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Speaker 1: And we are back with another edition of the Federalist

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Radio Hour. I'm Matt Kittle, Senior Elections correspondent at the

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Federalist and your experienced Shirba on today's quest for Knowledge.

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As always, you can email the show at radio at

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the Federalist dot com, follow us on exit FBRLST. Make

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sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcast, and of

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course to the premium version of our website as well.

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Our guest today is Richard Corcoran, former Speaker of the

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Florida House the Sunshine States, former Education Commissioner, and now

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President of New College of Florida. Richard's new books, Storming

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the Ivory Tower, How of Florida College became ground Zero

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in the struggle to take back our Campuses, is a

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first hand account of how he successfully took on powerful

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progressive interest groups, broke their monopoly, and paved the way

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for higher education reform across America. Thank you, sir for

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joining us on this edition of the Federalist Radio Hour.

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Speaker 2: Oh it's a pleasure to be on, Matt. Thank you

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for having me.

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Speaker 1: This is your journey, but it is America's journey as well.

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And this is not something that started a few years ago.

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It's not something that started during the Biden Harris administration,

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although it got exceedingly worse during that time. Take us

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back to before you began the battle for common sense

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on our campuses.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so, I know, the short version of my involvement

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in politics really comes from my parents. Both my parents

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were older, they both lived through the Great Depression, and

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they both fought in World War Two. My mom was British,

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so she fought in Woman's Auxiliary Force and in the

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Blitz during London and so they basically just said, hey,

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you ought to know your philosophy. You ought to know

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what you believe, and you ought to have a philosophy

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for everything, whether you're raising children, whether you're working in

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a job, because if you don't, someone's going to have

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a philosophy and they're going to move you. They're going

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to affect your life, as theirs were by horrible philosophies

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that affected them in the Great Depression and in World

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War Two. So we were always kind of politically active,

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and that led me to get politically active and basically volunteered,

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you know, all that kind of stuff. Became a staffer

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in the legislature. I was chief of staffer for Marco Rubio,

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then ran for office myself and became Speaker, and then

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after that I launched a starting of a governor's bid.

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Governor DeSantis was sort of the eight hundred pound guerrilla,

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so I got out of the race, and then he

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asked me to be on his transition team. And it's

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kind of an interesting story there because he actually I

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got out and endorsed his opponent. I didn't think the

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governor could win. And then I was in a debate

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with Matt Gates in a green room and I said

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that Governor de Santa's had a bulldog mouth and a

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Chihuahua ass and he still called me that. He still

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called and asked me, and in fact, when he called

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me right after the primary, I said, hey, you know

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then I was calling him Ron. I said, hey, Ron,

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you did hear what I said to you in the

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green room. And He's like, I don't care. I just

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want to assemble the best people. And because I wish

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I was there to watch you and Gates go at it,

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but I want to know assemble the best people, sort

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of like you know, the old Lincoln team of rivals.

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And it shows in his leadership style. But from there

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I did the transition and then he asked me to

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be a Commissioner of Education. So I did that for

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four years and then ultimately came to New College to

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be the president. And his point there was, here's this

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public institution. It's probably one of the most liberal in

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the entire country, and it's paid for by the taxpayers.

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And we're not going to have that. We're not going

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to have one sided indoctrination on either side. We're going

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to have a balanced liberal arts university that's going to

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teach kids how to think about what to think. And

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so he changed the entire board. He put on just

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great people, Christopher Rufo's, Matthew Spalding's, Mark bauerlines, Charles Kessel's,

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all these great people. They had some great board members

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already there, and then they chose me to be the

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president and we went to work. That's the short version.

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Speaker 1: Christopher Rufo, of course, one of the most well known

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defenders of speech and basic First Amendment liberties. He writes

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the forward for this book. It should be noted as well,

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this is again a generational thing. That is to say,

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the indoctrination that has been going on from the left,

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the Marxist movement to indoctrinate our kids from preschool through

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institutions of higher education. It's been going on for a

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long time. I remember as an undergraduate at the University

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of Wisconsin, Milwaukee in the early nineteen nineties, you know,

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having to take you know, I don't know what they

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called it, some sort of diversity class at the time.

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And the sort of stuff that we have been hearing

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about with critical race theory and all of that kind

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of thing that was really beginning to take shape in

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the late eight nineteen eighties. I don't go back that

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far the eighteen eighties, I feel like I do sometimes,

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but in the late mid to late nineteen eighties, this

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was all taking shape on college campuses. Again, it has

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exploded exponentially, but we really saw this. Parents really saw

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this firsthand, didn't they. They got a first hand view

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during COVID in the lockdowns.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, to your point, Matt and I talk

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about it a lot. This isn't a new piece of

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you know, groundbreaking revelation that we put in the in

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the book. What we're saying is it's a continuation of

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a story and something has to be done, and so

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I talk a lot about to your point, William F.

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Buckley wrote god Man in Yale in the early nineteen

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fifty saying, Hey, I'm being indoctrinate. They're telling me that

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capitalism isn't good, you know. And then you have Alan

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Bloom writing in the late eighties, you know, the closing

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of the American mind and an example after example of

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the indoctrination's going on campus. What we tried to do

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here and I wanted to say, and when I say we,

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I'm talking about because it really it's a story about

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the entire board, the governor and how this was overhauled.

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And so what we tried to say, I put it

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into words of what was done by all of us,

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is that you have to put it in action. Enough

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is enough. We can't have seventy years of just constantly

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saying this is going on, this is going on, this

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is going on. We all know what you experienced at Wisconsin.

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I experienced it. What we need to do is have

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a plan of attack. And I think that it's what

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Christopher talks about in the forward is enough is enough?

