The Associated Press claimed in a Tuesday “fact check” that the Sept. 29 National School Board Association’s (NSBA) letter did not ask President Joe Biden to label parents who protest at school board meetings as “domestic terrorists.”
However, the NSBA letter said that acts of malice against school boards “could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism.”
“As these acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials have increased, the classification of these heinous actions could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes,” the NSBA letter read.
The AP’s easily debunked “fact check” is driving a massive ratio and the reporter has locked his account.
It’s time for fact check editor (and former HuffPo employee) @KarenMahabir to retract this story. pic.twitter.com/5RI1CQVTLX
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) October 6, 2021
The NSBA letter also explicitly urged Biden to consider using the PATRIOT Act in regards to domestic terrorism to deal with “acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials.” (RELATED: America’s Top 25 Private Schools Are Pushing ‘Anti-Racism,’ ‘Equity’ Initiatives)
AP’s fact check read, “The organization … is not asking Biden to label parents who protest at school board meetings as terrorists. The NSBA asked the administration to do an interagency investigation of threats of violence against school board members and said the threats ‘could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes.'”
NSBA CEO Chip Slaven said the letter was addressing violence and threats, not protests from parents, in a statement to the AP, according to the outlet.
The letter condemned both threats and “acts of intimidation” against school board members, and mentioned “attacks against school board members and educators for approving policies for masks” and threats inspired by “propaganda purporting the false inclusion of critical race theory within classroom instruction and curricula.”
The Department of Justice responded to the NSBA letter Monday, instructing the FBI to cooperate with local law enforcement in every federal judicial district to address threats against school administrators and other school staff.
The AP reached out to the Daily Caller to share that it updated the story and stands by it.
The update includes a comment from Chris Rufo that the Biden administration is “using the FBI to suppress parents and criminalize dissent.”