Hundreds of thousands of dollars in pandemic-era federal relief funding, including money intended to help students recover from learning loss, instead went toward “anti-racism” training for teachers and administrators in Albuquerque Public Schools.
The district approved $336,500 in American Rescue Plan funds in 2021 for training tied to the Peoples Institute for Survival and Beyond (PISAB), while accounting records obtained by America First Legal show APS ultimately spent nearly $700,000 on the training program.
School district officials told Fox News Digital they could not confirm the spending or how much came from federal COVID relief funds because they did not have immediate access to the records.
PISAB, which has received grants from George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, has distributed training materials instructing “White folks” to “learn how [they] became white” and defining race as a “specious classification of human beings created by Europeans (whites)” to assign human worth and social status and maintain “power and privilege.”
At APS, the programming included “Community Conversations,” an introductory course centered on “core equity and anti-racism principles,” as well as “Introduction to Undoing Racism” and a multi-day “Undoing Racism” workshop.
The training was delivered through the Anti-Racism Training Institute of the Southwest (ARTI), which had a 23-year relationship with PISAB.
The effort reached hundreds of district employees after initially focusing on school leadership. During the 2020-21 school year, APS principals and assistant principals participated in “Community Conversations,” a course ARTI “specifically designed” for the district which incorporated PISABs organizing principles.
By July 2022, at least 721 APS staff members, ranging from teachers to senior district officials, had attended an ARTI training, according to records obtained by AFL.
“Leftist groups infiltrate schools because they know that they will have the opportunity to shape and control children’s minds and social behavior,” Bobby Crossin, counsel at America First Legal, said in a statement. “Here, the Albuquerque Public Schools took money intended by Congress to help students harmed by government lockdowns, and spent it on Critical Race Theory indoctrination sessions.”
Julie Levin, senior counsel at America First Legal, said the group’s concerns centered in part on the use of pandemic relief money at a time when schools were trying to help students recover from COVID-era disruptions.
“You had all of this money that Congress was giving to school districts to get children back on track after the COVID pandemic,” Levin told Fox News Digital. “Instead of using that money to help the students, they were using it to pay for these anti-racism trainings.”
“What was happening was taxpaying dollars were be
