Jill Biden, the wife of 2020 Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, fired back at Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Wednesday after DeVos took aim at her husband’s recent comment on charter schools during a Fox News interview.
In an interview with CNN’s “New Day,” Jill Biden blamed DeVos and the Trump administration for not having a strategy to reopen schools safely in the fall as rates of new coronavirus infections continue to vex officials in many states.
“No, it doesn’t surprise me [that she didn’t have a plan],” Biden told CNN’s Bianna Golodryga. “Coming from Betsy DeVos, you know, I don’t think she ever felt invested in America’s public schools.”
“She didn’t have a strategy, Trump didn’t have a strategy,” Biden continued. “There’s so many things already that Joe has planned to do.”
Biden went on in the interview to point to her husband’s plan to boost funding for schools to provide personal protective equipment and other sanitary measures to make in-person learning in schools safer, as well as his vow to replace DeVos if elected.
Her comments come after an interview DeVos gave the night before on “The Story with Martha MacCallum” on Fox News, during which DeVos hammered the former vice president over his opposition to federally funding for-profit charter schools.
“Well, Martha, Joe Biden probably doesn’t remember it, but in 1997, he gave an impassioned speech on the Senate floor in favor of school choice,” DeVos said on Fox. “Today, he’s turned his back on the kids that we are talking about, and he’s turned his face in favor of the teachers’ union and what they have to say and what they have to demand, and it’s really shameful.”
President Trump in particular has sought to muddy Joe Biden’s stance on charter schools and has accused the former vice president falsely of wanting to end “school choice” and the charter school system entirely.
“I saw this two days ago for the first time. He wants to end school choice, no school choice, and abolish charter schools,” the president said at a tele-rally in July.