Latest / CrossPolitic Show / Defunding the Democrats' Most Destructive Force (ft. Ryan Walters)
Transcript
- All right. Hey, oh, welcome to my monitor. Come to five off the network. Pastor Toby just landed. He made it. Hey, say to me. Chocolate knocks on the water boy and we got Ryan Walters. Ryan Walters. He's the head now the head of the teacher freedom of alliance. So thank you, Ryan. So much for coming on cross Baltic. Hey, appreciate you having me on. Yes, sir. So Ryan, I followed you when you became super intended of the Oklahoma public education system. Um, surprised you got there in the first place. Um, to even even too conservative for Oklahoma. And uh, why are you surprised? Because he was too conservative for public education. Is that true? Is that true, Ryan? Like, was it, was it kind of like amazing that you got the position? I mean, I'm not amazed I got the position, but heads definitely exploded when I walked in the building after the election. For sure. So other people were surprised. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. But I think of Oklahoma as being like a very conservative state. Yeah. Yes. So like, like Christian and like, so you're like, yeah, I want to be a Christian and I want to help reform these schools and everybody's heads really exploded. I mean, look, even in the Republican party, you had people that were like, no, leave all that alone. No, just just get more money and then they'll leave you alone. Yeah. I mean, the Republican party was still doing all that stuff because you're positioned. It's not an appointed position. It's an elected. You actually got to get popular vote to get to where you were. Correct. Yeah. I served in a role. I was appointed for two years. And then I served in the role and I went in one in election to really have the power to institute to paying. So my question, I actually can start here because you're actually now the executive director is that correct for president of the teacher, freedom alliance. But my question before we get there is you were elected and you stayed in office, but you left before your term was up. Correct. And so, you know, however, the terminology you want to put it, but basically quit before your term was up. Now, why would you do that? And especially, especially after winning election, I can maybe understand the appoints it maybe, but after winning election and then you quit on me. Well, I served with government for my container green. Is that what you just said? That's what I heard. That's what I heard. I'm sorry, I just I just want to clear this up for good names say. Inject that into that. So first of all, we instituted all the changes that we said we're going to do. And we had full school choice in the state. We put the Bible back in every classroom. We put Christian standards back in every schools. We had annihilated the teacher's union. They have now less than 20% of their membership in the state. And that's frankly what we had to do to win was we had to defeat the teacher's union. The teacher's union is the biggest problem in education right now. So what we did is we started an organization that will fight the teachers unions nationally because I'm you could fight them in a state all you want. The money that came in 16 million dollars that fought against us and everything that I did did not come from Oklahoma. It came from Chicago. It came from New Jersey from from teacher union from teachers union funding. We had packs that were set up by the teachers union. We had direct fees from the teachers union to poured into our state to stop us from doing things. And their message is we are going to stop this at every place that you start in here. There is nobody taking the teachers unions on directly. And you have to do that. You have to defeat. They spent 400 million dollars for Kamala Harris. And the last election 400 million dollars. The teachers union. The teachers. Wow. Wow. And so if you if we don't take them on directly and defeat them, we're playing a game we can't win. What why do the teachers union get their money from? Teachers union dues tax pay your dollars. So you pay a teacher salary. Yeah, they get a cut of it every month. And then they funnel into these political causes. So somebody took our money to make sure that we supported bringing awareness and attention to Kamala Harris. Their cause. Their cause. Our money. Their cause. All I heard was knocks you pay to support Kamala Harris. That's right. That's right. Forget Marjorie Taylor. Great. I'm support Kamala Harris. Great. Got it. So then I guess because for me, my position, I would love it if we lost government schools and parents had the chance to get their money to train their kids and a co I told Ryan this question. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, it was definitely coming. But I but the reason I think you hear you know where I'm right? That's my position. And people can choose to join with private institutions to be able to pay for their kids to get educations or use it for homeschooling. So and so forth. Remove the socialistic system. But there that's what I want. But there's where we are. And what I'm hearing from you is if I'm going to get taxed anyway. This might be arguments and gauge in what you're doing because I was going to ask you, why would you go and do what you did? But if they're going to take my money to help fund a democratic campaign for the vice for a president, I would like to be able to shut that off if I could. That's right. So at least I understand now, is that part of the reason why you were doing what you were doing? Yeah. If you don't stop them, they're still taking your dollars and weaponizing them against you. Period. You are funding the Democrat army against you right