Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick wants professors to lose tenure if they teach CRT

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Texas professor slams ‘activist’ faculty over pledge to support critical race theory

The University of Texas at Austin Associate Professor Richard Lowery discusses how faculty policy has shifted and impacted students.

Texas college and university professors may soon lose tenure if they teach critical race theory (CRT) in their classrooms, according to the Lone Star state's lieutenant governor, who has vowed action by the state.

In a warning message to educators this week, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said he will work to strip them of their job security in the state if they teach CRT.

Dan Patrick, Texas' Lieutenant Governor, speaks during the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Dallas, Texas, U.S., on Friday, July 9, 2021. (Dylan Hollingsworth/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

"The critical race theory people are trying to take us back to a divided country," Patrick told reporters at a press conference. 

TEXAS PROFESSOR BLASTS FACULTY AS THEY PASS RESOLUTION PROMOTING CRITICAL RACE THEORY: VIDEO

"Tenure to these professors who voted 41-5 telling the taxpayers and the parents and the legislature, and your own board of regents, to get out of their business that we have no say what you do in the classroom… You've opened the door for this issue because you went too far."

"What we will propose to do is to end all tenure for all new hires," Patrick said, vowing that the state legislature would take action against those who teach the subject in their classrooms.

"The law will change to say teaching critical race theory is prima facie evidence for good cause for tenure revocation," he said. In addition to his comments concerning tenure, Patrick said he wants annual reviews for the professors rather than six year reviews.

Signs opposing Critical Race Theory line the entrance to the Loudoun County School Board headquarters, in Ashburn, Virginia, U.S. June 22, 2021. (Reuters/Evelyn Hockstein)

Patrick's remarks came after a vote by the Faculty Council at the University of Texas at Austin on a resolution to "defend academic freedom" by allowing the promotion of critical race theory in classrooms.

In a video that has been viewed over 10,000 times, UT-Austin Associate Professor of Finance Dr. Richard Lowery spoke out against the resolution which affirmed the "fundamental rights" of professors to push critical race theory in classrooms.

Lowery told Fox News that critical race theory, which promotes the idea that the United States is inherently racist, has "no scientific basis."

"From an academic perspective it basically assumes its conclusion," Lowery said. "There’s no reason to do research when you’ve already assumed that everything is driven by this one particular thing. They assume everything is driven by racism so you go back and figure out how things are driven by racism and that’s not actual research. It’s not falsifiable. It has no scientific basis."

An even mix of proponents and opponents to teaching Critical Race Theory in Orange County. (Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

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Differing from Lowery, Andrea Gore, a professor in the Division of Toxicology and Pharmacology at UT-Austin, offered support for the resolution, saying it is "educators and not politicians" who should be making decisions about what is taught in schools across the state.

"This resolution affirms that its educators and not politicians who should make decisions about teaching and learning and it supports the rights and the academic freedom of faculty to design courses curriculum and pedagogy and to conduct related scholarly research," Gore said.

Fox News' Andrew Mark Miller contributed to this article.