Saturday, July 26, 2025

Publishers Refuse to Print Ryan Walters’ Election & Religion‑Infused Curriculum

Oklahoma’s State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Ryan Walters, has drawn national scrutiny for issuing new social studies standards that embed Trump-aligned conspiracy theories and Christian nationalist narratives into K–12 curricula.

The standards, adopted in December 2024, direct teachers to question the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election using thoroughly debunked claims: late-night ballot drops, “illegal” mail-in votes, and suspiciously high turnout. Walters also inserted language suggesting COVID-19 was likely engineered in a Chinese laboratory and mandated that students learn the United States was founded explicitly as a Christian nation rooted in “Judeo-Christian principles.”

But when the Oklahoma Department of Education tried to find publishers willing to produce textbooks that match the new standards, they were met with silence—or polite refusals.

Textbook Publishers Say No

According to reporting by LGBTQ Nation, major educational publishers—including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt—declined to produce materials conforming to the new standards. Two smaller publishers also reportedly turned down the request, citing concerns about the accuracy, ideological slant, and commercial viability of such textbooks.

As one publisher put it, Oklahoma’s K–12 market is too small to justify rewriting and potentially damaging the integrity of their materials for national distribution. Another privately said they would not "print lies.”

This puts Oklahoma teachers in a bind: either use outdated materials, create their own lesson plans that conform to politicized standards, or face potential disciplinary action from Walters’ office.

The Bigger Agenda

The state’s new standards were developed behind closed doors by a group of far-right activists, including PragerU founder Dennis Prager, Project 2025 architect Kevin Roberts, and pseudo-historian David Barton. Their vision aligns with broader Christian nationalist efforts to reshape public education—and ultimately public life—by teaching a distorted version of U.S. history and civics.

In fact, the standards are so extreme that Walters’ own advisory group suggested adopting PragerU Kids videos and other ideologically driven content in classrooms, effectively privatizing parts of the curriculum with unaccredited, partisan material.

What It Means for Higher Education

These developments in Oklahoma are not isolated—they are part of a national movement to reshape public education from kindergarten through college. What’s happening now in K–12 has ripple effects in higher education, including:

  • Erosion of Academic Standards: Students taught disinformation in high school may enter college ill-prepared for evidence-based inquiry.

  • Politicization of Education: Public education is increasingly divided along ideological lines, with colleges caught in the crossfire.

  • Chilling Effect on Educators: K–12 and higher ed instructors alike are facing new political pressures, including book bans, curriculum censorship, and loyalty tests to partisan ideas.

  • Curriculum Segregation: As some states embrace fact-based education while others embrace political indoctrination, a two-tier education system is emerging—deepening inequality and distrust.

Will Oklahoma be OK? 

Walters’ campaign to institutionalize misinformation in Oklahoma classrooms has hit a critical obstacle: publishers won’t print it. This quiet but firm resistance from the educational publishing industry stands in contrast to the state’s increasingly aggressive posture toward teachers, schools, and dissenters.

It also raises a critical question: if public institutions are compelled to teach lies, who will tell the truth?

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