PEACE Act of 2025
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Sen. Risch, James E. [R-ID]
ID: R000584
Bill's Journey to Becoming a Law
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3. Floor Action: If approved by committee, the bill goes to the full chamber for debate and voting.
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5. Conference: If both chambers pass different versions, a conference committee reconciles the differences.
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7. Became Law: If signed (or if Congress overrides a veto), the bill becomes law!
Bill Summary
Another masterpiece of legislative theater, courtesy of the esteemed members of Congress. The PEACE Act of 2025 - because nothing says "peace" like a bill that's sole purpose is to stifle free speech and intellectual curiosity in the name of ideological purity.
Let's dissect this farce, shall we?
**New Regulations:** The bill creates a new prohibition on using certain American History and Civics Education program funds for curriculum or teaching that promotes "divisive concepts." Because, you know, discussing the complexities of American history and civics might lead to uncomfortable conversations about racism, privilege, and power structures. Can't have that.
**Affected Industries:** The education sector will be the primary casualty of this bill. Specifically, schools and educators who dare to tackle topics like systemic racism, white privilege, or critical race theory will be forced to self-censor or risk losing funding. Because, clearly, the solution to addressing these issues is to pretend they don't exist.
**Compliance Requirements:** The bill requires schools to ensure that their curriculum and teaching methods do not promote "divisive concepts." Good luck with that. The definitions provided are so vague and subjective that it's essentially a recipe for bureaucratic paralysis. Schools will need to hire an army of lawyers and compliance officers just to navigate the minefield of potential infractions.
**Enforcement Mechanisms:** The bill doesn't specify any explicit enforcement mechanisms, but we can be sure that some enterprising bureaucrats will find ways to interpret this law as broadly as possible. Expect a flood of complaints from conservative activists and parents who object to anything that challenges their worldview.
**Penalties:** No specific penalties are mentioned, but schools that fail to comply risk losing funding. Because what's a little financial coercion when it comes to shaping the minds of future generations?
**Economic and Operational Impacts:** This bill will have a chilling effect on academic freedom and intellectual curiosity in American education. It will create a culture of fear and self-censorship among educators, who will be reluctant to tackle sensitive topics for fear of losing funding or facing bureaucratic reprisal. The long-term consequences will be a generation of students who are ill-equipped to engage with complex social issues and think critically about the world around them.
In short, this bill is a symptom of a deeper disease: the cowardice and ideological rigidity that has infected American politics. It's a desperate attempt to impose a narrow, conservative worldview on the education system, rather than encouraging critical thinking and intellectual exploration.
Diagnosis: Legislative Laryngitis - a condition where politicians are unable to speak truth to power or address complex issues in a meaningful way. Treatment: a healthy dose of skepticism, critical thinking, and a willingness to challenge the status quo. Prognosis: poor, given the current state of American politics.
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đź’° Campaign Finance Network
Sen. Risch, James E. [R-ID]
Congress 119 • 2024 Election Cycle
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Project 2025 Policy Matches
This bill shows semantic similarity to the following sections of the Project 2025 policy document. Higher similarity scores indicate stronger thematic connections.
Introduction
— 336 — Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise on civil rights, the next conservative Administration should take sweeping action to assure that the purpose of the Civil Rights Act is not inverted through a disparate impact standard to provide a pretext for theoretically endless federal meddling. Assistance to States for the Education of Children with Disabilities; Preschool Grants for Children with Disabilities (Equity in IDEA) l Effective January 18, 2017, the department issued final regulations under Part B of IDEA that require states to consider race and ethnicity in the identification, placement, and discipline of students with disabilities. The new Administration should rescind this regulation. Students should never be denied access to special education services because of their race or ethnicity, but this is happening in school districts across the country thanks to the Obama Administration’s Equity in IDEA regulation. This was not the intent of the regulation, but it is an inevitable byproduct of its flawed assumptions. The Obama Administration looked at the racial statistics on special education assignment and made two assumptions: that African American students were dis- proportionately overrepresented, and that this overrepresentation constituted a harm that required federal pressure to ameliorate. School districts deemed to overrepresent minority students in special education assignment, or in discipline amongst special education students, are tagged by their state education agencies as engaging in “significant disproportionality,” and are required to reallocate 15 percent of their IDEA Part B money into coordinated early intervening services that are intended to address the “root causes of dispro- portionality.” In practice, this can mean raiding special education funding to pay for CRT-inspired “equity” consultants and professional development. This is especially problematic given that both of the assumptions behind Equity in IDEA are flawed. Special education services provide extra assistance to students; they do not harm them. And according to the most rigorous research on the subject, conducted by Penn State’s Paul Morgan, black students are actually underrep- resented in special education once adequate statistical controls are made. That means that this regulation effectively further depresses the provision of valuable services to an already underserved