Biased Message Pitched in Taxpayer Funded Textbook

Students in high schools around Michigan and the nation are being taught how former U.S. Representative Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, D-Detroit, was “more interested in finding solutions than focusing on politics,” according to a 2005 American Government textbook still in use.

“The best public policy is bipartisan,” Kilpatrick is quoted as saying on page 339 of a profile of her called, “Voices on Government,” in Prentice Hall Magruder’s “American Government."

Except, nobody considered Kilpatrick, the mother of ex-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, to be bipartisan in the 14 years she served in the U.S. House of Representatives.

“Kilpatrick had one of the most liberal voting records in Congress,” the Washington Post reported. In her last term, Kilpatrick voted with Democrats 97.9 percent of the time.

Kilpatrick refused to vote to certify the Ohio electoral votes that secured the 2004 presidential election for Republican George W. Bush.

Barney Keller, communications director for the limited-government Club For Growth, called Kilpatrick “one of the most partisan, liberal, borderline-socialist members in the history of Congress.”

Kilpatrick voted to limit government 3 percent of the time over her career, Keller said.

“She never advanced a single policy idea that attracted Republican votes,” he said. “It is just shocking to me that she would pretend that she is a bipartisan politician.”

Yet students are being taught just the opposite. Before 1970, school districts in Michigan weren't required to provide textbooks free of charge. However, a 1970 Michigan Supreme Court ruling stated schools need to provide school materials.