Accreditation for College Excellence Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. OWENS. Mr. Chair, I thank Chairwoman Foxx for her remarkable vision and leadership.

Mr. Chair, I will speak to the ACE Act, which is a part of the End Woke Higher Education Act.

Our Nation's education system is built on the fundamental values of free speech, freedom of religion, and the guaranteed rights of hearty and healthy debates. These core principles are so inherent to America that we often take them for granted. We, over time, assume that these freedoms will always be safe, without any effort on our part to protect them. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

A glance at our university system reveals a troubling trend: Ideological conformity and intolerance when not compliant is undermining academic freedom.

There is a systemic acceptance of a new litmus test in the accreditation world. Institutions of higher learning are facing immense pressure from accreditors to conform to the anti-American Marxist doctrine of DEI and critical race theory or risk losing access to Federal funding. This is not the education our Founders envisioned in their quest for America to continue to be a more perfect Union.

My dad was a college professor for 40 years at Florida A&M. Being raised in Tallahassee, Florida, in the shadows of FAMU and Florida State, I remember distinctly the era when our Nation's colleges and universities prided themselves on merit and competition. It was in that era within the classrooms that value of free speech, free exchange of ideas, and high standards were proudly taught.

Fast-forward to 2024, and throughout our Nation, religious institutions and conservative colleges that seek to teach their own values, the same values that students are signing up for and paying for, risk losing Federal funding by doing this process, by teaching this process.

The ACE Act brings this attack on the foundation of our American culture to an end. It allows every educational institution in our country to return to its original mission, which is to educate students in the American tradition of free and open debate, to allow for the training of critical thinking skills, and to prepare them to enter and succeed in America's innovative and diverse workforce.

The ACE Act reinforces the autonomy of every school to develop their own curriculums and policies without undue pressure to conform to the Marxist agenda pushed by politicized accrediting bodies. Most importantly, this upholds our constitutional right of free speech, which is fundamental to preserving the legacy of freedom for all future generations.

Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to join me in defending the basic American rights afforded to us by the Constitution and support the ACE Act, H.R. 3724.

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