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Need to get to work. And so I think the

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book is a continuation of that story. But it's actually

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a plan on how you can change this, and you

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can change it really really fast. And to your point

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on the COVID, I think, just like we had. You know,

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these are catastrophic events. So I don't want to minimalize

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the catastrophe of a government taking away all our freedoms

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in a so called declared emergency or what happened on

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October seventh in Israel. But a silver lining, if there

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could be one. In COVID, parents saw, wait a second,

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I cannot believe what I'm hearing my kids being taught

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on these zoom calls, and it radically changed K twelve education.

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And in October seventh we saw these presidents and these

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administrations actually defending students being assaulted and battered because of

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who they were, and that was okay. And the rhetoric

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and the testimony before Congress. I think people are like,

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oh my gosh, this is gotten out of control. So

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both of those I think COVID in K twelve October seventh,

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Higher ED a perfect example of COVID. I mean of

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Higher ED is is Bill Ackman. This is a guy

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who is donating to aiding to Obama. He graduated from Harvard,

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He had a child at Harvard who graduated from Harvard,

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and he goes and he figures out real fast, Hey,

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this DEIB. They don't just call a DEI diversity equity inclusion.

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They added belonging, the irony of the titles that I mean,

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they're fantastic, the progressive left of choosing words that we

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all will agree with and sound great, and they long

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and U seeing them to do the exact opposite. The

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only people who belonged in there were if you were

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in the club. I always quote George Rowell from My

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Animal Farm, all of us are equal. I want everyone

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to know we're all equal, but some more equal than others.

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And we'll let you know who that is. And that's

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really what DEI be, whatever you want to call it.

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And the acmens of the world everyone, because of the

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October seventh, just catastrophic event, had the veil ripped off,

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that this indoctrination on university campuses has hit a level

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of national secure already. Arguably, Yeah, no doubt about that.

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Speaker 1: And you know, I just think about what we have

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gone through, particularly over the last several years in this country.

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You know, I spoke with some leaders in the Moms

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for Liberty movement this week, and we were talking about

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some of the recent successes they've had, and certainly with

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this Sea change election, those elections are those, you know,

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successes are very clear becoming much more clear. But they

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were talking about the early days of their movement and

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what a lonely space it was. You know, there were

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a lot of parents in this country going through exactly

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what we were just talking about, seeing their kids being

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indoctrinated live on zoom and you know, just didn't know

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what to do. Shocked, stunned, but you know, paralyzed if

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you will not to, not willing to or couldn't take

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action because they were worried about the repercussions from burial

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and left. But much has changed. You too, were a

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lonely warrior when you began this in many respects. Let's

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talk a little bit about what the times were like

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when you started your campaign.

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Speaker 2: Well to your point, obviously, Moms for Liberty was founded

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in Florida, and all those folks are good friends. In fact,

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most of them were school board members in those early days.

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And then they got their veil ripped off way early

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because they saw, hey, wait a second, how is this

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coming Before I'm not approving any of this stuff, but

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they were minorities because the school boards are just dominated

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by the teachers Union. You know, basically, get on a

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school board anywhere in this country. You go into you

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graduate as a teacher from a College of Education, so

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you've already been indoctrinated there. You go in and you teach,

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and you join the teachers union, and you spend ten

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years doing whatever the teachers Union really wants or advocates for,

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and then they say, hey, why don't you run for

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school board and they help you get elected to school board,

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and then you spend the next of your time and

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abeyance to the teachers Union. And that's really the you know,

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school boards, that's the story, that's the mo And then

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every now and then you get a Tiffany Justice, a

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Tina Daskovich, you know, they get on these school boards

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and they're like, wait a second, this is this is

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unheard of. And then they pulled off and they started

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this wonderful grassroots movement. So I was with them throughout

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that entire process, and there were some of our greatest

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advocates for all of the reforms that we were doing

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on the state level under Governor DeSantis. They were just

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an amazing force djure and to the point that it

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went national and has become this phenomenal group. And it's

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no different. And during that time of COVID and opening

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up schools and empowering parents that they were so helpful with.

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You know, we opened up schools all we said, Matt

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was in COVID. We did an emergency order that said,

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you must this is public, taxpayer funded institutions. You must

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open up and have a seat for any child or

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student who wants to be in that classroom. And you

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would have thought we had people doing mock grave sites

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out in front of the department. We had protests, we

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had lawsuits. Now they've all found religion in the sense

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that you know, the head of the teachers and Randy

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Wingarden says, we were demanding schools being opened in March

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of twenty twenty, and let's said, well, you sued me

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in July of twenty twenty to not do it, so

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I don't react the case. But it's the same thing

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with New College. You know, New College. We came down

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and that's why one of the ideas I have in

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the first one I talk about in chapter nine is

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Leadership is everything. If Governor DeSantis doesn't say we're taking

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over this, we're not allowing in doctrination factories. Any appoints

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an amazing group of leaders, and those leaders are just

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they've been tested by fire. They're not going to be

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pushed around or bullied. They know exactly what we need

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to do. And then they bought me on to be

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on the ground. And again it's a firestorm. You know,

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the school was sixty three years old, Matt. We hadn't

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had a single faculty grievance. I think we're on faculty

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grievance number fourteen. We had litigation from federal government, litigation

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in the state government, auditors from the Department of Education,

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inquiries from the sacks of creditors. They came at us

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with sixty right now we count them, but about sixty

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four different legal machinations and we haven't lost one of

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them because at the end of but that's what they do,

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that's how they fight, and you have to. I think

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I was talking to Christopherufoon and I was saying that

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you know more than anything. I think the book is

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about fighting and if you fight and you can prove

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you can do it. At a public liberal arts institution.

