While key topics like inflation, immigration and the economy are constant hot-button issues ahead of the November presidential election, one issue largely ignored by candidates seeking the nation's highest office is an equally important one: education.

The two presidential candidates, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, were not asked a single question during a recent debate about the many issues facing the American education system, including the wide gap in student performance on standardized tests and LGBT ideology in the classroom. Pessimism about the current state of the U.S. education system has grown in recent years, with 42% of Americans saying they will be “very dissatisfied” by 2024, up from 30% in 2015. according to According to a Gallup poll. (Related article: “Chair-throwing, biting, punching”: Children born during the coronavirus lockdown are having serious problems at school, reports say)

Education experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation that rising student loan debt and the federal government's role in addressing it, the current administration's attempt to overhaul Title IX, the Biden Department of Justice's (DOJ) targeting of parents who protested at school board meetings, and LGBT ideology in schools are all important issues that presidential candidates should address.

“American public education, and education in general, is facing a serious crisis,” Tina Deskovich, co-founder of Moms for Liberty, told DCNF.

School committees have emerged as a key battleground in the ongoing culture wars, with parents voicing concerns about transgender policies, mask-wearing, critical race theory and other hot-button issues.

Amid the heat around these issues in 2021, the National Association of School Boards wrote a letter to the Biden administration likening concerned parents to domestic terrorists and urging it to use various laws, including the Patriot Act, to protect school boards from threats of violence.

Five days after the letter was sent, Attorney General Merrick Garland in a memorandum directed the FBI to “use its authorities” to pursue parents who intimidate or assault public officials. The attorney general's letter cited an “alarming spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff.”

“Teachers unions don't care about parent involvement, even though union leaders acknowledge that some of the biggest indicators of student success are parent involvement, and it's important that parents take the lead, and I want our presidential candidates to talk about that,” Deskovich said.

No, Jay, there isn't one.

And American parents are wondering.

We want a President of the United States who will protect and defend parental rights.

We want an American president who promises to never burden our children with the fears and selfishness of adults.

It's time to put your kids first. https://t.co/CH8dpUC8fZ

— Moms for Liberty (@Moms4Liberty) June 28, 2024

There was also no mention of America's massive student loan crisis, with around 19 million Americans not paying a cent towards their student loan payments.

“I think there should be a discussion about the federal government's role in higher education, particularly student aid and student loan repayment, because this is an issue that needs to be addressed,” Neil McCloskey, director of the CATO Institute's Center for Educational Freedom, told DCNF, “But I was surprised that this issue wasn't brought up because obviously the Biden administration is working hard to forgive a lot of student loan repayment.”

The Biden administration has devised multiple plans to cancel student loan debt, but they have been rejected by the Supreme Court and lower courts. In 2022, the administration proposed a plan to cancel the student loan debt of about 40 million Americans, forgiving up to $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients and $10,000 for non-Pell Grant recipients, but the Supreme Court rejected the plan in a 6-3 decision.

Shortly after the Supreme Court ruling, the administration in April proposed the SAVE plan, which would have limited student loan payments to 5% of a borrower's monthly income, down from a 10% cap. Federal judges in Missouri and Kansas have blocked parts of the administration's plan from going into effect.

“There should also be a discussion about Title IX, because the federal government makes a lot of rules for schools at basically all levels about how they treat and classify people, particularly based on sex and gender, and how those are defined,” McCloskey told DCNF.

The Biden administration also sought to redefine Title IX protections to include “gender identity” and “sexual orientation” in the rules, a rule change that has sparked numerous lawsuits across the country and led to numerous major victories for plaintiffs in federal court.

Several states have prevailed in their attempts to block the rule changes: Federal judges in Kansas, Texas, Louisiana and Kentucky have all sided with the states in lawsuits and blocked the rules.

U.S. District Judge Terry A. Doughty, a Trump appointee, called the amendment an “abuse of power” and a “threat to democracy.”

“There are serious issues that need to be addressed by the next administration, specifically the Biden administration's attempt to rewrite Title IX to include gender identity,” Alex Nester, research associate at Parents Defending Education, told DCNF in an email.

School transgender policies have also become a flashpoint in the broader education debate, with one case reaching the Supreme Court only to be refused hearing by the Supreme Court, which challenged a Maryland school district's policy of concealing information about a child's “gender identity” from parents.

In April, Parents Defending Education filed a lawsuit against the Summit School District for using “affinity groups” to racially discriminate against parents, alleging that the district tried to prevent parents who did not belong to a particular ethnicity from joining affinity groups.

“The erosion of meritocracy in our education system is another issue that parents are rightly concerned about, and it is crucial that the next administration refocuses the Department of Education on educating children, rather than imposing a political ideology on them,” Nester told DCNF.

The Biden and Trump campaigns did not respond to DCNF's requests for comment.

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