As Biden crossed 20 days in the White House, agency confirms that on his watch, school partnerships with Chinese Communist Party foreign missions will be kept going and kept quiet.
Under Biden, Confucius Institute Partnerships Need Not Be Disclosed.
ICE has confirmed that the Biden Admin scrapped a rule proposed by Trump in December that would have required American schools and universities to disclose partnerships with Confucius Institutes, the U.S. affiliate of a Beijing institute whose directors include members of the Chinese Communist Party.
In August 2020, the Trump administration designated the U.S. arm of the program as a “foreign mission” of the Chinese Communist Party. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo described the Confucius Institute as “an entity controlled by the PRC that advances Beijing’s global propaganda and malign influence campaign on U.S. campuses and K-12 classrooms.”
President Joe Biden visited a “Confucius Classroom” in California in 2012, where he praised Chinese then-Vice President Xi Jinping as “straightforward” and “open.”
On School Reopening, Goalposts Fade Into The Distance.
In the briefing room Tuesday, press secretary Jen Psaki doubled down on the “$2,000″ for Americans in need (which may as well be “$3,200” if we’re combining Trump and Biden stimulus dollars, but $3,200 wasn’t a signature Biden campaign promise).
“The President and the administration are making the case directly to the country about the need to pass the Rescue Plan so we can finish the job and get $2,000 into the pockets of working families, so we can reopen schools safely, and so we can get economic relief to struggling Americans and communities.”
When pressed on the definition of “open schools,” Psaki added:
“His goal that he set is to have the majority of schools — so, more than 50 percent — open by day 100 of his presidency… Teaching at least one day a week in the majority of schools, by day 100.”
Safe school reopening has been one of the major pitches for the $1.9 trillion relief plan, but understandably, “50 percent of schools on 20 percent of school days” has not been, until now.
As of Wednesday, February 10, official CDC guidance on reopening schools is expected to be released imminently.
Dems, Labor to Biden: Think Twice on Killing Keystone.
This week Sen. Joe Manchin sent a letter to Biden urging him to reconsider his day-one cancellation of the Keystone XL Pipeline, the latest in negative feedback from Biden’s own allies on the decision.
“I encourage you to reconsider your decision to revoke the cross-border permit for the Keystone XL pipeline and take into account the potential impacts of any further action to safety, jobs, and energy security,” Manchin wrote.
Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, also expressed skepticism about the forthcoming “green jobs” in an Axios on HBO interview, saying he wished the president had “paired” the cancellation with the promised job creation “more carefully.”