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You can do this anywhere, And I think that's what

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has them so frightened about a school that's got eight

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hundred kids or eight hundred students, because if we can

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do it at New College, you can do it at

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every university in the country.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you really have written the blueprint for it. You know,

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Florida was in many ways at the vanguard of the

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successes that we're talking about, first and foremost the liberty

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successes of just opening up schools, of you know, making

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sure that the powers that be weren't able to control

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absolutely everything through COVID fear and you know, and let's

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face it, it was easy enough for all kinds of politicians

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to say, this is too big. We're just going to

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have to trust all of the experts. We found out

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what that god is, of course, but you've kind of

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described this. But why was Florida on the leading edge

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of fighting back against this historic incursion on liberty?

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Speaker 2: One? It goes to that point again, it's just leadership.

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But here's what we did. You know, it's funny how

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the progressive left gaslight us for what they claim we're

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not doing when they're the ones that aren't doing it.

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A perfect example is how many times have we heard,

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you know, follow the science, follow the science. You guys

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are ignoring the science. Who ignored the science from top

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to bottom in COVID where the progressive left, it's the

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Gavin Nussoms, it's the Randy Winegartens, it's the talking heads,

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it's the Anthony Fougis. They ignored the science. What we

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did as soon as it was like middle of February

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and it was starting to explode in China, in Wulan,

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and I immediately got, you know, our staff together. I said, hey,

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I want one or two of our best guys. I

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want them to research every single thing every day, scour

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any study, any outbreak, any news of what is happening

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on COVID. The governor did the you know, the governor

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put together a whole force. He put one of his

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staffers in charge of it. And what we did was

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intensely study the data over and over and over every

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aspect of it. I was on phone calls with epidemiologists

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from SWE, I was on phone checking on outbreaks in Israel.

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We called everybody and talked to everybody, and the governor

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was just you know, if he has a multiple uh

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spidey senses. One of his is his ability to just

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read that data and see the trends. And and then

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what happened is we got with the right people. You know,

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Scott Atless, you know, was bought into the White House.

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We talked because now we're getting sued on the opening

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of schools. Then he hooked us up with Jay Botichara,

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and Jay Bodichara helped write our affidavit defending our right

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to open up the scientific reasoning for opening up schools.

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But we just followed the data. And when you looked

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at the data, you knew that when it came to

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school children, there wasn't a uh any kind of extravagant

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or even a real threat to life for health. Uh,

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it was they they definitely, and they weren't as much

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of a They weren't super spreaders. It was there weren't

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as viralent and so okay, well, you know, we lost

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I think twenty kids the year before to the seasonal flu,

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and we knew from looking at the data, we're not

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going to and we didn't shut down schools for the

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seasonal flu. And we also knew the ramifications of shutting

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down school we saw in the data from schools that

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immediately did that spikes and suicides, spikes in drug use,

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spikes in isolation and depression and anxiety. You every single

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metric didn't go up one percent, two percent, or ten percent.

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They were going up in the hundreds of percent. It

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was far, far riskier for our school children to have

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schools closed than to have them opened. And that was

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all scientific and all from the data. In fact, when

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Gavin Newsom and Randy Weingarten tweeted, and I want to say,

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in the last six months, they're like, you know, we

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all thought, you know, Hindsight's twenty twenty was Gavenusom. You

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know we didn't know what we didn't know. And it's like, no,

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you did. You did not care about the science. You

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didn't care about the data. It was a moment of

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control and to affect people's lives for your agenda, and

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you seize it and don't try to pretend that the

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scientific data wasn't there because we saw it and we

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opened up schools.

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Speaker 1: Well, you knew, you knew, Richard, I mean you and

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others in Florida. You were public officials. Gavin Newsom's a

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public official. You know, the governor of New York who

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was whose policies were killing elderly people and senior citizens

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in nursing homes because of these lockdown sort of practices.

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They all knew, but you knew again that the dangers

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with COVID for young people were significantly less than all

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of the things that we've seen. We're paying as a

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society for those lockdown practices, those practices that we saw

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from the so called leading by the so called experts,

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and we found that so much of that has just

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been absolute lies. Somebody has got to be held accountable.

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But while you were going through this, of course you heard,

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as you said, you have the protesters out there, you

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had stinging criticism from the left and the accomplished media.

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How did you deal with all of them?

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Speaker 2: You just stay focused. You know, there's a chapter in

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the book when it comes to New College skipping from

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COVID back to and I talk about COVID at length

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in the book, just because it is a parallel universe

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when you're dealing with the media and to your point,

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the lies and how you combat that. But you know,

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I have a chapter in the book I call it

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Barking Dogs, and I stole it from Winston Churchill, and

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his point was, if you know what the mission is,

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the mission is what did the governor care about? What

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did I care about? We cared about the school children.

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We cared about the health and safety of people of

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our state. We cared about printal rights. And those were

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the things. That's what we were driving down the road saying,

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we want to get these kids a world class education,

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we want to keep them safe, we want to empower parents,

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and so everything on the side of the road. Uh,

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you know, Churchill would say, if you're going to stop

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your car on the way to that great destination, which

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is the right destination, and kick every barking dog, you're

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never getting there. And so I think one thing that

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the governor does does very well that we did very well,

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where we never stopped the car for the marking dogs.

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You guys can say all you want, we know, we

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know the data, we studied the data, and we're going

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to accomplish this. And the irony is we would have

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never closed schools at all because the data was there

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by you know, by the end of March, we were confident.

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We took an extra spring break because that was going

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on at the time, So we added a spring break

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on the back or the forward for some of our

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school districts, which gave us two weeks. And then we

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looked at the data and we knew we were good.

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And guess who really was the driving impetus of shutting

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down schools and Florida just for that you know, six

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week period. Were the universities, the liberal universities, the progressive universities,

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the indoctrinating universities, basically, you know, all of them rust

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of leftists that we're leading the charge. You know, the

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whole world is coming to an end. Everyone's going to die.

