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Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, my children are grown now, but every time that we moved or considered what neighborhood to live in, as they were growing up and attending public schools, the first question we would ask is, ``What about the schools?'' because we, like most parents, wanted to make sure that our children went to the very best schools possible. And if we had to dig a little deeper and figure out how do we buy a house in a neighborhood that was in that school district, then we would do it. But the sad fact of life is that many parents of lesser means, of lower income, don't have the luxury of buying a house in a neighborhood where a public school is excellent. In fact, many of our children, because they don't have access to charter schools, are literally trapped in failing schools, which will forever affect their course of life, their development, the jobs they can qualify for, the level of education they can achieve. All of that will be impacted negatively by the fact that many of our young people go to schools that are less than excellent and, in many cases, failing.

In 2010, I think it was, I saw the documentary called ``Waiting for Superman.'' This was a story that in one way was exhilarating but in another way it was very depressing because it was all about the lottery system in New York's schools. If you were lucky enough to win the lottery, you knew that your life and your future was going to be forever impacted for the better.

But I still remember looking at the faces and the tears of the children who did not win the lottery, who did not get to go to the best schools, and they knew that their life, too, would be forever impacted but in that case for the worse.

I am a firm believer that competition makes us all better. It makes us work harder, strive for greater achievement. But I think the public school system--in particular, the teachers unions--they don't want any competition because they don't want anybody to show that our children can be educated better--with better teachers, better training, better facilities. And that is what the charter school movement has provided: some competition, some basis for comparison.

If everybody is operating at this level, with no one operating at this level, then everybody is going to continue to operate in a subpar performance. Of course, I am not painting with a broad brush, but I am saying that a lot of low-income children are condemned to bad schools with no way out. And charter schools offer a way out for those children.

Now, I think sometimes the term ``school choice'' gets confused with charter schools because school choice, as I understand it, is more broadly interpreted to mean parochial schools and that sort of thing-- private schools. But charter schools are public schools. We are talking about high-quality, tuition-free public schools that are open to all students.

In my State, in Texas, we have 900 charter schools. They don't serve the elite. They don't serve the wealthy. They don't serve even the majority population. In fact, 62 percent of Texas charter school students are Hispanic. We have about a 42-percent Hispanic population. So you can say that charter schools disproportionately benefit Hispanic students.

Twenty-seven percent of the students that attend charter schools have limited proficiency in English; that is, English is not their first language. And the overwhelming majority of students are economically disadvantaged. In other words, their parents can't buy a house in the best school district in town. Their parents don't have the money to send them to a private school. And so charter schools represent the only real option-- public, tuition-free schools that are open to all students.

I am concerned that the Biden administration is too close to the teachers unions that were responsible for much of the extended lockdowns we saw during COVID-19, and many of their members basically refused to go back to the classroom even though across the country private schools and many other educational institutions were able to continue--yes, observing social distancing, masking, all of the protocols we became very familiar with during the pandemic. But they continued to learn in person, in school--my understanding is, for example, virtually all the Catholic schools because they depend on the tuition dollars from parents, and parents weren't going to pay to have their children learn sitting in front of a computer, if they were able to learn at all. And we are only today beginning to skim the surface of the kind of damage that occurred to our students--our children--as a result of remote learning.

You know, I sort of envision a single mom with three children who may not have even graduated from high school, much less college, herself, worried about her own job, worried about being able to provide for her family, with three school-aged children, all attending different grade levels. I can't imagine being able to adequately supervise and make sure that your children are able to learn in those circumstances. Maybe you have three kids from three different grades with three separate curricula sitting in front of a computer trying to pick up whatever educational benefit that you can.

What we learned, as a result of the draconian lockdowns supported and encouraged by Randi Weingarten and the teachers unions, is that many of our children have fallen far behind. And it may take not months, not weeks, but literally years to catch up, if they ever do.

So I don't really understand this idea of some of the Biden administration and the teachers unions who don't like and won't tolerate charter schools. Is it because they are OK with children being trapped in failing schools? I can't really understand why they would view this as a threat.

Public, tuition-free, high-quality charter schools--these are public schools. They aren't private schools. These aren't for the elite. This isn't for the rich. This is for overwhelmingly economically disadvantaged students.

And so I support Senator Tim Scott. I applaud his leadership in this area in saying that the Biden administration should not stand in the way of these charter schools.

Every child deserves a quality education, and every parent deserves the freedom to choose the school that will serve their child best.

So I appreciate the fact that Senator Scott is such a tireless advocate for charter schools and is a champion of choices and alternatives for parents, many of whom are economically disadvantaged and have no other choice other than to send their child to a failing school.

I hope our colleagues will join us in voting to overturn this damaging new rule tomorrow when we vote on it.

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