Ryan Walters wants Oklahoma taxpayers to spend $6 million on public school bibles

The state's Christian Nationalist Superintendent of Public Instruction wants more money to indoctrinate kids

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Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction, Ryan Walters, always looking for new ways to shove Christianity into public schools, now wants to spend $6,000,000 on New King James Version bibles for teachers across the state.

It’s not a shocking pronouncement. After all, this is the same guy who tried to force teachers to make the Bible part of their curriculum, backed a taxpayer-funded Catholic charter school (which the Oklahoma Supreme Court later declared illegal), tried to put Christian chaplains in public schools, and attempted to mandate displays of the Ten Commandments in public schools.

He also approved the use of PragerU materials in classrooms, claimed the Tulsa Race Massacre had nothing to do with race, falsely insisted that President Joe Biden “wants to destroy our Christian faith,” formed a faith committee to examine prayer in public schools, appointed the troll who runs Libs of TikTok to a statewide library advisory board, and sent out a “sample prayer” for teachers to use for the people of Israel (and definitely not the innocent people living in Gaza).

He’s so bad at doing his job that even his Republican colleagues are demanding an investigation into Walters and his office over a batch of concerns that aren’t even related to the Culture Wars.

Ryan Walters, about to say something thoughtless (screenshot via Facebook)

Until he gets kicked out of office, though, he’ll keep trying to wreck the school system he was elected to oversee, and the Bible remains his most potent weapon.

As I mentioned earlier, Walters issued a memo over the summer demanding that every public school incorporate the Bible into their curriculum. In order to facilitate that request, he set aside $3 million from his office’s budget to purchase bibles for use in classrooms. Now he wants to double that.

Walters said during the monthly meeting of the Oklahoma State Board of Education that the funds would be coupled with $3 million from last year for a total of $6 million to provide Bibles for public schools throughout Oklahoma.

He said he wanted to purchase New King James Version editions that were free from commentary, although he noted it would be fine if the books included other key historical documents, such as the U.S. Constitution.

He also said this was an attempt to prevent censorship… a problem that exists only in his head:

“So, this would give us the ability to utilize $6 million in less than two years to ensure that the Bible hasn’t been driven out of Oklahoma classrooms,” Walters said. “That would be a significant step for the state of Oklahoma to ensure that we’re not allowing the left to censor American history.”

Walters confuses an accurate and comprehensive understanding of American history with a whitewashed version promoted by the likes of pseudo-historian David Barton which caters to their shared fictional Jesus-centric story of our past. Reality, to them, is oppression.

Also, why $6 million?! Oklahoma has about 43,000 public school teachers (as of 2022). Most of them don’t teach classes that would even need a Bible, but even if you bought a copy of the book for every single one of them, it would come out to $139.53 per Bible. What the hell are Ryan Walters’ overheads?! How come none of the Board members bothered to do the basic math here?! (Not to mention that there are undoubtedly megachurches that would bend over backwards to donate free copies of the Bible to schools if they were able to get away with it.)

During Thursday’s board meeting, no one seriously questioned the wisdom of Walters’ absolutely idiotic plan.

At Thursday's education board meeting, all four of the appointed members in attendance asked questions about, and expressed support for, Walters' plans to distribute Bibles to every classroom in Oklahoma.

Walters and his minions all pretended this was in the spirit of religious neutrality, that the bibles were absolutely not an endorsement of Christianity, and that the only purpose of this project was to help students learn the “role the Bible played throughout American history.”

But if that was actually the agenda, there’s nothing currently stopping teachers from referencing any relevant text in the classroom. History teachers can (and do) bring up the Bible if it’s relevant. They bring up the Magna Carta, too, but no one is arguing that every classroom needs a physical copy of that text. If teachers want a copy of the Bible in their classrooms for objective reasons, they can always bring one in. And translations of the Bible are (can you believe it?) free online! No teacher needs a specific copy of the Bible in every room, paid for by taxpayers—a translation that isn’t subscribed to by non-Christians or many other Christians.

This is nothing more than a $6 million gift to religious ministries willing to provide a specific Bible translation to teachers across the state. The only way these Bibles might be worthwhile is if students use them as shields during a school shooting.

The Board later approved a $4,100,000,000 (billion) budget request to state lawmakers that included the $3,000,000 earmark for copies of the Bible. It’s possible the legislature could ignore Walters’ recommendations and simply give his office less money than he wants. It’s all theoretical right now, but it’s indicative of the Board’s priorities.

They are more interested in promoting Christianity than giving students the tools they need to succeed. They want to rewrite history to advance their religion, despite criticism from historians who know better, and they want the legislature to pay for brainwashing kids.

At least some people are speaking out. Democratic State Sen. Mary Boren pointed out that using tax dollars to buy bibles was arguably a violation of the state’s Constitution which “establishes a higher bar of separation of church and state.” She also poked a giant hole in the argument that this particular version of the Bible was influential throughout history, noting that Michelangelo was influenced by the “Latin Catholic Bible,” not the version Walters is hawking.

House Democratic Leader Rep. Cyndi Munson was even more blunt in her criticism:

The State Superintendent continues to ignore the Oklahoma Constitution. He wants to use millions in public taxpayer dollars to fund religion in public schools—something the majority of Oklahomans are adamantly against—while Oklahoma public schools remain some of the most underfunded public schools in the nation. Oklahoma ranks 45th in the United States for per-student expenditures and Oklahoma public school teachers are paid more than $10,000 less than the national average salary for public school teachers. There are major gaps in funding public education in Oklahoma, and yet the State Superintendent continues to abandon the needs of our public school districts to push for policies that do not benefit teachers, students, or families. He has and continues to fail us and our public schools.

The most direct comments came from Democratic State Rep. Mickey Dollens:

This is what it looks like when Christian Nationalism attempts to take over public education. The State Superintendent of Oklahoma public schools wants to spend millions of your tax dollars to purchase Bibles, which he demands be taught in public school classrooms beyond just world history and social studies.

When asked which version he preferred, he specified the King James Version but added that it could include other key historical documents, such as the Constitution. Conveniently, the "Trump Bible" is the King James Version and includes the U.S. Constitution.

Public schools are not Sunday schools. The State Superintendent and numerous GOP politicians in Oklahoma are on a Christian nationalist crusade to impose their religious agenda on everyone else's children.

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It’s also important to note that students can and do bring their Bible, Torah, Quran, Bhagavad Gita, Avesta, etc., into classrooms. However, forcing religious texts into classrooms by the government is a violation of the freedom of religion. The Bible is already available for free access through district-assisted devices.

These aren’t the only concerns. As I’ve said before, Walters’ decisions could make college admissions counselors think twice before admitting a student graduating from an Oklahoma school. Ryan Walters is an obstacle in the way of Oklahoma students who want to succeed later in life. Students can always overcome those obstacles, but it’s awful that the man in charge of the state’s public schools is working as an antagonist rather than an ally.

One more note: It’s possible no one would have known about this meeting—and the $3 million Bible funding request—if Walters had his way. He didn’t want the media to have access to this meeting. Oklahoma City NBC news affiliate KFOR had to go to court earlier this week to demand access to the meeting, since Walters and his office regularly denied it or sent reporters to an overflow room so they couldn’t record it. He’s also denied KFOR reporters access to his post-meeting press conferences. A judge granted the station’s request on Wednesday.

When a KFOR reporter, Spencer Humphrey, asked State Board of Education Press Secretary Dan Isett for comment about the litigation, Isett was predictably asshole-ish about it: “We don’t respond to fake news organizations.”

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