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--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. When you visit the doctor, you probably hand over your insurance, your ID, and contact details. It's just one of the many places that has your personal info. And if any of them accidentally expose it, you could be at risk for identity theft. LifeLock monitors millions of data points a second. If you become a victim, they'll fix it, guaranteed, or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year at LifeLock.com slash podcast. Terms apply.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: More states are giving parents the choice and the funds on where to send their children to school. The root of the problem is that families disagree about how they want their kids to be educated and how they want their kids to be raised. Which states are embracing school choice and which options are parents choosing? I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley.
--:-- Host: John Bickley: It's February 4th, and this is your Saturday edition of Morning Wire. More Oscars controversy. The Academy has launched an investigation into why a little-known white actress received a nomination for Best Actress when multiple high-profile Black actresses were passed over. We have the story and the results.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know. Do you love Morning Wire? Well, you can shop the collection at dailywire.com slash shop. Start today with your favorite podcast and coffee from your very own Morning Wire mug. Or rep the news you need to know with Morning Wire t-shirts, hoodies, and tote bags. That's dailywire.com slash shop.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: The school choice movement has gained momentum. Eleven states have recently passed or introduced school choice legislation that allows parents to use tax dollars for private education. Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham is here to give us the details on the new school choice laws, as well as the political impact they're having.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So, Megan, for years, school choice has been a fairly marginal issue, but suddenly there's a big wave of support. So just to start, what specifically do these laws do?
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So you'll hear this phrase a lot from those who support this kind of legislation, fund the student, not the system. And essentially what that means is that these kinds of bills allow parents to use some amount of tax money earmarked for their child's public education and apply it to private schooling or tutoring, or in some cases, even homeschooling programs.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So to give you one specific example, a law just passed in Iowa gives parents around $7,600 in state money, or basically what the state previously paid public schools to educate one student in an academic year. And it allows parents to use that for private school tuition if they want.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: Now, various states are enacting various programs. Some are voucher-based, some are savings account-based. So it is, of course, going to look a little bit different everywhere. But critics of these laws say that the programs take money away from public schools, and that disproportionately hurts minority and low-income students. And they also take issue with tax dollars going to any religious schools.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: Now, how many states are embracing this and which states are they? Well, of course, red states are seeing the most success in passing these bills. So far, four states now have broad school choice laws on the books. Arizona led the way last August. West Virginia passed a very similar bill right after. And then just last week, Iowa and Utah both joined them.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So you can expect a lot of other red states are going to jump on that bandwagon soon as well because they have similar bills pending and governors who have been very open about their support for them. So in that case, we're looking at Florida, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Indiana, Ohio, South Carolina, a number of others. And in Texas in particular, Governor Greg Abbott campaigned on the issue. So we'll probably see some movement there as well.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: But on the other side of the coin, some Democrat governors have also made some concessions to school choice supporters. Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania actually came out in favor of what has been called a scholarship bill for low-income students right before the election last year, and he did that in defiance of most of the rest of his party. And then in Illinois, Governor J.B. Pritzker also flipped at the last minute to support a similar tax credit program.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: And then even in the very blue states where there's pretty much no chance of any form of school choice legislation getting passed, you are still seeing polling that shows parents want those kinds of options. A new poll out of New York, for instance, shows that 64% of parents want Governor Kathy Hochul to lift the cap on charter schools so that they have more publicly funded options.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So why is school choice having such a moment right now? Well, part of it is the rift between parents and public schools over things that we've seen a lot in the news, like masks and LGBT programming. And then interestingly, the lockdowns appear to have played a pretty big role in how that concern developed.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So because kids moved to remote learning during COVID, parents suddenly had a lot more exposure to what was in the curriculum. This is what Corey DeAngelis, executive director of the Educational Freedom Institute, told me about that.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: Families who thought their kids were in great public schools because maybe they were A-rated by the state. Maybe their kids were coming home with good grades on their report cards, or maybe their kids were just passing all their standardized tests with flying colors. Those same parents started to figure out their public schools weren't as great as they thought they were because there's another dimension of school quality, which happens to be whether the school's curriculum aligns with their values.
--:-- Guest: Megan Basham: So school choice has been around as a political issue, but the pandemic really supercharged it. And I think a key thing to note on this is how we're seeing it transcend typical partisan divides. A poll just released on Monday from the University of Houston found that in Texas, 78 percent of Black Democrats and 57 percent of Latino Democrats support some form of school voucher program. In fact, the only group in that poll that did not give it majority support was white Democrats.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham. Controversy has erupted in Hollywood over the selection of this year's Oscars Best Actress nominations, and some are blaming race. Joining us to discuss is Daily Wire Hollywood correspondent Christian Toto.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: Oh, my pleasure.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: So there's a real controversy emerging over the nomination of English actress Andrea Risborough for the Best Actress Award. She's a Hollywood outsider who starred in the indie film To Leslie, which earned only about $27,000 in theaters. So she was seen as this extremely niche nomination with critics calling for an investigation into how she got nominated. Tell us a little bit about this scandal.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: Well, that's part of it. There's two other components here. The campaign on her behalf was atypical. You had a lot of A-list stars like Jennifer Aniston and Gwyneth Paltrow hosting private screenings, really kind of using their social media platforms to push her Best Actress nomination possibility.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: So that part of it. Also, there were two other actresses that seemed an almost lock to win a nomination, I'm talking about Viola Davis for The Woman King, also Danielle Deadweiler for Till, two highly celebrated performances. And the Oscar So White controversy from a few years ago changed the Academy. They included more members of color. So now we have results.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: I don't think people can automatically say, well, because it was an all-white body, they produced all-white results. It's more complicated than that. And now there was a fairly stunning quote from a black film critic named Robert Daniels in the LA Times. I'm just going to read it.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: What does it say that the black women who did everything the institution asks of them, luxury dinners, private academy screeners, meet and greets, splashy television spots, and magazine profiles are ignored when someone who did everything outside the system is rewarded.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: So this begs the question, is the Best Actress Award actually based on the best performance or is it based on some of these Hollywood insider politics that he mentioned?
