Just a few days after the brutal assassination of Conservative activist Charlie Kirk, the Texas Education Agency will be suspending more than 100 Texas teachers’ certifications, making them ineligible to teach in the state.
On September 10, Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and prolific Conservative activist, was viciously killed at Utah Valley University by a single gunshot to the neck. Kirk’s assassin was eventually turned in to the authorities by his family two days after the shooting.
However, following the shooting, thousands of liberals took to social media to celebrate the death of the husband and father.
One teacher, Jennifer Courtemanche, an English teacher at Baytown Lee High School, mocked Kirk’s death, saying:
“I’ll bet if the victim had been Black or Brown or a Democrat influencer, he’d have been singing a different tune … Could Kirk have baited just ONE too many people? Could this have been the consequences of his actions catching up with him?”
In Wylie ISD in North Texas, an elementary teacher and band director in the district resigned from the respective positions, due to making comments about Kirk’s death, with one teacher saying:
“Looks like he took one for the team. Hope he is roasting! He spewed hate, racism and misogyny so I’m not shedding any tears. Then the orange POS PEDOPHILE RAPIST wants flags at half mast. I served for 20 years, my husband served for 26 we will never get flags flown at half mast. Yet this vile a** kissing POS does. Pathetic!” the Wylie ISD teacher said.
After the TEA was made aware of multiple comments from school personnel, the agency’s Commissioner Mike Morath wrote a letter to superintendents announcing he will be “referring all documentation of educators that have proliferated such vile content to TEA’s Educator Investigations Division.” Morath also added that the posts could constitute a violation of the ‘Educators’ Code of Ethics.’
In the letter, Morath included that additional instances of inappropriate content can be shared with TEA’s Misconduct Reporting Portal.
“While the exercise of free speech is a fundamental right we are all blessed to share, it does not give carte blanche authority to celebrate or sow violence against those that share differing beliefs and perspectives,” Morath wrote in the letter. “Mr. Kirk was a father and a husband, and tragically, his children no longer have their father, and his wife no longer has her spouse. As a father and husband myself, and as someone devoted to the education of children, it is heartbreaking.”
Following the letter, it was confirmed that TEA had received around 180 complaints related to inappropriate posts made by Texas teachers about the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
“While all educators are held to a high standard of professionalism, there is a difference between comments made in poor taste and those that call for and incite further violence – the latter of which is clearly unacceptable,” Morath wrote in an updated statement. “TEA’s Educator Investigations Division has already begun its review, and I will be recommending to the State Board for Educator Certification that such individuals have their certification suspended and be rendered ineligible to teach in a Texas public school.”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott also chimed in on the conversation, saying that more than 100 Texas educators will have their teaching certification suspended.
Anyone who has information on other Texas educators supporting violence or celebrating Charlie Kirk’s assassination can file a complaint here.