Commentary

Woke Bureaucrats Are Lying About State Reforms

  • By Do No Harm Staff
  • March 20, 2023

We always knew the woke bureaucracy would fight back against any attempt to reform health care. Yet even we’re taken aback by what’s happening in Missouri and Tennessee. In both states, unelected officials are claiming that common-sense bills would endanger state revenues. Their bogus arguments deserve to be rebutted – and ultimately ignored.

Consider Tennessee. The state legislature is moving forward with a bill that prevents medical schools from forcing students and professors to hold woke views. Medical schools would also be required to list courses, seminars, workshops, and other training sessions in a publicly searchable database. And they would also have to keep using standardized testing in admissions, lest woke activists convince them to lower standards in the name of diversity. The bill has many other praiseworthy reforms.

Enter the woke bureaucracy. On March 12, the Tennessee General Assembly Fiscal Review Committee claimed the bill would incur millions of dollars in annual costs for the state and taxpayer-funded universities and institutions. It further claims: “The proposed legislation may result in increases in state and local expenditures associated with compliance measures, potential civil litigation and could jeopardize federal funding and accreditation status.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. Woke bureaucrats simply hate the law – so they’re making outlandish claims to try and stop it.

It’s the exact same story in Missouri. State lawmakers are advancing a similar bill in the name of protecting medical students and patients. But the Committee on Legislative Research is trying to kill the bill using the most absurd statements imaginable. To wit: It says the bill could lead to a “loss of federal funding for non-compliance with DEI provisions and the resulting loss of facilities’ accreditations could be significant.”

How significant? The woke bureaucrats predict a “maximum loss of $2.2 billion annually.” Yes, you read that right – billion with a b.

This is woke fear-mongering at its finest. The bureaucracy doesn’t want lawmakers to bring medical schools back to reality, and they’ll say anything to stop the roll-back of woke domination of higher education. Here’s hoping lawmakers in Tennessee and Missouri ignore everything these bureaucrats say – and do the right thing for medical schools, students, patients, and health care as a whole.