Oklahoma Superintendent Ryan Walters announced Wednesday that he would step down from his role overseeing the state's schools to lead the conservative group Teacher Freedom Alliance, saying, "We're going to destroy the teachers unions."
The announcement from Walters, a conservative Republican who pushed to incorporate teaching about the Bible into public school classrooms, caps off a contentious tenure marked by a willingness to embrace culture war issues.
"We have seen the teachers unions use money and power to corrupt our schools, to undermine our schools," Walters said on the show "Fox News @ Night" on Wednesday. "We are one of the biggest grassroots organizations in the country. We will build an army of teachers to defeat the teachers union once and for all."
Teacher Freedom Alliance confirmed Walters’ new role as CEO, saying in a post to X that he “fearlessly fights the woke liberal union mob.”
State Attorney General Gentner Drummond, a Republican, slammed Walters in a statement after the announcement, saying in a post to X that Walters' appointment as superintendent led to "a stream of never-ending scandal and political drama" and calling him "an embarrassment to our state."
"It’s time for a State Superintendent of Public Instruction who will actually focus on quality instruction in our public schools," Drummond said.
Randi Weingarten, the president of American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement that "today is a good day for Oklahoma’s kids."
"Any educator worth their salt understands it’s impossible to educate students if you don’t support teachers," she added. "Walters didn’t do that in Oklahoma, and now, at a time we need to bring the country together, he’s trying to export his divisive rhetoric nationally."
As the state's top education official, Walters generated controversy for ordering schools to include the Bible in the curriculum and pushing to require that families prove their U.S. citizenship in order to enroll their children in public schools.
Just days ago, he announced a partnership with Turning Point USA, vowing that high schools in the state would have chapters of the conservative group co-founded by conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated earlier this month. Walters said in his announcement video on X that "radical leftists with the teachers union dominate classrooms and push woke indoctrination on our kids." Details of the initiative were not immediately clear.
Walters was sworn in as state superintendent in January 2023, and in his first few months in office, he called for prayer in schools and hanging the Ten Commandments in classrooms in public schools.
Walters has said he wanted to “put God back in schools” and called the separation of church and state a “myth.”
Last summer, a sheriff's office investigated an alleged incident at a state Board of Education meeting in which board members reported they saw images of naked women on a television screen in Walters' office, according to The Oklahoman. Walters called the board members' accounts "desperate lies." An Oklahoma County prosecutor declined to file criminal charges earlier this month.
Walters did not answer questions in a video posted to X by a reporter with Fox affiliate KOKH about when his superintendent role would end or his message to Oklahomans about leaving the position.
