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Hi there,

Just before former President Biden left the White House, a bombshell investigative report ([link removed]) found that Biden’s Justice Department issued $2.5 million in grants to North Carolina schools to fund Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), restorative justice and social emotional learning (SEL) initiatives.

The grants were part of a $100 million package, allocated since 2021, impacting 36 states, 946 school districts, and about 3.2 million students across the U.S., as identified by Parents Defending Education.

What do these grants actually do?

Parents Defending Education noted that these grants include collaborations with organizations, like the International Institute for Restorative Practices and Courageous Conversations about Race, "to improve school environments for communities affected by systemic inequalities, particularly LGBTQ+ and BIPOC groups."

Which North Carolina schools took Joe Biden’s DEI money?

Ashe County School District received $607,423 for a "Restorative Justice in Ashe County Schools" project with RTI International to improve school climate, reduce disciplinary infractions, and increase school safety.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools received $933,662 for a Social Emotional Learning (SEL) initiative for the district’s alternative program, mostly composed of students with a history of violent incidents or physical aggression.

The nearly $1 million grant to Durham Public Schools was for a restorative justice and SEL initiative focused on bullying and school violence prevention programs, for almost 6,000 high school students.

An additional $1 million was offered to the Public Health Authority of Cabarrus County (though this funding has yet to be accepted).

Critics point out that these programs don’t often achieve their intended goals, and in numerous cases,have the unintended consequence of negatively impacting the very learning environments they purport to help.

As Locke’s very own Dr. Bob Luebke said:
“Unjust discrimination in order to eliminate discrimination is never right and shouldn’t be tolerated. Neither should failed programs that erode legal rights and trivialize crime. These programs not only don’t work—they continue to have harmful impacts on our society. There are more than enough reasons why local school districts should end all DEI and Restorative Justice Programs.”
It’s well past time to say good riddance to the politically-biased, racially-divisive DEI programs in our schools, and leave these initiatives behind with 2024.

You can read more about the issues facing our schools and students here ([link removed]) , here ([link removed]) and here ([link removed]) .

Esse quam videri,

Brooke Medina
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More from Locke
1) 🏠🏠🏠 California’s home insurance crisis the result of government intervention ([link removed])
* California wildfires have left many homeowners without insurance coverage
+ Between 2020 and 2022, 2.8 million homeowner policies were not renewed by insurance companies in California
+ The focal point of wildfires, Los Angeles County, saw 531,000 policy cancellations
o Some homeowners whose policies were dropped were able to use a costly, last-resort state reinsurance program
o But many have no coverage at all
* How did it get this bad?
+ Government intervention in insurance pricing is a key issue
o Record insurance payouts due to wildfires have led insurers to seek rate hikes
o But California's Proposition 103 complicates rate increase approvals, requiring a 20-year average loss calculation
o This effectively caps insurance premiums, causing insurers to pull back from high-risk areas (or leave the state altogether)
* In short, California has effectively imposed a price cap on home insurance premiums
+ But the laws of economics can’t be suspended in natural disasters…
+ And government price controls, like those on insurance, lead to shortages
+ So, in the end, the consumers the state was trying to protect are left unprotected
* The lesson is straightforward - government meddling that prevents markets from freely adjusting prices leads to chaos and harm
+ The most efficient and fair way to allocate resources is allowing markets to freely adjust prices - including insurance risk
+ Continued government meddling in pricing will produce similar results, both in CA and elsewhere

You can read more here ([link removed]) .

2) 🚬🚬🚬 FDA moves forward to plan to cap nicotine in cigarettes ([link removed])
* The FDA has announced it plans to move forward with a proposed rule to lower nicotine levels in cigarettes
+ The proposed rule would effectively mandate the production of Very Low-Nicotine (VLN) products
+ According to the FDA, this would lower nicotine levels by 96%
* The rule was first proposed in 2018, and has been a long time coming
+ The proposal does not ban cigarettes or tobacco…
+ But the rule proposes a cap on nicotine levels of 0.7 milligrams per gram of tobacco
* The FDA Commissioner stated that the proposed rule would save lives, reduce severe illnesses, and save large amounts of money
+ U.S. Rep. Pat Harrigan (NC-10), argues the rule would boost black market activity, harm small businesses, and represent government overreach
* If approved, it would dramatically impact North Carolina’s economy
+ NC is the largest tobacco-producing state, with 822 tobacco-producing farms generating $557 million in revenue and $197 million of the state’s GDP
* Our very own Brian Balfour warned that the rule, if approved, would deliver a crushing blow to NC’s tobacco industry
+ Tens of thousands of jobs will potentially be lost, along with billions of $ in economic output and forcing farms to scramble to find alternative uses of their land
+ We even commissioned a full report ([link removed]) on how the proposed rule would impact North Carolina’s economy

You can read more about the rule’s impact on North Carolina here ([link removed]) and here ([link removed]) .

3) 🧮🧮🧮 A lost opportunity for an income tax cap amendment ([link removed])
* In 2018, North Carolina voters approved a Constitutional amendment that would reduce the cap on income taxes from 10% to 7% by a wide margin
* In June of last year, the state Senate advanced a bill which included another Constitutional amendment to reduce the income tax cap further, from 7% to 5%
+ But unfortunately, the bill wasn’t also passed by the House
+ If the bill had been passed, voters would have had the opportunity to approve the new income tax cap in November
+ The Senate tried introducing the amendment (Senate Bill 920) again after the election, but still the House failed to act last month
* The House should have passed the bill for the following reasons:
+ Voters should be able to limit the extent to which government can tax them
+ Ensuring lower income taxes attracts productive individuals and innovative businesses to the state
+ Reductions to the cap benefit all who pay income taxes, not just the wealthy
+ A lower cap increases stability and predictability for individuals and businesses
+ The state has continued to grow its savings by generating budget surpluses
+ And now that House Republicans have lost their supermajority, it unlikely passing an income tax cap reduction be politically viable in the future

You can get the full picture here ([link removed]) .


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