An education firm that was co-founded by the son-in-law of US Attorney General and former Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland is under fire for issuing resources that claims former President Trump's supporters are white supremacists.
Alexander 'Xan' Tanner, 30, is a founder and the president of Panorama Education, an analytical software and services company in Boston. He married Attorney General Garland's daughter Rebecca in 2018.
Panorama recently put out a workshop which deals with systemic racism.
It includes a link to an article that calls both Ku Klux Klan members and President Trump's supporters 'examples of white supremacy.'
'SEL as Social Justice: Dismantling White Supremacy Within Systems and Self,' the Panorama workshop in question, features several 'resources' for teachers, including one that links to a Medium article titled 'How White Supremacy Lives in Our Schools, written by Altagracia Montilla.
Montilla's piece, published in July of 2020, says 'the rise in images of overt white supremacy in the media feeds into the confusion about white supremacy. While the Ku Klux Klan and MAGAs at half-empty Trump rallies (not that these are mutually exclusive groups) are in fact examples of white supremacy, they are not the only examples.'
An education firm that was co-founded by the son-in-law of US Attorney General and former Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland is under fire
Alexander 'Xan' Tanner, 30, is a founder and the president of Panorama Education, an analytical software and services company in Boston
The article claims that 'murderous police officers' is part of the reason why white supremacy 'is everywhere, pertinent and pervasive, woven into the fabric of our society and reflected in every institution and organization in the US, including schools.'
Montilla, who describes herself as a 'freedom-dreamer, facilitator, and strategist committed to dismantling oppressive systems,' says the education system is often close-minded toward ideas that go against what she sees as white supremacy culture.
'One of the purposes of listing characteristics of white supremacy culture in schools is to point out how schools consciously or unconsciously use these characteristics as their standards making it difficult, if not impossible, to open the door to other cultural norms and standards,' Montilla claimed, listing 'Perfectionism,' 'Worship of the Written Word,' 'Paternalism,' 'Defensiveness,' and 'Right to Comfort' as 'school practices that act as antidotes to white supremacy culture in schools.'
She goes as far to say that schools celebrate only those students that 'adapt and conform' to white supremacist-rooted ideals.
'The reality is while schools may say they're invested in diversity and equity, they really only celebrate students who adapt or conform to the cultural norms rooted in white supremacy,' it claims. 'Naming and identifying the characteristics of white supremacy culture in schools so we shift from accepting these characteristics as norms towards recognizing them as destructive — is the first step to working toward building schools that value all students.'
A Medium article titled 'How White Supremacy Lives in Our Schools, written by Altagracia Montilla, is part of why the Panorama report is causing controversy
Montilla's article calls both Ku Klux Klan members and President Trump's supporters 'examples of white supremacy.'
Montilla describes herself as a 'freedom-dreamer, facilitator, and strategist committed to dismantling oppressive systems'
Attorney General Garland's Justice Department has said it's trying to fight back what it claims is an increase of violent threats against teachers and administrators in schools across America.
Critics say there may be a conflict of interest at hand with what the involvement of the attorney general's son-in-law and Panorma's ties to left-wing groups.
Republicans have been heavily critical of Garland's efforts, with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell calling parents protesting school officials a form of democracy rather than intimidation.
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