Republicans Prioritize Censorship, Discrimination Over Freedoms, Economic Growth with SB 1's Passage

COLUMBUS – State Rep. Cecil Thomas (D-Cincinnati) responded to the House passage of Senate Bill (SB) 1, the Higher Education Destruction Act: 

“I can tell you: this bill is an affront on marginalized communities. It ignores the struggles of Black, Brown, and LGBTQ+ students, as well as students from various religious backgrounds, and it sends the dangerous message that their voices and experiences are not worthy of consideration. That they are not worthy of the freedom to education,” said Rep. Thomas. “I stand with the people who marched against this bill throughout the state, I stand with our students, and I stand with the values of inclusion, diversity, and intellectual freedom.”

Senate Bill 1 doesn’t build bridges—it burns them. It fosters division, not dialogue. It places ideology over education. And it prioritizes a narrow, exclusionary vision of education over the holistic, inclusive environment that we should be fostering in our institutions of higher learning. It threatens the very essence of what it means to provide a world-class education in Ohio. The cornerstone of a quality education is diversity of thought, and SB 1 undermines that by forcing many of Ohio’s most dedicated, tenured professors to leave our institutions. This bill prioritizes ideology over education and threatens the intellectual freedom that fosters academic growth. It threatens the opportunity for our students to learn from diverse perspectives. And it does so in a way that risks undoing years of progress we’ve made toward equity and inclusion.