now. So like you said, we live in the world. We're in right. We've got public schools. They are being they've been captured by the Democrat party. If you at least don't defund the Democrat party through the teachers union, they just continue doing their great. You sent your kids to a Christian school. You sent your kids to homeschooling. Right. That's fine. We still got your money. Yeah. And we're still going to weaponize it against you. Right. And part of what I want to do is remove the socialistic structure that takes my money anyway. So I got to go pay for other kids that are not mine. So I got somebody else's kids and I there for to go to school that mean my wife didn't have. Don't like that. That's right. And it's not the it's not the end all answer. But one of the answers is school choice to go listen if my I mean, and I always, you know, challenge under this, if my kid doesn't go to your school and they're my tax payer dollars, why would they still go to the school when my kid didn't go there? So that is a way of going. No, if my kid goes to a Christian school as homeschooled, my tax payer dollars go to wherever they go. I'm not going to keep paying into a system. I'm not even using it. I'm going to put some words in your mouth. I maybe maybe I'm going to. I think you said earlier that the teachers unions were the number one problem of public schools. Yeah. Is that is that true? I mean, like is that just true? Why would you how would you defend that? So first of all, I'll quote Charlie Kirk, but they're the most destructive force in the country. So Charlie Kirk said the teachers unions are the most destructive force in the country. Why? Why are they the most destructive force? Because they are taking hundreds of millions of dollars they are then using it in elections, but it goes even much further than that. What they are doing is injecting their woke ideology into every single level of the school. So transgenderism in kindergarten. And by the way, you have to do this because if you don't, we will come after you, individually as teachers, you have to be in our union. And so that is the way this education system is going to work. So even if you got good teachers, we get this all the time. Got good teachers. What am I supposed to do? I'm supposed to go up against the biggest political operation in the country by myself until recently, it was also I'm going to go against the federal Department of Education by myself. Right. And so grassroots groups conservative parents over the country have been standing up now we'll have your back, but you got to fight back. And so right now, that's the way that they have been able to leverage their positions to control our schools, to control elections and have so much influence over the system. So they're the driving force you're saying like behind like the ideologies that are being pushed in curriculum and values and that kind of thing. You're saying that's the teacher's unions. Yes, I would say 100% why isn't the Bible in school right now? How do you how do you have an education system where you don't talk about the Bible? How do you understand Western civilization? The world world history without the Bible? How did how did prayer get out of schools? This was all teachers union initiatives to say it's about power, but it's about their woke ideology. So they've been able to drive that and you look at the societal problems of today. It's like, well, yeah, they have been able to capture 80% of our kids are in public schools. So they've been able to control most of what now again, you have kids who rebel against it, but they're the exception not the rule. Most kids are sitting there going, I sounds like America is pretty bad to me. I mean, every teacher I've had from kindergarten to high school tells me it's evil racist country. Right. So I guess it is then they go to college and it's like, wow, I mean, it's nuts. So you said a minute ago, I think that is you got teachers unions down to 20% in Oklahoma. How did you do that? Oh, I mean, what's the 20% doing now? Well, they're basically two districts as basically, but but what happened was is first of all, we did a big PR marketing campaign of I put all the positions of the teachers unions made a video, put it out. Go this is what they're pushing nationally, guys. As with state superintendents, as state superintendents, and then I send an email to every single teacher in the state multiple times going, this is what you're paying into. This is and again, most Oklahoma teachers are going, okay, hold on. I'm not for this transgender stuff. I don't even care if I'm a Democrat. I'm not for all this stuff. Right. So we got to leave that way. Then the other thing we did is we said, you can't automatically take money from a teacher's paycheck and then say, Hey, if you don't want to be in, go find your way out of it. We got a teacher right now, try to get out of the union for two years, sent them letter after letter going, I want out with taking money on my paycheck. Well, fill out this paperwork already did that four times. Well, fill it out again, send it to our corporate office and we'll so we said, no, if they want to cut you a check, they can cut you a check, but we're not going to let you just deduct it every month and then say, find your way out of here. So did you actually could you actually change that? Yes, legislatively. And I floored it just past it two years ago, Arkansas passed it this year. There he saw 40% reduction in union membership. Arkansas on one year after saying, Hey, if you want to join join, but like just cut them a check, then we're not going to take it out of your pay check. So that means that's great. Now the government can't even take their own taxes out of our paycheck