The following article by James Hohmann with Breanne Deppisch and Joanie Greve was posted on the Washington Post website February 27, 2018:
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D) criticized President Trump’s focus on arming teachers on Feb. 26, saying that teachers “don’t want to do that.” (The Washington Post)
THE BIG IDEA: President Trump crossed his arms and looked annoyed as Jay Inslee, the governor of Washington State, spoke out against arming teachers.
“I have listened to the biology teachers, and they don’t want to do that,” Inslee said during an event at the White House on Monday. “I’ve listened to the first-grade teachers that don’t want to be pistol-packing first-grade teachers. I’ve listened to law enforcement, who have said they don’t want to have to train teachers as law enforcement agents.”
As the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association and a likely 2020 presidential candidate, Inslee was most certainly grandstanding. But he has the credibility to do so: He lost his House seat in 1994 because he voted for an assault weapons ban despite knowing that it was toxically unpopular in his rural district.
“I just suggest we need a little less tweeting here and a little more listening,” Inslee told Trump, “and let’s just take that off the table and move forward.”
What followed in the State Dining Room was a fascinating back-and-forth between Trump and other governors of both parties over what has become the president’s hobbyhorse since the massacre at a high school in Parkland, Fla., two weeks ago. The session quickly became a seminar on federalism — and a reminder that states really remain the laboratories of democracy.
As soon as Inslee finished making his point, the president asked the Republican governor of Texas to talk about how arming teachers has worked in his state. “Sure,” replied Greg Abbott. “We now have well over a hundred school districts in the state of Texas where teachers or other people who work in the school do carry a weapon … It could be a coach, it could be an administrator, it could be anybody who works in that school. But it’s a well-thought-out program with a lot of training in advance.”
“Well, I think that’s great,” Trump responded. “And so, essentially, what you’re saying is that when a sick individual comes into that school, they can expect major trouble. Right? Major trouble?!”
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) chimed in to say that some poorer schools in his state arm rank-and-file employees because they cannot afford to keep law enforcement officers to be on site. “I have the belief that no teacher should be compelled, and most of them want to teach and focus on that,” he said. “I think what the governors want to say is that there can’t be, necessarily, a national security plan, but the states can develop this.”
Then Montana Gov. Steve Bullock (D) noted that his 11-year-old son bagged his first buck last year, but he added that a nephew was also 11 when he got shot and killed while on a playground. “I want to make sure, if somebody is armed in a school, that they have that training,” he said.
President Trump criticized the press for saying he wants to arm teachers and said that he wants only those with “natural talent, like hitting a baseball.” (Photo: Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
— Showing a little sensitivity to the bad optics of filling schools with guns, Trump replied that his plan is narrower in scope than the media coverage suggests. He repeatedly emphasized that only “very adept” people will be allowed to carry weapons. “It could be 10 percent [of all teachers], it could be 5 percent, could be 20 percent,” the president said. “They start with training and then they have additional training every year, and I think they should get a bonus. … I want highly trained people that have a natural talent, like hitting a baseball, or hitting a golf ball, or putting. How come some people always make the four-footer, and some people, under pressure, can’t even take their club back? Right? Some people can’t take their club back.”
Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant (R) jumped in to help the president from digging a deeper hole. He noted that a 16-year-old killed two students at a high school in his state in 1997. “A vice principal, who was an Army Reserve officer, went to his vehicle, retrieved his 1911 .45, and stopped that shooter before he could kill other children in Pearl, Mississippi,” Bryant said. “When I heard you speak of your idea, that was the concept I believed in. Find that Army Reserve vice principal, give him the training he necessarily needs, arm him, and stop this madness.”
The president appreciated all the back up. “Thank you, Phil,” he said.
Gov. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) would rather increase law enforcement presence in schools as opposed to arming teachers with firearms. (Reuters)
— Several Republican governors who were in the room didn’t want to say it to Trump’s face, but they think arming teachers is a bad idea and don’t want to pursue it.
“I disagree with him,” Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R), who plans to run for Senate, said on “Fox News Sunday.” “I want our teachers to teach, and I want our law enforcement to be able to protect the students. I want each group to focus on what they’re good at.”
