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THE FOLLOWING LETTER APPEARS IN THE GAZETTE
To the Editor:
The actions of Superintendent Walker during the recent school board election raise issues of concern beyond the 2025 election itself. One of those actions was the email sent out the day following the candidate forum.
As is common after a candidate debate, supporters posted clips on social media. The district sent an email saying that members of the public were prohibited from doing so because of FCC regulations:
“Only licensed media, including TV, radio, and newspapers, are entitled by FCC regulations to air portions of this recording. Anyone else who broadcasts or streams this recording must do so only in its entirety.”
This is complete nonsense, which raises the question of why Superintendent Walker had the email sent out. What was he thinking? There are three possibilities.
Perhaps he believes that the FCC can restrict the First Amendment rights of Croton residents on social media. Perhaps he believes that newspapers are “licensed” by the government. Perhaps he believes that the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) has a provision granting broader Constitutional rights to government-licensed corporations than to Croton residents.
I don’t believe that Superintendent Walker is that ignorant of the Constitution or of free speech rights. But the fact that we can seriously consider this possibility says something about our view of his ability to direct an educational enterprise.
The second possibility is that the Superintendent believes that the residents of the school district are ignorant, or that they forgot what they learned in eighth grade social studies class. This says something about his contempt for the intelligence of his adult constituency.
The third possibility is that the Superintendent is not stupid, nor does he believe members of the community are stupid. This leads us to a disturbing conclusion.
The people most likely to post clips of the candidate forum are those who are passionate about the election, and these are most likely parents.
CHUFSD is a relatively small district. People know each other and there are a limited number of common social media pages: your fellow parents and your children’s teachers and school administrators will quickly find out what you post online.
In other words: the third (and most likely) possibility suggests that CHUFSD was intimidating voters from exercising their constitutional rights. On the day prior to sending out the takedown the Superintendent used the official Parent Portal to warn of “ongoing… misinformation.”
“Misinformation” is the trendy term for inconvenient facts. It is used by people who cannot deny the factual accuracy of a statement but wish to shut down debate by discrediting the speaker.
What the school district did in the email is not an example of “misinformation” but rather an example of falsehood. Insofar as it was intended to intimidate voters from speaking about an upcoming election, it arguably constituted electoral interference.
The district has attempted to blame the League of Women Voters. Let us assume that LWV did tell Superintendent Walker the “FCC-licensed media” nonsense. One of the things we hear ad nauseum is that old folks don’t know how difficult is for today’s students to determine the reliability of the information flooding over them. We are told that they need classes in “information literacy” and are taught “how to think, not what to think.”
If Superintendent Walker had taken such a class, he might have turned to his trusty iPad. There he would have located the government website containing the regulations promulgated by federal agencies. It is (not surprisingly) called “Code of Federal Regulations.” Our intrepid scholar would have found news articles about the (rare) instances where someone said you can’t post clips of a candidate debate. He would have learned the reason for the rarity of cases is due to First Amendment concerns (including “fair use” in instances of copyright infringement). He would learn that the FCC is loath to do anything which would impinge on political speech, and looks to its statutory authority before initiating any such enforcement activity. And… umm… newspapers are not licensed by any agency of the US government.
Armed with this newfound knowledge, the Superintendent could have questioned the source— that is what his “information literacy” teacher would have taught him. He could have started by going to the primary source and not simply rely on a facially dubious claim made by a secondary source.
I should note that I emailed the district, politely asking for the CFR cite. I am waiting for their response. I am also waiting to win Mega Millions. Anybody want to bet on which event will occur first?
—Paul Steinberg
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