automatically. And that would be great. I see. Just falling the logic there, you know, it is a game changer though, right? I mean, it's some different one the teachers are cutting a check and they go home and they go, why are we paying? How much do you actually believe in this? How much do you actually believe in this? I mean, that's what exactly forced. And if they really want to do it, it's free country. You can do it. But if you don't actually believe in these things, then you shouldn't be locked to a union that you don't even hold to. And the unions lie to them and say, there was a Supreme Court ruling few years ago it said, Hey, you don't have to join a teachers union. That goes against your first memorites. The Janus ruling right. But the unions still come out and say, well, hold on though, but if you leave, you'll lose your retirement, you'll lose your benefits, which is below me, which is not true, right? But they tell them all that. So they all go, well, I can't leave. I mean, I've been in the education for 20 years. I lost my those are all lies. You can make every state that that's a lie or the state that have exceptions. Yeah, you can leave the union and not lose any of your benefits in your retirement all the rest of it. Correct. And then they scare them with the whole well, you know, we got few liability insurance. And so what if you get sued and now you're not going to have legal protection? Well, my organization will go, that's $38 a year. We'll cover that. Like that's not that's not, you know, we can cover liability. If some left winged that job sues you, you can be legally covered. And by the way, most of the time the school covers you, think about it, if you get sued doing your job, right. Your employer pays or attorney fees to cover you for doing your job. Now, if you do something crazy, it's outside of your job. Well, that's on you, right? But again, they scare teachers and then now, though, you know, I'll, but it's just nonsense to keep. So tell us the name of the organization you're heading now. Yeah, the teacher freedom alliance teacher freedom alliance. And you're in all 50 states. Okay. What's our play? I want to have a play. Yeah, what's the play? The play is how you get people to leave the unions. Well, we've, well, we've already had tens of thousands do it in the last few months, but what we tell them is exactly what we did. What I just said is, do you agree with these values? No, you don't. Okay, you don't have to be in the union. We'll help you get out. And in, by the way, we're unapologetically Christian conservative America first. Guys, do you want to be a part? I mean, frankly, we're here at Amphist. Hey, do you want to be a part of what's going on right now? We're conservatives are fighting back. We're conservatives are under attack, but we're all joining together to fight back. You can do that teachers. We have an organization that will help support you. We'll connect you with parents. We'll connect you with conservative groups to go, you're not in this alone. Yeah, we'll give you legal protection. We'll do us. But we'll put you in a conservative community to say, no, if some lack of left left winger comes after you, we all have your back. And frankly, it's what most parents want. They want to support that. Well, you know, it's really fascinating about that, which is I think for a lot of years, Gabe talks about this a lot. A lot of Christians have kind of gone into the closet about their faith. A lot of teachers have worked in the public school systems and have can't have their bibles on their tables, the desk, they can't teach anything from the Bible. And now here we are having an opportunity that you're offering where it's like, OK, listen, have you ever wanted to be public about your faith? Have you ever wanted to be able to teach? Now, you're already a Christian working in the government school. So you're there already. Now, what does it look like to destroy that structure in one way or another and actually allow you to live your faith out loud? So I do like that. That's an interesting option. Well, I'm going to say this too. So the New York Times interviewed me a few weeks ago and they did a fact check on me, right? And I was like, OK, guys, y'all are all twisted up about putting the Bible back in every classroom, OK, like we did. All right, 30 years ago, the Bible would have been in every classroom. Wouldn't have even been questioned. Is the most red book in American history is the most influential. I mean, I don't care if you're an atheist, what you are, you can't deny that fact. And then in their fact check, they go, well, that is factually correct. 30. Oh, yeah, factually correct. At least they tell it the truth. They're able to do that one. Yeah, they did give me that one. But it was just like, guys, I mean, we have allowed the left to capture so much of the corporate media and education system where they want you to believe that a Bible in the classroom is just this crazy concept. It is dangerous. Yeah, yeah. But, but that's right. But just, I mean, we're not talking that long ago. Right. It would have, it would have been there. No questions asked. No one would have even raised an issue about it. That's fantastic. You said, you got, you've got the teachers genes down to 20% of teachers in Oklahoma. Yeah, what does that do to the funding? I mean, with with 20% can Chicago still send hundreds of millions of dollars? Yes. They can. And that's where the national organization had to come in. Because like I said, we can defeat it in red states all you want. They don't want a proof of success anywhere. So in Oklahoma, we've gutted them. Well, they're still sending in money from Chicago. There's still some money from New Jersey from New York. If