But over the governor’s objections, conservative state legislators are heeding the president’s call and introducing legislation to make it happen. In Tallahassee, Republicans are forging ahead with a plan to allow local sheriffs and police departments to deputize teachers as armed “school marshals” if they complete 132 hours of training and pass background checks. “It’s just a question of working out the details,” said state Sen. Bill Galvano (R), the next president of the Florida Senate.
In Alabama, a state representative quickly got about three dozen co-sponsors for a proposal to let teachers carry concealed pistols in schools. Gov. Kay Ivey (R), a former teacher, expressed her displeasure. “In my personal opinion, teachers have got their hands full being teachers and instructors and I just think there’s some other way to provide protection,” she said.
— Utah Gov. Gary Herbert (R) offered a conciliatory message after some of his colleagues expressed opposition. “Each state is going to have to find their own way, based on their own culture, based on their own politics, based on their own unique demographics,” he told the president. “And we’ll learn from each other.”
— As the hour-long discussion wore on, Trump seemed more and more inclined to leave all the specifics and complexities of arming teachers to others. He said the federal government “will help monetarily,” possibly with grants to cover $1,000-a-year bonuses for teachers who pack heat, but that the governors and local districts can tackle everything else. “Just go and do it yourself,” the president said at the end of the meeting. “We will be there to help you no matter what your solution is. But this is largely a state issue.”
Many teachers across the country turned to social media to demand that they be armed with resources, not guns. (Melissa Macaya/The Washington Post)
— All politics is local. Here’s a look of how this issue is playing across the states:
- The State (South Carolina): “SC politician giving guns to teachers in message to ‘deranged psychotic degenerates.’”
- Greenville News (South Carolina): GOP “Governor candidate Catherine Templeton calls for arming teachers while opening campaign.”
- News & Observer (North Carolina): “NC education chief says more cops — and not armed teachers — will make schools safer.”
- Duluth News Tribune (Minnesota): “Northland educators oppose arming teachers with guns.”
- KELO-TV (South Dakota): “Parents React To Tri-Valley School Sentinel Policy.”
- KOAT-TV (New Mexico): “Arming teachers: Some schools say it ‘can be done right.’”
- LA Times (California): “One big problem with the idea of arming teachers: Insurance companies won’t play along, and for good reason.”
- Daily News (New York): “Retired NYPD cop who is now a teacher rips Trump’s ‘ludicrous’ proposal to arm educators.”
- NHPR (New Hampshire): “Local SWAT Commander: Arming Teachers is a Bad Idea.”
- Lawrence Journal-World (Kansas): “Lawrence educators blast proposals for arming teachers as ludicrous and a distraction from the real issues.”
- ArkansasMatters.com (Arkansas): “As Colleges Prepare for Guns, Clarksville Offers a Few Lessons.”
- Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Texas): “Teachers packing heat: It’s one thing to carry a gun. It’s another to pull the trigger.”
- Dallas Morning News (Texas): “Arming teachers and building police stations: a desperate Texas is trying everything to keep our kids safe.”
- Midland Reporter-Telegram (Texas): “Argyle teachers volunteer to be armed.”
- Cross Timbers Gazette (Texas): “Local school district police chief believes arming teachers works.”
- Daily Iowan (Iowa): “Trump’s support of giving guns to teachers is problematic and not plausible.”
- Springfield News-Leader (Missouri): “Trump wants some teachers to carry guns. This school district is already doing it.”
— Are we taking our eye off the ball? “The deliberately outrageous idea of arming classroom teachers is nothing more than a distraction, a ploy by the gun lobby to buy time for passions to cool,” columnist Eugene Robinson argues in today’s paper. “The National Rifle Association and its vassals in the Republican Party would like you to exhaust your outrage on a possibility that is, from the start, impossible. … ‘Up to States’ means abdicating the federal government’s responsibility and urging state legislatures to waste time and effort debating whether to mandate that instruments of death be introduced to classrooms.”
View the post here.