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We're shutting down. Kids are coming back from their spring break,

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they're going to from Europe. They're going to infect the

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entire campus. We're all going to die. And they shut

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down universities. And when they did that, it's we were

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in a position which I talked about, where now all

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the superintendents, sixty seven superintendents I was on the call

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with them on a daily basis, are twenty eight colleges

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telling them to stay open. And they're like, you know,

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the local university right next to me just closed, and

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they said it's a health and safety issue and kids

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could die. Now. I got parents, you know, lining the doors,

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saying why are we leaving K twelve schools open? Why

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are we leaving the college community colleges and the colleges open?

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And really they would just put us in a rock

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and a hard place, and so I said, you know what,

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let's now. What we had to do is basically convince

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the Floridian public that hey, we know the data, we

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know the safety issues, we know the damages of closing.

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And we immediately opened six weeks later for summer school,

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and then we also opened in the fall too. But

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it was led by the universities. If the universities didn't

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do their progressive left this is, you know, unscientific belief

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that this was going to be the end of the

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world and close, we would have never shut down at all.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and the people of Florida were definitely behind you,

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as the results of the subsequent elections would show. They

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got it, and they got it before the so called

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00:22:29,960 --> 00:22:32,039
experts got it as well.

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Speaker 3: If you don't have great credit credit, Trump policy, cancel

408
00:22:38,039 --> 00:22:40,799
your credit card. The Watchdout on Wall Street podcast with

409
00:22:40,920 --> 00:22:44,079
Chris Markowski. Every day Chris helps unpack the connection between

410
00:22:44,119 --> 00:22:45,680
politics and the economy and how it.

411
00:22:45,599 --> 00:22:46,440
Speaker 2: Affects your wile.

412
00:22:46,640 --> 00:22:49,160
Speaker 3: Trump and Bernie, you want to collaborate on capping credit

413
00:22:49,200 --> 00:22:51,759
card interest rates, but credit card dead as a non

414
00:22:51,799 --> 00:22:55,400
recourse loan. They can't repossess your dinner or your vacation.

415
00:22:55,720 --> 00:22:57,799
Whether it's happening in DC or down on Wall Street,

416
00:22:57,799 --> 00:22:59,000
it's affecting you financially.

417
00:22:59,079 --> 00:22:59,559
Speaker 2: Be informed.

418
00:22:59,640 --> 00:23:02,279
Speaker 3: Check out Watched Out on Wall Street podcast with Christmercowski

419
00:23:02,400 --> 00:23:04,759
on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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00:23:06,839 --> 00:23:09,440
Speaker 1: Our guest today is Richard Gorker, and former Speaker of

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the Florida House, the Sunshine State's former education Commissioner, and

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now president of the New College of Florida. His new books,

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Storming the Ivory Tower, How a Florida College Became Round Zero,

424
00:23:22,559 --> 00:23:26,119
and the Struggle to take Back Our Campuses is a

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00:23:26,200 --> 00:23:29,960
first hand account of how he successfully took on powerful

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00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:33,160
progressive interest groups, broke their monopoly, and paved the way

427
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for higher education reform across America. Let's get to the

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cultural aspects of this now, Because you were were you

429
00:23:44,480 --> 00:23:48,799
there's the term happy warrior. It seems to me you

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00:23:48,839 --> 00:23:53,559
were a happy warrior taking on the identity politics that's

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so entrenched in our institutions of higher education and now

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in our public rules in particular, did you go into

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the battle against critical race theory and you know safe spaces,

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you know the lefts silencing and killing a free speech

435
00:24:15,440 --> 00:24:17,119
all of that. Did you go into that as a

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00:24:17,160 --> 00:24:17,960
happy warrior?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean war, war, war as hell, I mean

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any kind of I mean, and I'm gonna tell you

439
00:24:26,200 --> 00:24:28,839
that that was in reference to actual people physically dying.

440
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You know, I've never really felt like I was going

441
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to physically die, so so I don't mean to say it,

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you know, to rob from the honor of our fallen

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soldiers in any sense. But what I'm saying is it's

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never comfortable. But but you know you're doing something, you know,

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as we say, that is true and good and beautiful

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and it's and it's we have an exceptional country with

447
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an amazing history, and it needs it needs fighting for,

448
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it needs preserving. And so when you have these types

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of movements that are quasi again, the these are strong words.

450
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I'm a lawyer, but our quasi treeson treason is I

451
00:25:03,880 --> 00:25:08,839
always say, what's more threat threatening? Is it? Where we at? Threat?

452
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Is it?

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Speaker 1: You know?

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Speaker 2: Russia? Is it? China? Is it radical jihatism. No, The

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biggest threat to our country is our educational system has

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failed for sixty or seventy years, engaged in this indoctrination

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to the point that people don't believe in a in

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a free market, people don't believe they believe in socialistic

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countries should be the way in the future for America.

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And it's and we have to protect it. We have

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to fight back and protect it. And it starts in education.

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It starts from birth to universities. We have to get

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education right. And they've become for all intents and purposes

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and doctrination factories for way too long. And so it's

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never easy, Matt. It's not something you wake up and say, Okay,

466
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I can't wait for the two more lawsuits they're coming

467
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my way, or whatever it might be. But you know

468
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you're doing something that is so vitally important for the

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few sure of our country, let alone for the lives

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of our citizens.

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Speaker 1: I think you touched upon it. There's a quote that

472
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is often wrongly attributed to Abraham Lincoln. He has said

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things similar to this, but the direct quote is America

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00:26:14,519 --> 00:26:17,720
will never be destroyed from the outside if we falter

475
00:26:17,880 --> 00:26:23,119
and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

476
00:26:23,839 --> 00:26:26,680
That's something I think that a lot of Americans have

477
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:30,359
awakened to. You want to talk about woke.

