Delaware Teacher Sorry After Mother Complains She Told Class Obama Is a ‘Scary’ Muslim
A Delaware elementary school teacher has apologized to a local mother, her attorney says, after she and her daughters complained that the teacher told her fifth-grade class she would not vote for Barack Obama because he is a Muslim and “is scary.”
Dina Odetalla, who is Muslim, has a 10-year-old daughter in that class, and filed an internal complaint with Lord Baltimore Elementary School after she heard about the Obama comments, attorney Greg Varallo, a partner at the Wilmington firm Richards, Layton & Finger, told FOXNews.com on Wednesday.
Varallo called the remarks “unfortunate,” but said the matter is now “resolved.”
“There was a conference and there was an apology,” Varallo said.
Obama is a Christian and has been fighting rumors about Muslim ties throughout his campaign.
Varallo said an article Wednesday in The (Wilmington) News Journal that reported the state Human Relations Commission is investigating the matter is untrue. Varallo said the commission is actually investigating remarks allegedly made by a teacher at a different school where another one of Odetalla’s daughters attends. He said that case was spurred by remarks about the Prophet Muhammad that his client found offensive to Muslims.
He did not identify the teacher who made the remarks about Obama at Lord Baltimore Elementary School, but said he believes the teacher is still working at the school.
The comments were originally made public when the 10-year-old student’s older sisters in February wrote a letter to the editor, published in Delaware’s Cape Gazette, detailing the teacher’s political comments.
She reportedly made the remarks before a mock Super Tuesday primary on Feb. 5.
“Her teacher told the class that she is a Republican and that Barack Obama ‘believes in different things and is scary,’” the sisters, Fatima and Basima Abdelsalam, wrote in their letter.
Calling her remarks “dangerous and untrue,” they added: “We are American Muslim kids. We love our country … Kids are being taught hatred and fear of Muslims. Our sister was badly hurt by what was said in her classroom.”
The school district has released a statement saying it has conducted a thorough investigation. They too say they’ve resolved the issue after meeting with the mother and the teacher who allegedly made the comments.
A representative from the elementary school could not be reached for comment.
FOXNews.com’s Judson Berger and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
that is a shame that a teacher, a person with a degree does have enough common sense to do the investigation works before she open her mouth and let the class know that just because you have a degree doesn’t mean that you are intelligent.
I’m sure Obama will also find those remarks dangerous and untrue; and at the same time I wonder if it will occur to him that there are multiutudes of Americans who felt Rev Wright’s comments… surpassed the remarks of the teacher.
Why is it no one is allowed to have an opinion anymore? I have heard so many derogatory remarks in my life, yet I just let it run off my back. I am so tired of people constantly complaining about one thing or another. When I think back during my school days and what people said about me, the thought of suing or complaining never entered my mind. All my parents did was confront the person who said it and that was it. No hard feelings, life goes on.
I could not agree more with this teacher! We don’t know what Obama is, after listening to his preacher all those years it sure causes me to wonder if he agrees with his preacher’s comments. Scary Indeed.
she needs to be terminated as a teacher and frankly her teaching credentials should also be suspended and a review board needs to approve her ability to teach again.
I condem Rev. Wright’s craziness and his spewing of vile hatred and I condem this action as well; regardless of her race status.
You can say foul things about Christianity and some other religions but not about Islam in schools? This appears to be an example of double standards and another reason some of us have a lower tolerance for Islam in this country than for other religions. Too many good men and women of this country have died to give ALL of us the right to say whatever we want, about whatever we want, whenever we want, to be silenced by the stiffling cloak of political correctness overunning this country.
Can we nominate her as teacher of the year?
How Sad!!
Im actually not surprised that a Republican teacher at a elementary school would be saying these lies
Its kind of typical
The teacher should be fired! She has no sense of how insecure our children are at that age. That teacher should be teaching diversity issues such as unity and tolerance because of the different races, religions, etc. attending our schools.
SHE SHOULD BE FIRED!!
AND WE WONDER WHERE RACISM IS DERIVED?!!!!!!