group. l The next Administration should immediately commence rulemaking to rescind the Equity in IDEA regulation. No replacement regulation is required. l The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) should prepare a digest of the best research on this subject and share — 337 — Department of Education it directly with state superintendents and state special education leaders across the country, who have been led by this regulation to believe a false problem diagnosis. Every effort should be made to dissuade states from continuing to operate on the assumption that overrepresentation requires state intervention after the federal pressure is rescinded. Provide School Meals to Children in Need; Do Not Use Federal Meals to Support Radical Ideology In May 2022, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) tried to advance a radical political agenda using the federal school meal program. Nearly a century ago, federal lawmakers adopted the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and School Breakfast Program (SBP) and other services that provide meals for K–12 students to give children from low-income families access to food while at school. Since the 1940s, federal lawmakers have greatly expanded these meal programs, creating an entitlement for nearly all students, regardless of family income levels, and have turned the meal programs into some of the most wasteful federal pro- grams in Washington. Now, the USDA is threatening to withhold federal taxpayer spending for these meals from schools that do not implement Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 so that the term “sex” is replaced with “sexual orientation and gender identity” (SOGI). l The next Administration should prohibit the USDA or any other federal agency from withholding services from federal or state agencies—including but not limited to K–12 schools—that choose not to replace “sex” with “SOGI” in that agency’s administration of Title IX. The Administration will have significant support for this policy change among state officials and Members of Congress. Twenty-two state attorneys general filed a lawsuit after the USDA’s announcement that the agency intended to withhold spending from schools that do not replace sex with SOGI. Members of Congress also introduced legislation in 2022 that would prohibit the agency from carrying out its intentions regarding Title IX. Phase Out Existing Income-Driven Repayment Plans While income-driven repayment (IDR) of student loans is a superior approach relative to fixed payment plans, the number of IDR plans has proliferated beyond reason. And recent IDR plans are so generous that they require no or only token repayment from many students. l The Secretary should phase out all existing IDR plans by making new loans (including consolidation loans) ineligible and should implement
Introduction
— 342 — Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise use litigation and other efforts to block school choice and advocate for additional taxpayer spending in education. They also lobbied to keep schools closed during the pandemic. All of these positions run contrary to robust research evidence showing positive outcomes for students from education choice policies; there is no conclusive evidence that more taxpayer spending on schools improves student outcomes; and evidence finds that keeping schools closed to in-person learning resulted in negative emotional and academic outcomes for students. Furthermore, the union promotes radical racial and gender ideologies in schools that parents oppose according to nationally representative surveys. l Congress should rescind the National Education Association’s congressional charter and remove the false impression that federal taxpayers support the political activities of this special interest group. This move would not be unprecedented, as Congress has rescinded the federal charters of other organizations over the past century. The NEA is a demonstrably radical special interest group that overwhelmingly supports left-of-center policies and policymakers. l Members should conduct hearings to determine how much federal taxpayer money the NEA has used for radical causes favoring a single political party. Parental Rights in Education and Safeguarding Students l Federal officials should protect educators and students in jurisdictions under federal control from racial discrimination by reinforcing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and prohibiting compelled speech. Specifically, no teacher or student in Washington, D.C., public schools, Bureau of Indian Education schools, or Department of Defense schools should be compelled to believe, profess, or adhere to any idea, but especially ideas that violate state and federal civil rights laws. By its very design, critical race theory has an “applied” dimension, as its found- ers state in their essays that define the theory. Those who subscribe to the theory believe that racism (in this case, treating individuals differently based on race) is appropriate—necessary, even—making the theory more than merely an analyti- cal tool to describe race in public and private life. The theory disrupts America’s Founding ideals of freedom and opportunity. So, when critical race theory is used as part of school activities such as mandatory affinity groups, teacher training programs in which educators are required to confess their privilege, or school — 343 — Department of Education assignments in which students must defend the false idea that America is sys- temically racist, the theory is actively disrupting the values that hold communities together such as equality under the law and colorblindness. l As such, lawmakers should design legislation that prevents the theory from spreading discrimination. l For K–12 systems under their jurisdiction, federal lawmakers should adopt proposals that say no individual should receive punishment or benefits based on the color of their skin. l Furthermore, school officials should not require students or teachers to believe that individuals are guilty or responsible for the actions of others based on race or ethnicity. Educators should not be forced to discuss contemporary political issues but neither should they refrain from discussing certain subjects in an attempt to pro- tect students from ideas with which they disagree. Proposals such as this should result in robust classroom discussions, not censorship. At the state level, states