478
00:26:31,079 --> 00:26:31,440
Speaker 3: A lot of.

479
00:26:31,440 --> 00:26:35,599
Speaker 1: Americans got woke about the woke movement in America and

480
00:26:35,640 --> 00:26:40,839
what it is fundamentally doing to tear down the foundational

481
00:26:41,039 --> 00:26:47,359
or to strike at the foundational premises of this exceptional nation,

482
00:26:47,720 --> 00:26:50,880
this glorious city on the hill, as Ronald Reagan talked about.

483
00:26:50,920 --> 00:26:54,839
But yeah, I think you're absolutely right, and I think

484
00:26:55,400 --> 00:26:59,880
that's why a lot of Americans voted the way they did.

485
00:27:00,079 --> 00:27:04,880
They saw really very serious, if not an existential threat

486
00:27:05,079 --> 00:27:08,880
to this republic and for all it stands for now

487
00:27:08,920 --> 00:27:12,759
reading the results of this election, are you at all

488
00:27:12,920 --> 00:27:18,599
concerned of complacency? Because it's happened so often, and you know,

489
00:27:18,839 --> 00:27:24,200
the thought that well, we won, victory is ours and

490
00:27:24,440 --> 00:27:29,440
you know that's where the left really really lurks in

491
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:33,039
the shadows of complacency. Are you concerned about that?

492
00:27:34,440 --> 00:27:37,480
Speaker 2: You know? And I'll add to your point. I like

493
00:27:37,519 --> 00:27:40,200
it a lot, Matt, where you're quoting Lincoln and we

494
00:27:40,279 --> 00:27:43,839
say that too, is you know, you look at philosophers

495
00:27:43,839 --> 00:27:45,960
of any ilk, at any different time, and they'll all

496
00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:49,680
say something along the lines of show me how you're

497
00:27:49,759 --> 00:27:51,960
educating your youth, and I'll tell you the future of

498
00:27:51,960 --> 00:27:55,519
your country because it's that transparent, that it's that relatable.

499
00:27:56,680 --> 00:27:58,680
Or you know, even Ben Franklin when he comes out

500
00:27:58,680 --> 00:27:59,960
and they go, what kind of government did you go?

501
00:28:00,160 --> 00:28:01,759
And he says, a republic if you can keep it,

502
00:28:01,839 --> 00:28:05,079
meaning have to educate people. Well, it's not a natural

503
00:28:05,119 --> 00:28:09,079
thing to have for two hundred and fifty years a

504
00:28:09,160 --> 00:28:12,480
country that's self governing if people don't understand what it

505
00:28:12,519 --> 00:28:14,599
takes to live and be a part of a self

506
00:28:14,640 --> 00:28:17,359
governing society. And so I think those are really great

507
00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:20,519
points that you made there. But I'm not fearful at all.

508
00:28:21,240 --> 00:28:25,880
I think the early signs, the early rhetoric from President Trump,

509
00:28:26,119 --> 00:28:32,279
his selections, he's choosing people who are absolute disruptors. He's

510
00:28:32,359 --> 00:28:38,119
choosing people who are nowhere to go know that philosophy

511
00:28:38,160 --> 00:28:40,559
that's so important, have the courage to get there and

512
00:28:40,640 --> 00:28:43,799
live kind of by damn the consequences, full speed ahead.

513
00:28:44,319 --> 00:28:46,240
And so I think it's going to I think he's

514
00:28:46,319 --> 00:28:48,119
going to go in. I think he's going to blow

515
00:28:48,200 --> 00:28:50,920
up the Department of Education from the top to the bottom.

516
00:28:50,920 --> 00:28:53,279
I think he's going to gut it, and just like

517
00:28:53,319 --> 00:28:55,759
we did in Florida, I think he's going to use

518
00:28:55,839 --> 00:28:57,559
that power of the purse, use the power of the

519
00:28:57,640 --> 00:29:01,960
federal government to go in there and bring the Gavin Newsom's,

520
00:29:02,039 --> 00:29:04,640
the Hocals, the Whitmyer's, all of those who are saying

521
00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:06,720
we're going to stand up and fight them. They're well,

522
00:29:06,839 --> 00:29:08,480
you're not going to get billions of dollars until you

523
00:29:08,559 --> 00:29:10,640
end the indoctrination. You're not going to get these billions

524
00:29:10,640 --> 00:29:13,839
of dollars until DEI is gone, and these are these

525
00:29:14,240 --> 00:29:19,680
absolutely horrendous ideologies are taken out, and that the coursework

526
00:29:19,799 --> 00:29:22,519
is balanced and all of these great things. I think

527
00:29:22,599 --> 00:29:25,960
he's going to do that. And if you look at

528
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:29,920
educational history in this country during the four I would say,

529
00:29:29,960 --> 00:29:34,960
during the four years of Donald Trump, where was there

530
00:29:35,119 --> 00:29:38,400
anything bad regulatory past? Was there a bad policy? Was

531
00:29:38,440 --> 00:29:40,880
there a bad law past? When he had the Department

532
00:29:40,920 --> 00:29:43,480
of Education with Betsy Devost for that four years. The

533
00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:46,599
answer is no. But in that same time, again, because

534
00:29:46,599 --> 00:29:49,559
of the dominance of the union bosses at the local

535
00:29:49,640 --> 00:29:52,519
level and even at the state level, how many bad policies,

536
00:29:52,599 --> 00:29:55,519
regulations harassment of people who wanted to start a charter

537
00:29:55,599 --> 00:29:59,480
school or or fight for essays for students or empower parents.

