Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., slammed the media for lying to create a false narrative around his decision to ban critical race theory and queer theory in Florida A.P. African America Studies.
"You have the reporter saying that 'Governor DeSantis does not want students to learn about slavery and its aftermath.' Well if you actually looked at what our standards are, not only is it not prohibited to teach that, it's required to teach that," DeSantis said, hitting back at what he called "basically media lies."
The governor's comments come after outlets have reported he was trying to prevent students from learning black history, but DeSantis claims sonly "woke" curriculums were removed from Florida schools.
"We are required to teach all aspects of black history, not queer theory, but actual aspects of black history... They are lying to you," DeSantis said.
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MSNBC contributor Jason Johnson recently claimed that DeSantis is "happy with Black people being murdered on a regular basis," in response to Florida's curriculum adjustment.
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Johnson also suggested that DeSantis' revision was aimed at "protecting bigoted adults," rather than for Florida students.
"They are doing that to try to create a narrative, they're not doing that because Florida has a law," DeSantis hit back on Thursday. "They're doing it because they know there is enough people in corporate media who will just take that, and run with that… if it is explicit and pornographic, parents have the right to object."
The governor claimed the College Board’s original version of the course was "pushing an agenda" that Florida would not tolerate.
"This course on Black history, what’s one of the lessons about? Queer theory. Now, who would say that an important part of Black history is queer theory? That is somebody pushing an agenda," DeSantis said.
John Hope Bryant, an MSNBC guest panelist and Operation Hope founder, recently said that DeSantis was "stoking fears" and taking us back in history.
"You cannot decide which part of the history you want to learn about. All of our history is rich and important," Bryant said. "This is uh, 1960 all over again. This is 1865 all over again, where we’re stoking fears, deciding we are separate," he added.
