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By Deborah Stevenson
NHELD has sent State Representative Patrick Biggins a Freedom of Information request to provide NHELD with all documents, emails, texts, and social media comments to or from him, regarding, among other things, “homeschooling”; any “working group”; any “bill”; and “legislation”; any “proposed bill”; or any “suggested bill or legislation”; from March 12, 2025, up to and including August 21, 2025.
Why does NHELD seek this information? We seek it because we have had a variety of reports indicating that Rep. Biggins has made contradictory statements and taken contradictory actions about homeschooling issues during this time period.
Some of the contradictory statements and actions were as follows:
Leading up to, and after, the May 5, 2025 so-called “informational hearing” held jointly by the legislature’s Children’s Committee and the Education Committee, of which Rep. Biggins is a member, Rep. Biggins spoke individually by phone, and by email, to several individuals in the homeschool community. At time, Rep. Biggins listened to their comments and indicated that he simply wanted to engage in conversation about the possible need for homeschool regulation, that he had not decided what to do about it, and that no decisions had been made about it. For example, some quotes to homeschoolers, at various times, included:
“I am hoping to continue the conversation with the homeschool community.”
Yet, later he said, “I hope you will have a public hearing or another way of engagement and I would still participate but at this time I am no longer going to email”.
He also said, "I have really tried to engage with the people who emailed me. At this time I'm going to stop”; and “With that I will say that I do believe that there should be regulations.”
The largest example, though, of Rep. Biggins’ contradictory actions followed the May 5, 2025 “informational hearing”. Rep. Biggins took it upon himself to establish a “working group” of invited participants to have an “open discussion” about the possibility of, or any need for, adoption of “regulations” about homeschooling, to see if there “could be a consensus” about the issue. At the first meeting of the “working group”, held on June 24, 2025, while the horrific story about the Waterbury public school child, who allegedly was being starved by his public school teacher stepmother for five full years while he was enrolled in the public school system, appeared to be the impetus for the call for homeschool regulation, the “consensus” of the “working group” at that first meeting was that the Waterbury abuse case had nothing to do with homeschooling. It was the consensus of the “working group”, at that time, that the State agencies were at fault for not doing more to halt the abuse when it was reported to them, such that the “working group” should call each of the Commissioners of the State agencies involved to appear before them to be questioned, in person, about the agency failures involving the Waterbury case. Rep. Biggins then agreed to contact the Commissioners and invite them to appear, one at a time, before the “working group” for that purpose. It also was decided that the first Commissioner to be called to appear before the “working group” was the DCF Commissioner, Jody Hill-Lilly.
Even though the consensus at that first meeting specifically was to call each Commissioner to appear before the “working group” to be questioned, in person, about the agency failures, after several weeks of silence from Rep. Biggins, he finally emailed the “working group” invitees, only to unilaterally make a substantial change in the premise of the next meeting. This time, Rep. Biggins emailed the “working group” asking the invitees to provide him, before the next meeting, with a list of their questions to be asked of the DCF Commissioner, so that she would be able to “prepare” her answers to the questions in advance of the meeting. This was not what the consensus of the “working group” was at the first meeting, and was not the understanding of NHELD or CHN (or many others of the “working group”). Rep. Biggins did not indicate at the first “working group” meeting that the Commissioners would be given questions, in advance, to provide prepared answers at the meeting. The point was to be able to question the Commissioners in person. Not only did Rep. Biggins change the format to providing questions in advance, but also, directed that no one at the second meeting of the “working group”, scheduled for August 12, 2025, would be allowed to ask any questions of the Commissioners in person.
After weeks of waiting to question the DCF Commissioner, the second meeting of the “working group” took place on August 12, 2025. The problem was that the DCF Commissioner did not show up. Instead, six DCF staff members showed up in her place. The staff then proceeded to read from the prepared answers they had, in written form, regarding the questions that were sent to DCF by Rep. Biggins. Rep. Biggins, also admitted that he had “edited” the questions from the “working group” members before sending them to DCF. He did not answer how many of the questions he edited when NHELD asked, claiming he did not know how many he had “edited”. The six DCF members then read from their prepared answers to the questions Rep. Biggins sent to them, none of which addressed DCF’s failures or any corrective measures. Rep. Biggins also ensured that the “working group” invitees were precluded from asking any questions of the DCF staff present.
When NHELD, Rep. Dauphinais, CHN, and TEACH began asking Rep. Biggins questions about why the DCF Commissioner failed to show up, why he had changed the content of the meeting from its original intent to question the Commissioners in person about the failures of their agencies regarding the Waterbury case, when no one was allowed to ask any questions, at all, even of the DCF staff during the meeting, Rep. Biggins simply argued that he didn’t believe that questioning of the Commissioners during their appearance at the “working group” meetings was the original intent, and that he had no power to have the DCF Commissioner appear.
When we continued to ask questions of Rep. Biggins, the DCF staff simply walked out, and the meeting, such as it was, ended, notwithstanding our continued questioning of Rep. Biggins.
We do have documentation that, after the first “working group” meeting where it was agreed that the Commissioners would be questioned in person, that Rep. Biggins emailed the “working group” invitees, instead, to send to him, in advance, questions for the DCF Commissioner so she could prepare her answers before the meeting; and that he did speak with the Child Advocate about appearing at a “working group” meeting, when previously he had stated that he “had no juice” to talk directly to the Commissioners. For example:
“From: Rep. Biggins, Patrick [email protected]
Sent: Thursday, June 26, 2025 11:00 AMI just wanted to send out a reminder to please email me any questions you might have for the department if children and families, the office of the child advocate, and the state department of education.”
“From: Rep. Biggins, Patrick [email protected]
Sent: Monday, July 7, 2025 12:00 PMUnfortunately, we cannot expect our state agencies to answer question on the spot, so if you have any questions either your own or from the many people who you are connected with through your agencies please send those to me.”
“From: Rep. Biggins, Patrick [email protected]
Sent: Monday, August 4, 2025 12:11 PMI was able to talk with the Child Advocate, and we have a Date for them to come in to talk to the working group. I wanted to make sure I shared that information with all of you as soon as possible hence this email.”
In addition, during the evening only hours after the second “working group” meeting on August 12, 2025, we received word that the DCF Commissioner was “retiring”, and the following morning, on August 13, 2025, the story broke in the media that the DCF Commissioner indeed was “retiring” to accept another job elsewhere.
The third meeting of the “working group” was supposed to take place on August 19, 2025, with the appearance of the State’s Child Advocate, Christine Ghio.
On August 15, 2025, however, Rep. Biggins suddenly announced that he was disbanding the “working group” in its entirety.
Therefore, because the contradictory responses and actions of Rep. Biggins, NHELD believes that a Freedom of Information request is more than appropriate to determine exactly what happened, what was told to the Commissioners by whom, and exactly where the truth lies.
Rest assured, that when we are provided responses to our FOIA request by Rep. Biggins, we will be sharing that information with the public. Stay tuned.
Attorney Deborah Stevenson is the founder of NHELD, LLC. NHELD is an acronym for National Home Education Legal Defense, a national organization that seeks to protect and defend the rights of families who wish to educate in freedom. In everyday use, we just call it "NHELD." Our organization is open to all who wish to join. We provide resources, information, consultation, and assistance for families across the country to protect their freedom.
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