538
00:30:00,160 --> 00:30:06,960
We're killed, stymied through statutes, through regulations, through policies, maybe

539
00:30:07,160 --> 00:30:11,880
a million. And so I think President Trump gets that,

540
00:30:12,039 --> 00:30:13,519
and I think his team gets it, and I think

541
00:30:13,519 --> 00:30:15,200
they're going to use that power the first to go

542
00:30:15,319 --> 00:30:19,480
in there and say you're going to change and eradicate

543
00:30:19,640 --> 00:30:24,359
all of this to your point woke, pernicious ideologies, or

544
00:30:24,359 --> 00:30:26,960
you're going to be out bands of dollars. And that's

545
00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:29,759
how we did in Florida. We basically we're sort of

546
00:30:29,759 --> 00:30:32,640
a microcosm for the country. You know, we're a big state.

547
00:30:32,720 --> 00:30:35,359
We have our liberal counties. We have our New York's

548
00:30:35,359 --> 00:30:40,039
and California's and Illinois. And basically we said to them,

549
00:30:40,519 --> 00:30:42,799
you're not going to force masking of children, or we're

550
00:30:42,799 --> 00:30:45,920
withholding funds. You're you're going to open up schools or

551
00:30:46,079 --> 00:30:48,960
worth holding funds. And they fight, they kick, and screen,

552
00:30:49,039 --> 00:30:50,640
they sue, they do all that stuff. But at the

553
00:30:50,720 --> 00:30:53,160
end of the day, every single one of them was

554
00:30:54,359 --> 00:30:57,559
complied and was bought to their needs, so to speak.

555
00:30:57,599 --> 00:30:59,240
And I think that's what Donald Trump, if I always

556
00:30:59,240 --> 00:31:03,480
Gavin Knews and Local Whitmyer and all these governors. I

557
00:31:03,519 --> 00:31:05,880
think they're in for a world of hurt, because I

558
00:31:05,960 --> 00:31:08,519
really do. I think he's not going to waste a

559
00:31:08,599 --> 00:31:11,240
day and bringing about the education reform that saves our

560
00:31:11,240 --> 00:31:12,440
country and saves our republic.

561
00:31:12,839 --> 00:31:13,559
Speaker 1: I agree with you.

562
00:31:14,039 --> 00:31:14,400
Speaker 2: Do you.

563
00:31:15,920 --> 00:31:17,920
Speaker 1: How do you feel about the Department of Education? Do

564
00:31:17,960 --> 00:31:19,240
you believe it should be disbanded?

565
00:31:20,039 --> 00:31:22,640
Speaker 2: I think it needs to be gutted. I think I

566
00:31:22,880 --> 00:31:26,319
don't know how that works, and I really think that's

567
00:31:26,359 --> 00:31:30,240
what he means. And I think that's President Trump, because

568
00:31:30,279 --> 00:31:31,960
you don't want to send it down to where the

569
00:31:32,359 --> 00:31:35,519
union bosses control. You know, I talk in the book.

570
00:31:35,559 --> 00:31:38,200
I'll give you a perfect example. You know, we had

571
00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:43,759
the Little John's, their child's twelve middle school age was

572
00:31:43,839 --> 00:31:50,279
being transgendered by the local school districts without even telling them,

573
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:53,079
and they had quote unquote the right not to tell them,

574
00:31:53,119 --> 00:31:59,480
according to the you know, the superintendent's association. And it'sious atrocious,

575
00:31:59,559 --> 00:32:03,079
changing her name, allowing her on overnight school trips to

576
00:32:03,279 --> 00:32:08,400
stay in you know, boys rooms, just insane behavior. Now

577
00:32:08,599 --> 00:32:11,440
where she abused by the federal government. Was that coming

578
00:32:11,480 --> 00:32:13,519
down from the federal government. No that this is where

579
00:32:13,839 --> 00:32:17,759
the union bosses at that school board level and at

580
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:19,640
that local of onun the state level have so much

581
00:32:19,640 --> 00:32:22,480
control the same. There's another family I talked about called

582
00:32:22,519 --> 00:32:26,279
the Preses, and their child tried to commit suicide twice,

583
00:32:26,319 --> 00:32:29,279
and it was the local districts who said, we don't

584
00:32:29,279 --> 00:32:31,319
need to tell them. They don't they don't have that right.

585
00:32:32,119 --> 00:32:34,000
We don't need to, we don't need to. We're in

586
00:32:34,039 --> 00:32:38,640
good stead. You can't send And really, where is the

587
00:32:38,680 --> 00:32:41,640
teachers union right now? I wear these union bosses screaming,

588
00:32:41,680 --> 00:32:44,680
please don't do that, Please don't send you know, close

589
00:32:44,680 --> 00:32:46,240
it and send all the money down to the state

590
00:32:46,240 --> 00:32:48,880
and locals. They're not saying there's crickets. I think that's

591
00:32:48,920 --> 00:32:52,000
exactly what they want. I think President Trump knows it,

592
00:32:52,039 --> 00:32:53,880
and I think what he's going to do is blow

593
00:32:53,960 --> 00:32:55,680
up the department. You got to blow up the department,

594
00:32:55,759 --> 00:32:58,920
send in a seal team, take over that old department,

595
00:32:58,960 --> 00:33:01,079
and then use that power or the purse to bring

596
00:33:01,119 --> 00:33:05,680
about these massive changes. Massive changes to our creditors, massive

597
00:33:05,759 --> 00:33:09,640
changes to course curriculum, massive changes to colleges of education,

598
00:33:10,119 --> 00:33:14,759
massive changes to DEI, critical gender theory. All of those

599
00:33:14,880 --> 00:33:19,039
things can be effectuated and changed so much faster. And

600
00:33:19,440 --> 00:33:22,200
he's a return on investment guy. He's a businessman. Where

601
00:33:22,240 --> 00:33:24,920
do you spend the least amount of money and get

602
00:33:24,920 --> 00:33:28,680
the highest return on investment? And that's using that department

603
00:33:28,720 --> 00:33:32,119
as a hammer to bring down the union dominance that

604
00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:34,839
exists in too many states and in way too many

605
00:33:34,839 --> 00:33:35,680
local governments.