should require schools to post classroom materials online to provide maximum transparency to parents. l Again, specifically for K–12 systems under federal authority, Congress and the next Administration should support existing state and federal civil rights laws and add to such laws a prohibition on compelled speech. Advancing Legal Protections for Parental Rights in Education While the U.S. Supreme Court and other federal courts have consistently rec- ognized that parents have the right and duty to direct the care and upbringing of their children, they have not always treated parental rights as co-equal to other fundamental rights—like free speech or the free exercise of religion. As a result, some courts treat parental rights as a “second-tier” right and do not properly safe- guard these rights against government infringement. The courts vary greatly over which species of constitutional review (rational basis, intermediate scrutiny, and strict scrutiny) to apply to parental rights cases. This uncertainty has emboldened federal agencies to promote rules and poli- cies that infringe parental rights. For example, under the Biden Administration’s proposed Title IX regulations, schools could be required to assist a child with a social or medical gender transition without parental consent or to withhold infor- mation from parents about a child’s social transition (e.g., changing their names or
Introduction
— 583 — Department of Labor and Related Agencies including human-resources classifications and DEI trainings that promote critical race theory. l Eliminate EEO-1 data collection. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission collects EEO-1 data on employment statistics based on race/ ethnicity, which data can then be used to support a charge of discrimination under a disparate impact theory. This could lead to racial quotas to remedy alleged race discrimination. (The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) also has a right to the data EEOC collects.) Crudely categorizing employees by race or ethnicity fails to recognize the diversity of the American workforce and forces individuals into categories that do not fully reflect their racial and ethnic heritage. l Amend Title VII. The next Administration should work with Congress to amend Title VII to prohibit the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission from collecting EEO-1 data and any other racial classifications in employment for both private and public workplaces. l Eliminate disparate impact liability. With interracial marriages in America increasing, many Americans do not fit neatly into crude racial categories.1 Under disparate impact theory, moreover, discriminatory motive or intent is irrelevant; the outcome is what matters. But all workplaces have disparities. Congress should: l Eliminate disparate impact as a valid theory of discrimination for race and other bases under Title VII and other laws. Disparities do not (and should not legally) imply discrimination per se. The President should: l Sign an executive order explicitly forbidding OFCCP from using disparate impact in its analysis. l Eliminate OFCCP. The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) exists to enforce Executive Order (EO) 11246.2 That order was originally signed in 1965 to require federal contractors (and subcontractors) to commit to nondiscrimination. It gave enforcement authority to the Department of Labor, up to and including debarment from federal contracting. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has since — 584 — Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise grown, often making OFCCP’s authority redundant and imposing a second regulatory agency under whose rules businesses must operate. In addition, under EO 11246, the President and DOL can force a huge swath of American employers to comply with rules and regulations based on novel anti- discrimination theories (such as sexual orientation and gender identity theories) that Congress had never imposed by statute. l Rescind EO 11246. The President should eliminate OFCCP by simply rescinding EO 11246. Federal contractors would still be bound by statutory nondiscrimination law but would no longer work under overlapping regimes. (Contractors’ residual obligations under Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act and Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA) could be enforced by EEOC or DOL.) Contractors also would be less subject to the changing political whims of a President that might impose significant new costs or burdens on the contractors. Sex Discrimination. The Biden Administration, LGBT advocates, and some federal courts have attempted to expand the scope and definition of sex discrimi- nation, based in part on the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County. Bostock held that “an employer who fires someone simply for being homosexual or transgender” violates Title VII’s prohibition against sex discrimination. The Court explicitly limited its holding to the hiring/firing context in Title VII and did not purport to address other Title VII issues, such as bathrooms, locker rooms, and dress codes, or other laws prohibiting sex discrimination. Notably, the Court focused on the status of the employees and used the term “transgender status” rather than the broader and amorphous term “gender identity.” l Restrict the application of Bostock. The new Administration should restrict Bostock’s application of sex discrimination protections to sexual orientation and transgender status in the context of hiring and firing. l Withdraw unlawful “notices” and “guidances.” The President should direct agencies to withdraw unlawful “notices” and “guidances” purporting to apply Bostock’s reasoning broadly outside hiring and firing. l Rescind regulations prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, transgender status, and sex characteristics. The President should direct agencies to rescind regulations interpreting sex discrimination provisions as prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, transgender status, sex characteristics, etc.
Showing 3 of 5 policy matches
About These Correlations
Policy matches are calculated using semantic similarity between bill summaries and Project 2025 policy text. A score of 60% or higher indicates meaningful thematic overlap. This does not imply direct causation or intent, but highlights areas where legislation aligns with Project 2025 policy objectives.