Scholastic Tells Children: Trump is Great

His buildings reached into the sky.

His businesses just grew and grew.

Then Trump became our president–

People wanted something new.

This optimistic poem, which reads like promotional campaign material targeted at children, comes from Scholastic’s Rookie Biography series.

President Donald Trump by Joanne Mattern (2017) claims to offer young readers an informative, accurate, and unbiased narrative about the 45th U.S. president; however, as the poem above illustrates, it falls far short of that mark. The author outlines Trump’s personal and professional life with a celebratory tone. She omits facts, glosses over context, and ignores opposing perspectives. Read our full review.

Children deserve access to resources that equip them to develop democratic values, to think critically, and to examine their world in a truthful way.



Tell Scholastic that young people deserve an accurate and age-appropriate biography of Donald Trump. A biography that doesn't silence the voices of dissent, ignore acts of resistance, and exclude any reference to the words and deeds of racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, and misogyny that defined Trump’s campaign.

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