606
00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:42,240
Speaker 1: Indeed, I think President Electrump his selections so far, his

607
00:33:42,640 --> 00:33:48,400
nominees or cabinet post also speak to his focus. And

608
00:33:48,440 --> 00:33:52,079
I'm very glad to see this and understand why he

609
00:33:52,240 --> 00:33:55,599
is so focused on it. But his focus on the

610
00:33:55,599 --> 00:34:01,039
First Amendment on speech, free speech, which has been under

611
00:34:01,160 --> 00:34:06,079
absolute assault in this country for some time, but it

612
00:34:06,279 --> 00:34:11,039
just went to an entirely different level under the current regime,

613
00:34:11,119 --> 00:34:15,039
the Biden Harris regime. We have seen this in myriate examples,

614
00:34:15,039 --> 00:34:18,280
but in particular, we have seen this on college campuses.

615
00:34:19,079 --> 00:34:22,199
You have been on the front lines of fighting that

616
00:34:22,480 --> 00:34:26,519
as well in your previous professional life, as well as

617
00:34:26,760 --> 00:34:30,960
where you stand now as a president of the college.

618
00:34:31,119 --> 00:34:34,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's another great example. I mean, all we talked about,

619
00:34:34,320 --> 00:34:36,960
all the governor talked about, all Christopher Ruffo talked about,

620
00:34:37,280 --> 00:34:41,440
was bringing about academic real academic freedom in real free speech.

621
00:34:41,800 --> 00:34:43,719
Scott Outless. I opened the book and end the book

622
00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:46,239
with the story of Scott Outless being our first commencement speaker,

623
00:34:46,639 --> 00:34:51,280
where he was talking and praising the students for graduating

624
00:34:51,360 --> 00:34:55,320
and surviving COVID and living through that kind of catastrophe

625
00:34:55,840 --> 00:34:58,840
and talking about free speech and academic freedom and how

626
00:34:59,440 --> 00:35:01,719
it's a part the fabric of our society and it's

627
00:35:01,800 --> 00:35:05,039
integral to the future of our society. And while he's

628
00:35:05,079 --> 00:35:08,159
doing that, he's getting shouted down and booed and cussed that.

629
00:35:09,039 --> 00:35:11,400
And it's just such the progressive left. I don't know

630
00:35:11,400 --> 00:35:14,199
how many articles have been written about New College shutting

631
00:35:14,239 --> 00:35:18,360
down academic freedom and free speech, when the reality is

632
00:35:18,400 --> 00:35:23,559
we came and landed at New College to allow free speech,

633
00:35:23,719 --> 00:35:27,360
allow academic freedom. It was it was a college so

634
00:35:27,679 --> 00:35:31,679
dominated by the progressive left. They had outside groups and

635
00:35:31,920 --> 00:35:34,400
I quote in the book all the words of the outsiders.

636
00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:37,000
None of it was us mad. It wasn't Christopher Rufe

637
00:35:37,119 --> 00:35:39,440
or me or the governor Saint. It was their students,

638
00:35:39,440 --> 00:35:43,679
their alumni, outside consulting group's former presidents, that it was

639
00:35:43,719 --> 00:35:47,960
a toxic culture. Most kids, the highest in the state

640
00:35:48,199 --> 00:35:50,719
left after being there for a semester a year because

641
00:35:50,960 --> 00:35:54,159
they identified as liberal Democrats and they weren't liberal enough,

642
00:35:54,159 --> 00:35:57,199
and they got canceled, they got bullied, they got you know,

643
00:35:58,679 --> 00:36:03,840
literally chastise assaulted, all of those different things because there

644
00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:06,400
was no free speech, there was no academic freedom, and

645
00:36:06,440 --> 00:36:09,039
we come in and champion that, and they basically say

646
00:36:09,039 --> 00:36:11,239
we're the ones taking it away when it was a

647
00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:14,000
campus that had none had zero. We got rid of

648
00:36:14,079 --> 00:36:17,719
DEI and it was a campus that had almost zero diversity,

649
00:36:18,079 --> 00:36:23,440
it had zero uh inclusion. I mean it was it was.

650
00:36:23,639 --> 00:36:26,880
It was a country club a progressive left people. If

651
00:36:26,880 --> 00:36:30,239
you googled, hey, I'm a leftist or you know LGBTQ,

652
00:36:30,599 --> 00:36:32,480
and I want to go to a campus where it's

653
00:36:32,559 --> 00:36:35,639
it's just one ideology and one whatever new college came up,

654
00:36:35,639 --> 00:36:37,599
it would be one of the first colleges it would

655
00:36:37,599 --> 00:36:39,480
come up. We came in and said, no, we're going

656
00:36:39,519 --> 00:36:41,760
to have balance, we're gonna have William F. Buckley's and

657
00:36:41,760 --> 00:36:44,079
we're gonna have gorbidels, we're going to have great debates,

658
00:36:44,280 --> 00:36:47,920
we're gonna have total freedom, civil discourse. And yet every

659
00:36:48,079 --> 00:36:51,079
article chronicles Higher Ed inside Higher Ed. That's why I

660
00:36:51,079 --> 00:36:53,320
dedicated the book to the media, because it's like, guys.

661
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:55,199
Without you, guys, not one chapter of this book would

662
00:36:55,199 --> 00:36:57,880
be possible because everything you write to your point earlier

663
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:00,960
is just lies and uh and so yeah, it's the

664
00:37:01,039 --> 00:37:04,039
fight for free speech is real though, and again it's

665
00:37:04,039 --> 00:37:05,880
something has to be done on a day to day basis.

666
00:37:05,960 --> 00:37:07,440
You can't relax for a moment.

