Senate Panel Puts Off Vote on Confirmation of Devos As Secretary of Education

(Detroit Free Press/TNS) —

The Senate committee considering the nomination of Betsy DeVos as U.S. secretary of education has delayed the vote to give members time to read an ethics agreement.

The hearing of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions will now be held Jan. 31.

DeVos is the billionaire Republican donor whose nomination has been controversial. Critics are convinced that her decades-long advocacy of school choice means she will dismantle public education, while supporters say she will fight for children, particularly low-income children, and work to empower parents.

“The committee has received Betsy DeVos’s paperwork from the Office of Government Ethics,” a statement from the Senate committee said. “She has completed the committee’s paperwork, answered questions for 3 1/2 hours at her confirmation hearing, met privately with the members of the committee, and she will now spend the coming days answering senators’ written questions for the record.”

DeVos said in the agreement that within 90 days she will divest her interests in 102 companies. She also noted she is resigning her positions with 12 organizations, some of which have previously been reported. They include the Dick and Betsy DeVos Family Foundation and the Alliance for School Choice.

She also noted eight organizations from which she has resigned but in which she will retain financial interests.

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