you don't take out the heart of the beast and it is a beast, it just continues. And so that's where I mean, a lot of our efforts were in all 50 states. A lot of our efforts are in blue states to go listen, if we get 20% to leave the Chicago teacher, you need to gut those places. That's where all the money's coming. Because you got like 100% participation in the really, really bright blue places. You'll never get Chicago though. You'll know in California. You'll never get in the orgy. Yeah, we can give you the argument. Here's the argument to your money. Do you want to pay several thousand dollars years to teach her into a teachers union that engages in politics? Okay, if you want to engage in politics, engage in politics, do you want them making the decision for you? And frankly, even in those states, they still kick over 40% of their dues to the national organization. Let's say you even agree with the local one. Okay, well, 40% of your dues are going to the NEA FT. So what we do, again, are we going to get 100%? You get 20% of Chicago's cool teachers leaving. We're talking tens of millions of dollars in a few weeks. But okay, so but what I was thinking about this and I'm going to push back a little bit. Are most of our teachers like journalist liberals anyway? Good question. I would say no. I would say in red states, you got a lot of teachers that have conservative commonsense values. Now look, they've been lied to repeatedly about what Republicans are and they they're not good on education and all this kind of nonsense. But when you hit them with how far the left has gone, so we think most teachers in Texas and Oklahoma like support transgenderism, now most of them do. Right. But you have some that do, right? Of course, and they shouldn't be in the classrooms. But these are folks that are going to say, no, I'm not paying in to that kind of radicalism here. But most of them believe there's not another option. And I'm going to get when I lose all these benefits if I did. Interesting. And you're saying the same thing is true of many teachers in blue states as well, you're saying even if they they skew liberal skew anti-Christian, many of them would still even say, but I don't want my tax dollars going to support those kinds of extreme measures. Yeah, make I gave you one example that I'm going to give you a little bit of a hot take for a name of your organization's freedom. And yeah, that sounds too conservative. Yeah. What freedom? What teacher wants freedom? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. The full school system. Okay. New Jersey. Yes. You think no teachers want to leave the teacher junior New Jersey? New Jersey teachers union funded a drag show last month. Okay. We go to New Jersey and go, okay, guys, I get it. Most of you are probably Democrats. Did you think you were paying for a drag show for kids? We had 400 teachers leaving 48 hours. And it was one of those deals where again, we go in there and go, guys, we're not even talking like Republican Democrats. We're talking in sanity. Right. And they go, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not, I didn't get an education to pay for kids to see trans terrorism. But I'm going to say this to a small, this is my bit of a take. All right. Education should be a conservative principle. If you are a conservative, you should believe in conserving stop. The Republic by making sure that kids understand the Republic, understand the values of the Republic. People that are drawn to education should be more conservative leaning. Now, the left has, I mean, I'll give them credit from a strategy perspective. They decided 40, 50 years ago. Here's what we'll do. Yeah. We will create social justice warriors out of the education system. Hey, we may lose the little battles. We'll win the war. We'll capture these institutions. Right. But generally, more conservative people should lean towards kids, family, support parents, how do you help support parents? Can it? That's where I became a teacher. It's like, hey, I mean, teachers made a huge difference in my life. I want to do the same. But if we don't engage in this fight in a meaningful way, and you may argue with me and say it's already done, Ryan. My argument is it will be done because there will be no pipeline for anybody left of Mao Zedong to get an education. There will be no, but I mean, right of Mao Zedong to get an education. Sorry. There will be nobody with a good person. You're going, why would I go through the meat grinder of a college of education to a public school system to a union? Like I don't want to just be tortured the rest of my life. So breaking down all those walls and going, no, actually, we do want good conservatives in education. Actually, we do want Christians in education. Actually, this is exactly where if you want to make a difference in the future of the country, we got to win this war and we got to engage on it. That's huge. That's huge. And you can go from there and I think even there, go back to Noxist point. So in principle, I really don't want the government running those schools. Absolutely. But if you have Christians who understand that is the ultimate play, why, why can't Christians take it, you know, take it back and then basically say we got it from here. You know, like, you know, why can't, why can't government schools? Why couldn't public schools spin off and become private? Yeah. And we're very open about that. All of our members, your public school teacher, hey, we connect you with Christian schools going, hey, if you want to just jettison and go over here, here they are. So we, we literally have a jobs board for them going, hey, you got Christian school in your community goes on up to the Christian school. Hey, this is