “where our children learn that the identity that truly matters is the one we all share: our identity as children of God and citizens of the United States of America.”
“As long as I am governor, our schools will focus on the skills our children need to get ahead in the modern world, not brainwashing our children with a left-wing political agenda,” Sanders added.
Arkansas Gov. @SarahHuckabee bans critical race theory in schoolshttps://t.co/o05TMyjap6
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) January 12, 2023
The new governor also signed an executive order “to respect the Latino community by eliminating culturally insensitive words from official use in government.”
Arkansas Governor
Sarah Huckabee Sanders bans the term 'Latinx' on her first day in office 🙌— Mayra Flores Vallejo (@MayraFloresTX34) January 12, 2023
“According to Pew Research,” the order reads, “only three percent of American Latinos and Hispanics use the word ‘Latinx’ to describe themselves.”
“The Real Academia Española, the Madrid-based institution which governs the Spanish language, has officially rejected the use of ‘x’ as an alternative to ‘o’ and ‘a’ in Spanish,” it continues. “One can no more easily remove gender from Spanish and other romance languages than one can remove vowels and verbs from English.”
“[W]ithin sixty (60) days of this Order, all state offices, departments, and agencies shall revise all existing written materials by replacing the terms ‘Latinx,’ ‘latinx,’ ‘Latinxs,’ or ‘latinxs’ with ‘Hispanic,’ ‘Hispanics,’ ‘Latino,’ ‘Latinos,’ ‘Latina,’ or ‘Latinas,’” the governor’s executive order states.
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Susan Berry, PhD, is national education editor at The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Sarah Huckabee Sanders” by Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
