Kimberly Richey: From the Trump administration to a senior chancellor under DeSantis

A civil rights attorney who worked under former President Donald Trump is now a senior chancellor with the Florida Department of Education.

Kimberly Richey, former U.S. Department of Education assistant secretary for civil rights, started her role as senior chancellor on June 5, according to state records. Her annual salary is $183,750.12.

Before her position in the Sunshine State, Richey was deputy superintendent with the Virginia Department of Education, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Richey has been an outspoken critic against critical race theory. In 2021, as a senior fellow of education with the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, Richey wrote an article advising parents how to stop critical race theory from being taught in private schools.

"The teaching of CRT’s core tenets can be destructive and have a deep impact on students," she wrote. "No child is defined by the color of their skin. Moreover, the teaching of these devastating principles violates the basic religious tenets many of these schools claim to uphold."

Critical race theory, which examines how racism permeates institutions and society, has been a target of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is currently running to be the Republican nominee for president.

"In Florida we are taking a stand against the state-sanctioned racism that is critical race theory,” DeSantis said in 2021 when he announced the Stop WOKE Act. “We won’t allow Florida tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country or to hate each other."

Critical race theory is not taught in Florida public schools. DeSantis, however, claims its "principles" are entering into class instruction, especially in how history and social science is taught.

Richey is both a fellow with the OCPA and the Texas Public Policy Foundation, conservative think tanks that have recently pushed against the same "woke ideology" DeSantis' administration has targeted with laws like the Parental Rights in Education and Stop WOKE Act.

Before Richey was a deputy superintendent for VDOE, she was paid $10,000 as a consultant to Gov. Glenn Youngkin's education department to identify and eliminate "divisive content" in school classrooms, according to Virginia Public Media.

Richey replaces Henry Mack, who held a senior leadership position at DOE for four years until he moved to The Southern Group as an education consultant this past summer.

At DOE, Mack had administrative oversight of Florida's public and nonpublic institutions of higher education, according to his bio on The Southern Group's website.

He also led the Divisions of Florida Colleges, Career and Adult Education, Vocational Rehabilitation, Blind Services, the DOE's Office of Workforce Education and Economic Alignment and the Commission for Independent Education.

During her tenure with the Trump administration, Richey investigated education agencies in Washington, Virginia, California and Indiana for denying students with disabilities equal access to education during the COVID-19 pandemic.

She also argued that transgender girls who play on the sports team that corresponds with their gender identity discriminated against female-student athletes.

In a letter to Connecticut public schools, Richey wrote the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference's policy also "treated male student-athletes whose gender identity does not align with their sex more favorably than other male student-athletes, by affording them the opportunity to compete on and against teams comprised of members of the opposite sex."

Richey has a law degree from the University of Oklahoma College of Law and a bachelor's in education from Southern Nazarene University.

A request for comment about Richey's hiring from DOE has yet to be returned.

Ana Goñi-Lessan is the State Watchdog Reporter for USA TODAY - Florida and can be reached at AGoniLessan@tallahassee.com. Follow her on Twitter @goni_lessan.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: CRT critic Kimberly Richey named senior chancellor in Florida