Biden administration offers direct grants in fight with Florida over school mask mandates

President Joe Biden’s administration jumped back into Florida’s school mask battle on Thursday, making good on a pledge to back school boards that implement strict mask mandates despite a state ban.

The U.S. Department of Education announced the creation of a new grant designed specifically to cover any fines or withholding of funds that school districts face because of their mask rules.

The action marks the latest move in a tit for tat between the Biden administration and Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration over masks. Biden had called some Florida superintendents in August, encouraging them to keep fighting DeSantis’ rules requiring parental choice on masks, and also threatened legal action against governors who stand in the way of local schools “protecting our children.”

At a press conference Thursday in Washington, Biden said, “Right now, local school officials are trying to keep children safe in a pandemic while their governor picks a fight with them and even threatens their salaries or their jobs. Talk about bullying in schools.

“If they’ll not help — if these governors won’t help us beat the pandemic — I’ll use my power as president to get them out of the way. The Department of Education has already begun to take legal action against states undermining protection that local school officials have ordered. Any teacher or school official whose pay is withheld for doing the right thing, we will have that pay restored by the federal government. One hundred percent.”

Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said nearly a month ago the federal government might provide financial backing to the small but growing number of Florida school boards that were adopting strict mask requirements to combat rising numbers of coronavirus cases. His latest announcement came two weeks after the Florida Department of Education held back amounts equal to school board member salaries in Broward and Alachua counties, which refused to reverse course on masks.

The state education department also has threatened to do the same to eight other school districts, including Hillsborough and Miami-Dade, that have mask mandates without a parental opt-out provision for anything other than a medical reason.

“We should be thanking districts for using proven strategies that will keep schools open and safe, not punishing them,” Cardona said Thursday in a press statement. “We stand with the dedicated educators doing the right thing to protect their school communities, and this program will allow them to continue that critical work of keeping students safe.”

Jackie Johnson, a spokesperson for the Alachua County school district, said her district appreciated the federal government’s action. She expected the school system will apply for the grant as soon as those details become available.

“Not having to go through the state to request federal dollars to make up this difference will be very helpful,” Johnson said. “We were a little bit concerned about this issue.”

Broward County school district officials have raised questions about the state’s readiness to distribute federal coronavirus relief funds, as well. On Wednesday, the school board and interim superintendent issued a letter requesting that the state release all available stimulus funding as soon as possible.

Jared Ochs, a spokesperson for the Florida Department of Education, called Broward’s letter “political grandstanding” aimed at “scoring political points and being noticed by their party leaders in D.C.” He noted that Broward had received $62 million in federal stimulus funds so far, and had yet to use more than $9 million of it.

The district also received another $10.3 million in Non-Enrollment Assistance federal funds, Ochs said.

“As you can see, it is clear the FDOE has been working with Broward County for some time now and in good faith,” Ochs wrote in an email.

For the new grant program, the federal government is taking steps to ensure that districts will not have to go through the state agency to secure its funding. The Department of Education plans to release a notice inviting applications from school districts in the coming weeks, and expects to make awards “as expeditiously as possible and on an ongoing basis.”

Herald/Times Tallahassee Bureau staff writer Ana Ceballos McClatchy Washington Bureau reporter Bryan Lowry and contributed to this report.

This story was originally published September 9, 2021 at 6:41 PM.