The House has passed the Crucial Communism Teaching Act by a surprisingly large margin. HR 5349 was first proposed by Rep. Maria Salazar (R-FL) back in 2021. The bill didn’t go anywhere for the next session of Congress. Rep. Salazar reintroduced the bill this session and it passed on Friday by a vote of 327-62. Curriculum on the horrors of communism will now be developed and required in American schools. The thing that surprised many people was that so many Democrats voted in favor of it. What are they up to?

Rep. Salazar is the daughter of Cuban exiles. Her family is well acquainted with the horrors of communism under the Castro regime in Cuba. She refers to communism as “one of the most destructive political ideologies the world has ever seen.” Salazar proposed the bill because it is incredibly important to her Cuban constituents and their families in the Little Havana area in Miami.

The bill would require that American students be taught that communism has led to the deaths of more than 100 million people worldwide, at the hands of their own governments. An additional 1.5 billion still suffer under this form of government. We’d also argue that 330 million have been suffering under communism for the past four years in America with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in charge, but that was left out of the bill for some reason.

Rep. Danny Burgess (R-FL) co-sponsored the bill. He notes that communism has become increasingly viewed as something desirable. That never used to be the case in America. We used to be willing as a nation to fight proxy wars against the USSR to prevent the expansion of communism to places like Vietnam.

Surveys indicate that younger Americans, particularly GenZ, are woefully ignorant when it comes to the dangers of communism. One recent survey found that 50% of GenZ respondents had no idea that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has killed more civilians than Nazi Germany did. One in four GenZ students view communism favorably. One in five believe it to be more desirable than capitalism.

The legislation calls for the curriculum to be developed by the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. The foundation was created in 1993 after a unanimous vote in Congress. Perhaps the fact that 62 current Members of Congress voted against the Crucial Communism Teaching Act in 2024 illustrates why the curriculum is necessary today.

Ken Pope, the CEO of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, notes that communism “is a brutal ideology that runs counter to democracy and the very principles our nation was founded upon.”

The bill requires that students be taught the truth about communism and totalitarianism, and how they run counter to the freedoms that America was founded upon. The curriculum will include a “Portraits in Patriotism” section. This will include oral histories of people who survived communist regimes and escaped to America. (Those people always vote against the Democrat Party when they become US citizens. Weird coincidence!)

One of the Democrats who voted against the bill complained that it doesn’t teach anything about fascism. This demonstrates yet another reason why the bill is necessary. Many people don’t even realize that fascism is often a political reaction to communism. People often feel that they need to choose one monster to save them from another. Lumping communism and fascism together demonstrates a level of ignorance that could only have been produced in our modern public school system.

The bill now heads to the Senate, but it’s unclear whether there will be time for them to pass it before the current session concludes.