Defend the Right to Read—Reject H.R. 7661

Americans have long defended a simple but essential principle: the government does not get to decide what we are allowed to read. H.R. 7661 is a direct threat to that principle—and you must oppose it. By tying federal education funding to restrictions on books and educational materials, this bill pressures schools into removing titles that explore identity, history, and real lived experiences—simply because they make some politicians uncomfortable. That is not education policy. That is federal coercion. When Washington uses funding as leverage to control what appears on library shelves, it is regulating ideas themselves. This is not about one category of books. It is about whether the federal government will be allowed to narrow the range of perspectives available to students. It is about whether teachers and librarians will be forced into silence and self-censorship just to protect their funding. And it is about whether students will grow up in classrooms shaped by political fear instead of intellectual freedom. We should be deeply alarmed by where this leads. The warning is not abstract—it is captured vividly in the novel Fahrenheit 451, where suppression of books becomes suppression of thought itself. That is not fiction we should be inching toward—it is a future we must actively reject. Reading is foundational to a functioning democracy. It builds empathy, sharpens critical thinking, and exposes people to ideas beyond their own. Once the government begins deciding which viewpoints are acceptable, every American’s freedom is at risk. Existing legal standards, including the Miller Test and established obscenity laws, already provide guardrails to ensure age-appropriate materials in schools. H.R. 7661 goes far beyond that—it opens the door to sweeping bans driven by politics, not educational value. We are already seeing how similar efforts at the state level have removed a wide range of legitimate, meaningful books from classrooms and libraries. You took an oath to uphold the Constitution. That includes defending freedom of expression—even when it is inconvenient, even when it is controversial. Reject H.R. 7661. Stand firmly against federal overreach into education. Protect the right of students, educators, and families to choose what they read without government intimidation. The freedom to read is not negotiable.