The Department of Justice (DOJ) has spent over $100 million on education programs related to restorative justice, social emotional learning, and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) over the last four years, according to a new report by the non-profit group Parents Defending Education (PDE).
The report, which was released Thursday, found that the DOJ awarded and distributed $100,113,942 in grants to over 900 school districts across 36 states between 2021 and 2024. The funds were used for a range of initiatives, including project proposals that mention restorative practices or social emotional learning, as well as those that focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion.
According to the report, the DOJ spent $45,207,178 on proposals that broadly mention restorative practices or social emotional learning, $32,084,529 on proposals that discuss diversity, equity, or inclusion or explain how the project is intended to improve outcomes for a specific demographic group, and $19,881,347 on certification for consultants who often promote divisive concepts such as critical race theory, critical gender theory, and queer theory.
The report also highlighted the DOJ’s funding for the STOP School Violence Program, which aims to “improve school climate” by switching from disciplinary actions to “social emotional learning.”
PDE’s founder, Nicole Neily, criticized the funding, saying it prioritizes ideology over student safety and uses taxpayer dollars. “At the end of the day, federal bureaucrats made a deliberate choice to prioritize ideology and pet projects over protecting American schoolchildren, using the tax dollars of hardworking citizens,” she said.
The report comes on the heels of a similar report by PDE last month, which found that the Department of Education had spent over $1 billion on grants advancing DEI in hiring, programming, and mental health training in America’s schools since 2021.