667
00:37:08,119 --> 00:37:10,800
Speaker 1: No doubt about it. But listen, they use the language

668
00:37:10,840 --> 00:37:13,199
the leftists and Marxists try to use. That's the first

669
00:37:13,239 --> 00:37:16,360
thing they go after, the language. They can control the language,

670
00:37:16,480 --> 00:37:21,800
they control the message, they control the narrative, and let's

671
00:37:21,800 --> 00:37:24,920
face it, they have done so quite successfully in a

672
00:37:24,960 --> 00:37:29,400
lot of sectors of society for some time. This pushback,

673
00:37:29,519 --> 00:37:32,639
this fight back is coming. I mean, take for example,

674
00:37:32,960 --> 00:37:37,480
how they've tried to invoke the old classical liberal fight

675
00:37:37,599 --> 00:37:44,199
against banning of books. What they're defending when they're accusing

676
00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:48,960
school districts of banning books is that school districts are

677
00:37:49,000 --> 00:37:55,920
taking pornography out of elementary schools. And that's a ridiculous

678
00:37:56,000 --> 00:37:58,199
place to be in America. And I think a lot

679
00:37:58,239 --> 00:38:03,920
of Americans so that and see that. Now, final question

680
00:38:04,039 --> 00:38:09,480
for you, as we move forward in this most important battle,

681
00:38:10,719 --> 00:38:16,360
do you see more parents getting involved because that was

682
00:38:17,320 --> 00:38:22,280
that was such a critical element to this revolution, if

683
00:38:22,280 --> 00:38:22,920
you will.

684
00:38:23,519 --> 00:38:27,679
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, I think that's probably. You couldn't ask

685
00:38:27,760 --> 00:38:31,360
for a better proof of that than the November election.

686
00:38:31,639 --> 00:38:36,079
I think that's parents from the top down, it's business people,

687
00:38:36,559 --> 00:38:40,760
because this isn't just an infect universities. This isn't this

688
00:38:40,920 --> 00:38:45,920
infected boardrooms, corporate, government buildings, affected everywhere. And I think

689
00:38:45,960 --> 00:38:49,039
you had parents and everyone basically say enough is enough.

690
00:38:49,079 --> 00:38:51,519
And that's really part of the reason I wrote the

691
00:38:51,559 --> 00:38:54,840
book was because everyone gets the frustration. Everyone can see

692
00:38:54,880 --> 00:38:57,760
what the problem is. Everyone knows that problem has existed

693
00:38:57,800 --> 00:39:00,440
for a long time, but how do we fight? And

694
00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:03,800
so what we wrote was basically, here is the fix.

695
00:39:04,119 --> 00:39:04,360
Speaker 1: Here.

696
00:39:04,760 --> 00:39:07,199
Speaker 2: You know, if anyone just grabs the book and reads

697
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:11,639
just chapter nine, I very quickly synthesize nine things that

698
00:39:11,719 --> 00:39:14,199
you have to do. You should demand as a parent

699
00:39:14,280 --> 00:39:19,039
at your child school, you should demand in the K

700
00:39:19,079 --> 00:39:22,280
twelve arena. These things have to happen. And if you

701
00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:24,679
do them and you demand them, you'll get them, and

702
00:39:24,719 --> 00:39:27,400
when you get them, you'll transform education. That's really what

703
00:39:27,440 --> 00:39:29,000
we were trying to accomplish with the book.

704
00:39:29,400 --> 00:39:32,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, you really saw some exceptional people at the grassroots level.

705
00:39:32,920 --> 00:39:35,719
And I know, as you note in the book and

706
00:39:35,880 --> 00:39:39,679
we talked about on this podcast, you worked with them.

707
00:39:39,920 --> 00:39:41,119
Speaker 2: You were.

708
00:39:42,719 --> 00:39:48,159
Speaker 1: Both, i think, on all sides, receiving support and comfort

709
00:39:48,639 --> 00:39:52,039
during some very difficult battles. And I think it's because

710
00:39:52,920 --> 00:39:55,960
you had good people by your side, and you had

711
00:39:55,960 --> 00:39:58,760
a vision and a mission, and like you said, you

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00:39:58,760 --> 00:40:02,000
weren't going to stop to kick both dogs. You are

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going to get this done. And that's exactly what it

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seems to me happened in Florida and what is taking

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00:40:08,679 --> 00:40:13,079
shape thankfully across this country. Thank you so much for

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00:40:13,199 --> 00:40:15,880
joining us on this edition of the Federalist Radio Hour.

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Speaker 2: Really enjoy it, Matt.

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00:40:17,159 --> 00:40:21,119
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me absolutely our guest today once again,

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and we'd like to thank our guest.

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00:40:23,199 --> 00:40:25,440
Speaker 2: Today is Richard Corkoran.

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Speaker 1: He is a former Speaker of the Florida House, the

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00:40:29,159 --> 00:40:33,599
Sunshine State's former education commissioner, and now president of New

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College of Florida. His new book, Storming the Ivory Tower,

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How a Florida college became ground zero in the struggle

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00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:46,079
to take back our campus. Is you've been listening to

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00:40:46,079 --> 00:40:48,840
another edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Matt Kittle,

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00:40:48,920 --> 00:40:52,920
senior correspondent at the Federalist. We'll be back soon with more.

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00:40:53,480 --> 00:40:59,639
Until then, say lovers of freedom and anxious for the fray.

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00:41:00,239 --> 00:41:04,239
Speaker 2: Un looking man pump pult and said, pointed to the

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00:41:04,440 --> 00:41:05,000
grub ate

731
00:41:05,039 --> 00:41:08,559
Speaker 1: A fuel of the little check the man pump tap

732
00:41:09,800 --> 00:41:11,519
platom gel in the pla