Remember When the Biden Administration Opened 'Civil Rights' Investigations Into States Banning Mask Mandates?

Amazing how quickly things can change, isn't it?

Now that even The New York Times, the chief arbiter of acceptable liberal opinion, has come out acknowledging the importance of a return to normal schooling, it's incredible to look back at what Democratic politicians and their allies were doing to kids just a year ago.

Tuesday was the one year anniversary of the Biden Administration's Department of Education opening "civil rights" investigations into five Republican-led states for banning mask mandates in schools:

According to the AP's report at the time, government officials in Tennessee, South Carolina, Iowa, Oklahoma and Utah all received letters from the feds saying that banning mask mandates "could amount to discrimination against students with disabilities or health conditions."

Education secretary Miguel Cardona made the disgraceful comment that states that refused to force ineffective masks on children were "putting politics over the health and education of the students they took an oath to serve."

Lest we forget who really was behind the offensive attempt to stop local officials efforts to protect children by allowing them to return to normal learning environments, President Joe Biden had specifically asked Cardona to "explore possible legal action:"

"It marks a sharp escalation in the Biden administration’s battle with Republican states that say mask-wearing should be a personal choice. President Joe Biden last week asked Cardona to explore possible legal action, prompting the department to examine whether the policies could amount to civil rights violations."

Circling the Political Wagons

The original report details how many local school administrators, even in red states, were supportive of the federal government intervening to attempt to force masks on kids:

"In the Des Moines school district, which has opposed the state’s policy against mask mandates, officials were encouraged by the support from the federal government. The district is encouraging mask-wearing but is forbidden from requiring it.

'If our state government doesn’t change its position as the pandemic continues then hopefully the federal government will find a legal path that allows us to do more to keep our students and staff safe,' district spokesperson Phil Roeder said in a statement."

These actions highlight the importance of getting involved in local politics.

School officials, who overwhelmingly align with the left, are not only willing, but desperate, to conform to the Current Thing of liberal ideology.

This trend has continued into this year:

Because Democrats have been religiously devoted to ignoring reality in favor of listening to their preferred "experts," this overreach by the Biden Administration was supported by many decision makers.

"Civil rights" was used as a pretext to enforce what the media promoted and what they believed was "popular" among the intellectual elite.

Except that as soon as polling revealed that parents were sick of mask mandates, especially for their children, the supposed necessity of forced masking to "protect the health" and civil rights of those in schools quietly disappeared.

The progression has been remarkable to witness and is yet another remarkably obvious indication of how political COVID policymaking has been.

Mask mandates have accomplished nothing, harmed many, set learning back, and provided opportunities for constant displays of unearned superiority by liberals.

But the rapidly failing popularity of Biden's obsessive COVID mandates shouldn't take away from the fact that he and his cronies were willing to go after states who dared protect children from the political posturing of incompetent adults.