Texas has become the next battleground over ethnic studies, the Huffington Post reports. Latino activists are protesting a bill filed by Conservative state Sen. Dan Patrick that would disqualify ethnic studies courses from counting toward core history requirements. SB 1128 would instead require students [1] to take general surveys of U.S. and Texas history in order to graduate. Opponents of the law have likened the Texas measure to an Arizona law used to dismantle a controversial Mexican American Studies program in Tucson [2].
“We’re here to snuff out Dan Patrick’s SB 1128,” Tony Diaz, also known as “El Librotraficante,” told HuffPost Live [3]last week from the Texas legislature, where he was lobbying against the bill. “We’ve learned from our brothers and sisters in Arizona how hard it is to get a law off the books, so we’re here to nip it in the bud.”