Ryan Walters has been stonewalling the people of Oklahoma and the journalists working to inform them for months, but it’s taken until now for state lawmakers to take it seriously.
Why?
Because Walters is treating Republican legislators just like he’s treated everyone else who dares question the path forward for our public schools.
And to these GOP leaders, that’s infuriating.
Oklahoma’s education superintendent has punched a hole in their egos, and sent a flare that unless they’re affiliated with Fox News, youth-focused content creator PragerU or any other conservative national brand that can help Walters further his national ambitions of grandeur, they’re not urgently worth his attention.
Walters is refusing to comply with basic requests for information from lawmakers. He’s denying them access to his meeting rooms. He’s sending confusing signals about how he’s allocating funding.
More: Ryan Walters has become a household name in Oklahoma, but not for the right reasons | Letter
He’s calling some of his Republican legislative critics, gasp, RINOs — Republicans in name only. He’s described a superintendent, who is a military veteran, as a “clown” and “liar” for complaining about a lack of information flowing from the Oklahoma State Department of Education regarding his district’s Title I funding. Walters has dared question the way legislators have written their budgetary priorities and questioned if they comply with state statute.
And his decisions are starting to impact rural schools, whose administrators likely have lawmakers on speed dial.
One might feel a tad sorry for our Republican legislators — if the average Oklahoman hadn’t been living the same nightmare since he first took office in 2023.
Regular folks have been begging for access to State Education Department meetings for nearly a year now, so desperate to get in that they’ve camped out overnight hoping to hold a spot in line. Most just wanted the opportunity to look their public officials in the eye as they voted on consequential education policies. Or, they just want to simply be in the room to hear for themselves new policy ideas or budget priorities impacting their local schools.
Lawmakers deliberately looked the other way as our education officials stubbornly refused to move the meeting to a bigger location so that more people could participate.
So it’s OK for constituents to be barred from being in the room, but not lawmakers?
The State Education Department openly acknowledges there’s a massive backlog of open records requests. Lord knows, our newsroom has had some that are so old that I couldn’t even initially remember why we requested them in the first place.
More: Ryan Walters craves national spotlight while Oklahoma education remains low in rankings | Guest column
The average person has been struggling to get basic information from the state Education Department, and even the governor’s secretary of education has faced hurdles.
So, lawmakers’ requests for information should jump the line ahead of their constituents? Is their need for information more important than ours?
The State Board of Education, of which Walters is a part, recently has decided to bar entrance to three lawmakers who sought to attend executive sessions. That’s despite legal advice from the attorney general’s office that state law requires they be admitted.
When a Democratic senator was barred earlier this year, most Republicans seemingly took no public action to help her. But when a Republican House member found himself barred, it was like someone poked a beehive with a stick.
Within days, influential Republican lawmakers began circulating a petition calling for an investigation into Walters and possible impeachment. Now an investigation into state Education Department spending is underway
As of last week, over two dozen Republican legislators signed onto a letter calling for an inquiry exploring whether impeachment is justified. In the letter, supporters ticked off a plethora of issues that included a refusal to allow lawmakers into executive sessions, unseemly delays in responding to open records requests and failing to comply with lawmakers’ budgetary directives on funding for school security and asthma inhalers. Critics also say Walters is not communicating effectively with them or district leadership about critical items like how much funding they’re to receive.
I have no doubt Walters is shirking his responsibilities as a leader as he jetsets across the country, focused on raising recognition of his personal brand, but his competency has been subject to questions for months now.
I’m glad Republicans are finally paying attention. Maybe this is finally the impetus our lawmakers need to take action to make things better for the average Oklahomans who have found themselves locked out.
Janelle Stecklein is editor of Oklahoma Voice. An award-winning journalist, Stecklein has been covering Oklahoma government and politics since moving to the state in 2014. Oklahoma Voice is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Ryan Walters raises ire of Republican members of Oklahoma Legislature
Source Agencies
