NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A woman reappointed to a state committee that develops social studies standards in classrooms across Tennessee previously fought plans to establish a mosque in Murfreesboro.
Speaker of the House Cameron Sexton (R - Crossville) reappointed Laurie Cardoza-Moore to the Standard Recommendation Committee. The group recommends changes to current social studies standards, which need to be approved by the State Board of Education. The State Textbook and Instructional Materials Quality Commission then recommends textbooks aligning with those standards.
Cardoza-Moore couldn't be reached for comment Friday.
She was first appointed to the SRC in 2021, according to reports from the Associated Press. In 2010, she fought against plans to build a mosque in Murfreesboro and told senators she believed the mosque was being built by terrorists, despite then-state Sen. Raumesh Akbari saying there was no proof of such accusations from law enforcement, according to the reports.
The mosque got county approval in 2010, and they were able to start building a larger community center for religious ceremonies and other events. After the mosque in Murfreesboro was founded it faced protests, vandalism, arson and a bomb threat, according to The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. It was also involved in a lawsuit, which the mosque won in 2014.
Cardoza-Moore also founded a group that was listed as an anti-Muslim hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center in 2019. It is named "Proclaiming Justice to the Nations," and operates in Franklin, Tennessee. The group also has a campaign named "Taking Back America's Children," which focuses on changing curricula in classrooms across the U.S.
The group was not named in the SPLC's 2021 Year in Hate and Extremism Report.
State education leaders released a statement in response to controversies regarding Cardoza-Moore. The statement is below.
The State Board staff is looking forward to working with all members of the Standard Recommendation Committee.
The State Board of Education is expected to adopt social studies standards from the Standard Recommendation Committee in February 2024.
In 2022, state lawmakers passed a law requiring new scrutiny of the materials in public school libraries, amid a national spike in book challenges and bans. The law gives the state's textbook commission, which is made up of all political appointees, the ultimate say in an appeals process over whether a book stays in a school library.
It also required school librarians and teachers with classroom libraries to create inventory lists of all the materials they have available to students in the classroom, for review by parents and community members.
State lawmakers said they intended for this law to allow parents to have more oversight of their children's education. The law was criticized for coming amidst national reports of efforts by Republican lawmakers to ban books discussing LGBTQ+ identities, Black history and several other subjects.