great. Again, we want kids to get a Christian education. That's where them and their parents want. We want kids to be home school. If that's what they want, we connect them to home school co-ops. So again, it is trying to reform the system while at the same time saying, hey, guys, I get it. Here you go. Let's help these Christian schools grow. Let's help them build because one of the biggest things you guys and all know, Christian schools right now, we've got to find more teachers. More kids want to come here. We've got to find good teachers to come in here and help teach these kids. That's right. Are you connected with David Goodwin with ACCS? Yeah. Yeah. David. Yeah, they're great. They're fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. So Pastor Doug or our pastor started ACCS back in the day is you may read. I know. And I'm it seems, I guess the thing I'm still struggling with is, you know, why not maybe run the play that Ron Dessantis is trying to eliminate property tax? That to me, it's not like, you know, and I'm not trying to argue that you can't, you can only do one at a time or whatever. But that to me is maybe a bigger hit, taking away property taxes. I don't know. Just eliminate. Yeah. I agree. 100% eliminate property taxes. Let's do. Absolutely. He's not debating me. He's not. Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. That's good. You want to, you understand more about this or check you guys out. What's the best place to go to? Figure you guys out. Yeah. Guys, I appreciate the conversation. And again, I think this is the one we've got to have for the future of the country. Teacherfreedom.com's where we're at again, teachers, parents, taxpayers, anybody join up, join the work we're doing. But again, we're going to continue to fight back. We're going to continue to build this army to take the schools back. I got one last question. Yes, sir. So what are you doing in Idaho? What am I doing in Idaho? What is your organization? Where's your United? Oh, yeah. I'm more for my that I was like, am I going to I was right around? I was around. I had a home. Why did you not move there? I'm with Oklahoma. When are you guys going to take down the teachers unions? Why is Idaho better than Oklahoma? What do you think? Hey, we've got a total teachers of members in Idaho. So we are organizing efforts there to grow that drive to get the teachers out of the union and again, stand up and work with our organization. So I want to I want to hear maybe we can check back in at some point to do it. Find out about the progress you're making. Absolutely. Man, I got teachers. I got to connect you with. Absolutely. Yeah. What state are you having the most success in Oklahoma primarily? We have a lot of success in Oklahoma, but again, I mean, from a numbers perspective, these blue states they're coming in guys or again, thousands of members from these blue states because again, it is, get what you're saying about, oh, you all sound so conservative. It's everything else, but we're also, hey, common sense guys, do you want to pay for this? I mean, we went up there during the drag show. Do you want to pay for this? Right. No, actually, we don't. You know, it reminds me too of like, so Washington states right next to next or not. So really, it's eight miles from where they're the worst, by the way. So we, well, we know we call them. It's the socialist state of the economy to come and watching. But the thing is is the bright, bright blue is that I five corridor from Seattle down. Everything east of the mountains is conservative. Yeah, we're praying for those tectonic plates to really, but my point is is that I, I see what you're saying though, like in a blue state, even as blue and socialist as Washington state is, thousands and thousands of those teachers, east of Seattle don't want to get paying for all that stuff. That's right. So in blue states, a lot of times we go into the red areas of blue states because I said most of the state is red. I mean, that's, you know, it's a blue state, but most of the states red, even if that were for you, there's a lot of it. Absolutely. Yeah. But I give you one thing about Washington state. Washington state passed a law saying we cannot communicate with their teachers because we're impersonating a teacher's union. Of course, but I'm just showing you the impact I would self-identify as the teachers. I mean, that should have worked. You can get a surgery off the desk. But I'm showing you like, I mean, it's having an impact. They passed it all the way through the legislature's time by the governor to go, this group named us, named checked us, cannot come in here and message teachers, or they will get it fine for every email that they send. So what do you guys, that's how threatened they are. So what are you guys doing? We're seeing them. Okay. Good. Yeah. And in the meantime, I suppose private teachers, they can organize on their own. Yeah. And they can share your material. Oh, yeah. And we're working on private school teachers all over the country because again, we're giving them good curriculum. We're giving them curriculum around the role of Bible, played in schools. We're giving them a real American history curriculum, real training. I just mean like even public school teachers in Washington state, they can do whatever they want. They can share your stuff. And I joined teacher street. I come. That's what I'm saying. Like they can still be moving this and pushing this, even if you can't officially, that's correct. Now until you win your lawsuit. That's correct. And you accidentally slip in your email. That's right. That's right. What website again? Teacherfreedom.com. Heatyourfreedom.com. Bring it on. Hey, bro, hey guys. Do it out of here. Good time here.