TRENTON, NJ – New Jersey State Senator Joe Pennacchio this week criticized the administration of Governor Phil Murphy’s transgender studies in the public education curriculum for children as young as four years old.
“The woke agenda wielded by Murphy Democrats is a full-scale attack on families,” said Pennacchio (R-26). “State government has a role in all of our lives, but it should be to support our security and freedoms, not to dictate how mothers and fathers raise their children or reprogram the way kids think.”
Pennacchio pointed to curriculum changes in public education that intend to discuss topics such as privilege, equity, racial diversity, and other social justice and injustice topics young children may not be able to absorb.
“Recent legislation specifically targets 4- and 5-year-old children who still believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy to remove what the state perceives as their ‘unconscious bias’ so they accept the Administration’s misguided woke policies,” Pennacchio said.
Under the new curriculum, grade school youngsters will be taught about gender confusion, gender identity, cisgender, transgender, and gender nonbinary, Pennacchio said.
“To satisfy the Administration’s thirst for social engineering, they are committed to stripping little kids of their childhoods,” Pennacchio said. “Schools have enough trouble teaching students about reading, writing and arithmetic. These are age-inappropriate issues that have no place in elementary classrooms and certainly should have parental consent when being addressed.”
To help preserve parental rights, Pennacchio has introduced four bills that will empower mothers and fathers.
- S-1571 – Requires public schools to make curriculum plans available to the public and allow the plans, textbooks and learning material to be inspected and reviewed by the parents and legal guardians of students. [First introduced during the previous legislative session in June 2021 as S-3875]
- S-1570 – Requires boards of education to be more open about their meeting schedules and agendas, mandating them to publicly post full meeting agenda 48 hours prior to meeting.
- S-2385 – Reaffirms parental rights and amends current law to prevent schools from teaching some concepts related to critical race theory (CRT) and various controversial topics to students younger than high school age.
- S-224 – Creates the “Transparency in Government Act. The intent of the bill is to create another layer of transparency, letting parents know exactly how their dollars are spent and where the money is going. It was first introduced by Pennacchio in January 2012..
“Residents will not quietly tolerate government attempts to hijack the minds of their children,” Pennacchio said. “These bills will give some of the power back to the parents, and I encourage my Democrat colleagues to uphold the next generation of New Jerseyans and vote for these pragmatic measures.”