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: Well, it's a very revealing quote, by the way, and it's actually both because this is not unlike a political campaign. If an actor or actress has a chance at a nomination, they have to go through a lot more interviews than normal. They have to kind of be out and about. They'll do different profiles. It is a campaign.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: And I think that's one of the reasons why Riseborough's nomination was so stunning, because she didn't do that. She wasn't a part of the process. And that's what shocked everyone. So it's political in an odd way because you think, well, it should just be the best actor or actress, but it's more complicated than that.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: Now, I understand they opened an investigation into her nomination. What did they find and why was an investigation needed?
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: Well, I think because of the controversy that we're talking about, they had to do something. They had to kind of show that they're looking into it. But you know, the situation is a bit murky because like that critic said, there are all these different things that happen every year that are technically acceptable and are part of the process.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: But what is that process? Is it defined? And what if actors or actresses go on social media and start pushing out certain stars? Is that legal? Is that ethical? So that's what they were looking into.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: The investigation wrapped up rather quickly, and it looks like Riseborough will still continue. She'll be able to win a Best Actress award next month. So that won't change. But I think the conversation around it will continue for a while.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: Now, what are people saying about Andrea Riseborough's actual performance? I understand Kate Winslet called it something like the best on-screen performance she's ever seen in her life. Was that the consensus?
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: You know, I mean, the reviews are almost across the board outstanding. But, you know, a lot of actresses gave great performances this year. You can say the same thing about Viola Davis in The Woman King. So, you know, every year it's very competitive. There are a lot of good actors giving their best work.
--:-- Guest: Christian Toto: So it's not uncommon that there are snubs. People aren't included in the top five. But I will say some of the comments about her performance in To Leslie, a little bit over the top. We live in an age where to cut through the cultural noise, you have to say something a little bit outrageous or kind of be really evocative in your comments.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire Hollywood correspondent Christian Toto. The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, is taking steps to broaden the political discourse at the school through a program designed to end quote political constraints on what allowed to be taught in the university classes. With so much division and college faculty skewing overwhelmingly Democrat and left, the school which is America's first established public university might be onto something.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: So, Charlotte, full disclosure, I actually went to UNC for grad school, so this is of particular interest to me. Tell us about this new program.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: Sure. So UNC Chapel Hill recently took action to make a school of civic life and leadership. The board of trustees unanimously voted to speed up its creation, showing the interest in getting something like this off the ground.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: In a resolution, the board pointed out that it has seen there's a need for degree-oriented programs that focus on civic life and leadership. The school would be framed off of concepts in UNC's Program for Public Discourse, and it would provide those degree-oriented programs at some point in time.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: The school's chancellor said in a statement that a few years ago, the school started its strategic plan and one of its efforts was to promote democracy. All right, so promoting democracy is a pretty vague mission that can mean a lot of things. What specifically are the goals?
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: Well, board chair David Boliak and vice chair John Prayer told the Wall Street Journal that the concept is to stop, quote, political constraints on what can be taught in university classes.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: After the board's decision on the new school and the journal's article, some people associated with UNC apparently got really upset about it. One law professor said no faculty were aware of the major development.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: Now, it's no secret that a lot of kids on campuses feel like they can't really talk about their political opinions if they don't align with teachers' or peers' views. And often these institutions are heavily liberal. What about UNC faculty? Right. UNC is no different.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: A survey from last year showed that professors at Chapel Hill were 16 times more likely to be Democrat than Republicans. It looked at 14 departments across the humanities, as well as science, technology, engineering, and math. Of the teachers that they looked at, they discovered that 204 were registered Democrats and 13 were Republicans.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: 67 were unaffiliated and 121 were not clear. That's a pretty high number, and not all colleges are like that. But another study in 2020 showed that about 48% of professors included were registered as Democrats, while around 6% were Republicans.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: This is not consistent with the overall population, though, so it's clear why college students who are more conservative might feel silenced. Here's David Boliak, the board's chair.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: This is all about balance. At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, we clearly have no shortage of left-of-center and progressive views on our campus, like many campuses across the nation. But the saying really can't be said about right-of-center views.
--:-- Guest: Charlotte Pence-Bahn: So this is an effort to try to remedy that with the School of Civic Life and Leadership, which will provide equal opportunity for both views to be taught at the university.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire's Charlotte Pence-Bahn. Other stories we're tracking this week. U.S. health officials are advising people to stop using EzriCare artificial tears and over-the-counter eye drops brand that has been linked to an outbreak of drug-resistant infections.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: The Center for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday night sent a health alert to physicians, saying the outbreak includes at least 55 people in 12 states. They say one person has died.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: North Carolina has joined a growing list of states considering bans on transgender medical procedures for minors. A bill filed late Wednesday in the statehouse would ban hormone treatments and surgeries for anyone younger than 18 and make it illegal for medical professionals to help a minor present or appear in a manner that is inconsistent with the minor's sex.
--:-- Host: Georgia Howe: Well, that's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back tomorrow with the news you need to know.
