Andy Biggs, the Republican nominee for Arizona governor, has a plan for your kid's classroom: put a camera in it.

On an October 15, 2025 radio show, conservative host Garret Lewis asked Biggs whether he'd support putting cameras in public school classrooms so parents could keep watch on teachers. Biggs didn't hesitate, the Arizona Mirror reported.

"Absolutely, I would," Biggs said. "I mean, you've hit on the reasons why, but look, you wouldn't need to do it if you didn't have what we're seeing with some of these woke teachers and these woke lessons that are going on, and the indoctrination that's taking place here."

The question came after a Phoenix-area elementary school teacher was criticized for how she talked to her students about the shooting death of Charlie Kirk.

Biggs declined to comment to the Mirror.

A camera on the teacher is a camera on the kids

Biggs said he'd only back cameras if the feeds were limited to parents. But there's no way to guarantee that, the Mirror reported. Parents can share their logins. Logins get stolen. Systems get hacked.

That's not a guess. In 2021, a small group of hackers got into the live feeds of tens of thousands of Verkada security cameras — including cameras in schools and hospitals — and watched them for two days, the Mirror reported, citing the Associated Press. Verkada later agreed to pay a nearly $3 million federal penalty.

And even when the right people have the footage, children aren't safe. Last month a former Tempe Union High School District surveillance officer was indicted for voyeurism for downloading security video of Corona del Sol High School students in a dance room where girls were changing clothes.

Students feel it too. Nearly all the students in ACLU focus groups in 2023 said surveillance hurt how they interacted with staff and friends, according to the Mirror.

Even Republicans rejected this

This isn't a new idea. Kari Lake pushed cameras in classrooms when she ran for governor in 2021 — and Arizona's own Republican governor at the time, Doug Ducey, shot it down. Ducey warned the idea could lead to predators monitoring children, and said the answer was transparency in the curriculum, not cameras.

Biggs picked her idea back up anyway.

A different camera plan didn't survive the Legislature either. An early version of this year's state budget included $2 million for a pilot program putting cameras with biometric scanners in Mesa schools, meant to flag sex offenders and missing kids, with no live viewing. After criticism over privacy, it was quickly pulled.

Why "woke" is the tell

Look at the reason Biggs gave. He didn't say the cameras were to protect kids from abuse. He said you wouldn't need them "if you didn't have ... these woke teachers."

By his own account, the cameras are about what teachers are teaching — lessons he calls "woke" and "indoctrination." That makes it a system for policing teachers' words, with children's faces in every frame.

Biggs has made kids a political wedge before. He called Arizona's anti-trans ballot measure "an 80-20 issue", even though Arizona approved seven trans athletes in twelve years. And the Republican who wrote a bill to crack down on a polygamist cult that abused women and children in Colorado City says Biggs killed it. Biggs has defended that vote, saying the bill was poorly drafted.

What the record shows

Andy Biggs said "Absolutely, I would" put cameras in Arizona's public school classrooms, because of "woke teachers" and "indoctrination." Experts say such feeds can be hacked or shared, the Arizona Mirror reported — hackers once watched tens of thousands of security cameras in schools and hospitals for two days — and Arizona's last Republican governor rejected the same idea from Kari Lake, warning it could lead to predators monitoring children.

Source

This post is based on the Arizona Mirror's reporting. Photo: Diannie Chavez/The Arizona Republic, pool photo via the Arizona Mirror.