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  • Over the past few weeks, the senate has been holding hearings

  • on Trump's cabinet nominees.

  • And the hearings have raised important questions

  • about each of them.

  • For instance, is Rex Tillerson too loyal to oil?

  • Jeff Sessions-- is he down with the brown?

  • (like Carson): And will be Carson be good for the hood?

  • You see, it's 'cause "hood," we're trying to make-- anyway...

  • Uh, but of all Trump's picks, none seem to be less prepared

  • than the one we saw yesterday.

  • Which brings us to our continuing segment,

  • Profiles in Tremendousness.

  • I have the most dedicated people.

  • I have the best people.

  • Meet Betsy DeVos,

  • Trump's nominee for secretary of education.

  • She's a billionaire businesswoman from Michigan,

  • she's a major voice for conservative education reform,

  • and-- a lot of people don't know this--

  • she's the cofounder of the '90s R&B group,

  • -Bell Biv DeVos. Yeah. -(laughter)

  • Uh, yes, they had to kick her out, because...

  • -♪ That girl was poison. ♪ -(laughter)

  • But her illustrious history aside,

  • the big question is...

  • is Betsy DeVos qualified

  • to lead the education department?

  • Well, yesterday the senate sat her down

  • to test her on her knowledge of education stuff.

  • And right away you knew there was going to be a problem

  • when she couldn't answer a simple yes-or-no question.

  • Do you think that schools that receive...

  • K-12 schools that receive government funding

  • should meet the same accountability standards...

  • ...equal accountability in any K-12 school

  • or educational program that receives federal funding,

  • whether public, public charter or private?

  • -I support accountability. -Equal accountability

  • for all schools that receive federal funding?

  • -I support accountability. -Okay, is that a yes or a no?

  • That's a... I support accountability.

  • Do you not want to answer my question?

  • I support accountability.

  • (screaming)

  • Sorry, sorry.

  • (screaming)

  • I'm sorry, I just-- when I watched that,

  • I had a flashback to every single time

  • I called tech support, you know?

  • When they just keep saying the same thing and it's just...

  • (screams)

  • Accountability. (screams)

  • I'm surprised Tim Kaine didn't start screaming,

  • "Operator, operator!

  • I just want to talk to a human."

  • Now, now, the reason Betsy's ducking that question

  • is because she wants to take taxpayer money

  • from public schools and send it to private schools,

  • without holding the private schools to the same standards.

  • Which means the taxpayer could be paying for schools

  • with less qualified teachers, crappier curricula,

  • weaker testing and worst chicken nuggets in the cafeteria.

  • Yeah. You know that off-brand

  • where every once in a while you're like,

  • "Oh, there's a crunch. I don't know why

  • there's a crunchy thing in a nugget."

  • You know those? Yeah.

  • Now, now one of Betsy DeVos's main jobs

  • would be to improve student performance.

  • Now, some say you should measure that by what students know,

  • as in proficiency.

  • Others say you should measure it

  • by how much students improve: growth.

  • Betsy DeVos, she says, "Wha... ?

  • I would like your-your views on the relative advantage

  • of measuring, doing assessments,

  • and using them to measure proficiency,

  • or to measure growth.

  • If I'm understanding your question correctly,

  • around proficiency, I would, I would also, um,

  • correlate it to competency and mastery,

  • so that you-- each student is measured

  • according to the, um, advancement that they're making

  • in each subject area...

  • -Well, that's growth. -It's, uh...

  • That's not proficiency.

  • Proficiency is if they've reached a--

  • like, third grade level for reading, etc.

  • No. I'm talking about the debate between proficiency and growth.

  • I was kind of, uh, surprised--

  • Well, I'm not that surprised

  • that you did not know this issue.

  • (laughter)

  • (applause)

  • Damn.

  • Uh...

  • I would like to enter that shade into the record.

  • Yeah. Immediately after,

  • he said that all the other senators were like,

  • (exclaiming)

  • So, okay, okay, okay.

  • Uh, so Betsy did not do well

  • on the verbal part of Franken's questioning.

  • How did she do on the math?

  • You said that student debt has increased by 1,000%?

  • -Since 2009. -980% in eight years.

  • -I'm sorry. -980%.

  • -That's not-- that's just not so. -That's almost a thousand.

  • -It's increased 118% in the past eight years. -Hmm.

  • Damn.

  • Yo. Can I ask a question?

  • Why don't they ever fight back in these hearings?

  • She should have just been like, "Oh, yeah?

  • I forgot to carry the one."

  • She should just do that.

  • I mean...

  • But here-here's a question I have.

  • How do you put this person in charge of America's education?

  • It's like hiring an Amish person to run NASA, you know?

  • (with Amish accent): All right, let's strap some of the horses

  • to the space shuttle,

  • and take it to heaven.

  • I don't, I don't even know if that was a good

  • or bad Amish accent.

  • No, I mean it's not like they're gonna watch the show

  • and complain, so I mean...

  • I don't know.

  • Did you see what Trevor Noah said?

  • Me neither.

  • So one-one of the hearing's most revealing moments

  • was, uh, when Senator Chris Murphy,

  • who represents Newtown, Connecticut,

  • the site of the Sandy Hook shooting,

  • he asked DeVos about guns in school.

  • You can't say definitely today

  • that guns shouldn't be in schools?

  • Well, I-I will refer back to, uh, Senator Enzi,

  • and the school that he was talking about

  • in Wapiti, Wyoming.

  • I think probably there, I-I would imagine

  • that there's probably a gun in the school

  • to protect from potential grizzlies.

  • Get the (bleep) out of here, man.

  • Should schools have guns?

  • And you say, yeah, they should have guns

  • because maybe grizzly bears?

  • Let me, let me tell you something, and this is true.

  • We called the school in Wyoming she's talking about.

  • And a bear answered the phone--

  • No. Uh, we called the school...

  • We called the school and they told us

  • that they don't have a gun,

  • because they have a fence and bear spray,

  • and that works fine.

  • Like, here's another question.

  • Like, you-you're trying to justify having guns in school.

  • What do you think there are more of in America?

  • School shootings or school bear attacks, huh?

  • In fact, I would argue, every school should have a bear

  • to protect them from guns, that's what they should have.

  • (growling)

  • So after a day of hearings,

  • we learned Betsy DeVos clearly has no clue

  • about how to run the education department.

  • So, uh, the question is,

  • why is she being nominated in the first place?

  • Mrs. DeVos, there is a growing fear, I think,

  • in this country that we are moving toward, uh,

  • what some would call an oligarchic form of society.

  • Would you be so kind as to tell us, uh,

  • how much money your family has contributed

  • to the Republican party over the years?

  • I wish I could give you that number. I don't know.

  • SANDERS: I have heard the number was 200 million.

  • Does that sound in the ballpark?

  • It-it... Collectively,

  • -between my