District: Arpaio Too Controversial For Students


POSTED: 3:15 pm MST February 28, 2011
UPDATED: 3:31 pm MST February 28, 2011

This Friday, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio was set to read to the sixth-graders at Saguaro Elementary in Phoenix, but the event was canceled after a district administrator said he was too controversial for the classroom.

A teacher at the school invited the sheriff to read to the class for "Read Across America" week.

The sheriff's office said Arpaio reads to students every year for various literacy programs.

The assistant superintendent for the Washington School District canceled the event saying the sheriff might offend parents of Hispanic students and that they would complain.

"To disrespect the chief law enforcement authority of the county in this way is a bad example to students and the community overall," Arpaio said. "The program I was to participate in was about literacy - the importance of reading - and had nothing whatsoever to do with law enforcement or my efforts to fight illegal immigration."

The sheriff went on to say politics have no place in the classroom.

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