Washington, DC – Today, in the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse voted against President Trump’s pick for Education Secretary, Elisabeth DeVos, citing a record of advocating for failed education policies and Rhode Islanders’ overwhelming opposition to her nomination. Whitehouse noted in particular the comments of Barbara Pellegrino, an award-winning first grade teacher in the Warwick Public Schools, who attended a meeting with Whitehouse and Rhode Island education stakeholders in December.
Whitehouse said in his statement on the DeVos vote, “[W]hen this nominee came forward, I held a forum for Rhode Islanders to talk to with me about her record and what they want to see in a Secretary for Education. And I want to bring into this committee the voice of Barbara Pellegrino who is a first grade teacher in the Warwick Public Schools. She teaches in the classroom that she learned in. Still in the same chairs because public education is so starved for resources.”
Whitehouse continued, “She is also a recent recipient of the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching. Barbara told me this: ‘The students who attend our public school deserve an advocate who will work to strengthen our educational system, not one who wants to destroy it.’ Her concerns about this nominee are widely shared by Rhode Islanders, 3,000 of whom have called or written to me. Ninety-nine percent in opposition to this nominee. So I will reflect Rhode Island voices in my vote against her.”
Due to Mrs. Devos’s refusal to answer basic questions about her fitness to serve and come clean about conflicts of interest she may bring to her positions, Democrats on the Committee attempted to extend debate on her appointment, forcing Chairman Lamar Alexander to establish a new, and troubling, committee precedent to cut off debate in order to report out her nomination.
Whitehouse’s full statement during the meeting is below. Video is available here.
Thank you Mr. Chairman, let me first say that I am disturbed by what has taken place during the course of this meeting.
Many of us have felt that there has been an effort to ram this nominee through without adequate timing, without adequate questioning, without adequate vetting, without adequate disclosure.
And until this moment the defense for all of that from the Majority has been that this is all protected by precedent.
We debate some of the precedent because there have been second questions before for instance, but that has been what the explanation has been.
Today ripped any veneer of precedent away from what appears to many of us to be a steam roll job. The doubling of votes, the lack of notice, and the notion that it is in order to make an objection to a vote during a vote, while a vote is being called seems to me to be very inconsistent with any prior action in this committee. And while I’m not an expert, and I’m not a parliamentarian it is inconsistent with my understanding of our, of general open meetings requirements and rules of open order regarding conduct during a vote. So let me say that first.
Let me ask unanimous consent that my complete statement go in the record.
But let me point out quickly that when this nominee came forward, I held a forum for Rhode Islanders to talk to with me about her record and what they want to see in a Secretary for Education. And I want to bring into this committee the voice of Barbara Pellegrino who is a first grade teacher in the Warwick Public Schools. She teaches in the classroom that she learned in. Still in the same chairs because public education is so starved for resources.
She’s also a recent recipient of the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching. Barbara told me this, “The students who attend our public school deserve an advocate who will work to strengthen our educational system, not one who wants to destroy it.”
Her concerns about this nominee are widely shared by Rhode Islanders, 3,000 of whom have called or written to me. Ninety-nine percent in opposition to this nominee. So I will reflect Rhode Island voices in my vote against her.
But let me add another problem with the process that we have gone through. Not just in this committee but in others, with a predicament that we have been presented with for the first time by the billionaire cabinet of this administration.
The billionaire cabinet of this administration presents deep concerns about potential conflicts of interest and lack of transparency. This is particularly true for those with dark money operations, which our ethics laws and procedures have not yet been updated to consider.
The dark money activities of these nominees remain a black hole of secrecy in which conflicts of interest can easily lurk.
Our constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on presidential nominees has the scope and nature of potential conflicts of interest at its very heart. My colleagues on the HELP Committee and I have asked Mrs. DeVos twice to provide information about what she has done with the American Federation for Children and the Great Lakes Education Fund, 501(c)(4) organizations that raise dark money from anonymous donors to spend on political campaigns and causes that support radical education agendas. It ought to be obvious to all of us, Republican and Democrat alike, that fundraising for and spending by these organizations raises potential conflict of interest questions. Mrs. DeVos’s dark money role was in education and answers to the dark money questions: from whom did you raise it? To whom did you give it? In what amounts was it raised and given? And what was your personal role in making those asks and those decisions? It might well produce evidence of conflicts of interest, but we have papered that over—it is a black hole to us. There are potential decisions before Mrs. DeVos if she is confirmed to serve as secretary in which a conflict of interest could be apparent if we only had the information to know, but we have not been given that information. This candidate needed to put these concerns to rest. She could have done so easily by answering basic questions. She chose not to. I cannot support her nomination.
###
