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The federal education system that supports Defense Department schools around the world has ordered schools under its purview to remove books from their libraries that deal with any topic relating to diversity, equity and inclusion, following Donald Trump’s executive order.
The missive from the Department of Defense Education Activity was issued on February 6, forcing schools — like an elementary institution at the U.S. Army’s Fort Campbell in Kentucky — to round up books that don’t align with the Trump administration’s ideological views.
The order demands that employees at 161 elementary and high schools around the world “ensure compliance with executive orders and recent DoDEA guidance.”
But the order is reportedly being broadly interpreted by librarians and school officials to include any books dealing with issues that could be perceived as promoting one group over another — meaning that books about slavery, civil rights history, or treatment of Native Americans could be removed.
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Schools have already been told they can’t host events recognizing Black History Month and other cultural observances, agency spokesman Will Griffin said last week.
The document bans “monthly cultural observances,” prompting schools to immediately cancel Black History Month events and remove bulletin boards referencing Martin Luther King Jr., Harriet Tubman and Rosa Parks, Tennessee’s Clarksville Now reported.
The DoDEA instructions also include anti-trans changes like ensuring programs for girls can “only be accessed by biological females.”
Librarians at Fort Campbell’s elementary school have reportedly been instructed to remove any books that contain “discriminatory equity ideology.”
The school employees have reportedly been given a deadline of February 18 to remove the books.
“The librarians are frustrated – they’re not getting any true guidance but are getting specific time frames,” one person told Clarksville Now under condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
Ironically, the DoDEA order may force the school to scrub the history of the famed 101st Airborne Division, which is based in Fort Campbell. The 101st was deployed to Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957 to protect Black students during the desegregation of a high school. The moment was a pivotal turning point in the civil rights movement.
Another source told the outlet that a school in Europe under the DoDEA’s purview was forced to remove books that discuss immigration in a positive light.
Last week, the U.S. Military Academy disbanded 12 campus clubs that stem from ethnic and gender affiliation, including a club founded in 1976 for female cadets and professional organizations such as the National Society of Black Engineers, according to Stars and Stripes.
More than 300,000 soldiers who fought for the United States during World War II were immigrants at the time of the conflict, according to the National World War II Museum.
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The guidance is the result of Trump’s executive orders titled “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” and “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling.”
The American Library Association and the American Association of School Librarians lambasted the guidance as a “shameful censorship” decree that erases history and is designed to “silence the voices of Americans whose lives reflect the diversity of our nation.”
“By ordering the removal and suppression of learning materials and activities in its schools and libraries, the DoDEA is engaging in censorship of legitimate views and opinions that violates the First Amendment rights of those who serve our nation and their families, thereby denying them the very freedoms they have pledged to protect with their lives,” the groups said in a statement this month.
“The brave people who defend us deserve to exercise the rights they protect, and their children deserve the right to read a broad array of materials and learn from a range of perspectives that reflect the abundance of ideas from all Americans,” the statement said.
The Independent has requested comment from the U.S. Army.
