Chip and Joanna Gaines reportedly donated $1,000 to a Texas school board candidate trying to ban teaching about systemic racism

• Chip Gaines' sister Shannon Braun is running for a school board position in Colleyville, Texas.
• Braun has spoken out against critical race theory as part of her platform.
• The Gaineses reportedly donated $1,000 to her campaign.

Chip and Joanna Gaines reportedly donated $1,000 to a politician who supports banning critical race theory education in Texas public schools.

Chip Gaines' sister, Shannon Braun, is running for the Grapevine-Colleyville ISD (GCISD) school board in Colleyville, Texas.

According to her website, Braun's platform intends to provide "kids the education they deserve" - which she doesn't believe includes critical race theory.

Critical race theory looks at racism systematically, examining how generations of racism and inequality still impact society today.

"It's an approach to grappling with a history of white supremacy that rejects the belief that what's in the past is in the past, and that the laws and systems that grow from that past are detached from it," a lawyer and founder of critical race theory Kimberlé Crenshaw told CNN.

To critical race theorists, racism is not something that happened in the past tense, but an experience people of color deal with every day, while white people continue to benefit from an imbalanced system.

Critical race theory is not currently part of the GCISD's curriculum, as The Dallas Morning News reported, though a growing number of conservatives claim Texas school districts have plans to implement it.

Texas legislators are considering passing a bill that would make it more difficult for teachers to educate their students about racism, while deaths caused by domestic extremists who have racist ideologies are on the rise.

The bill would prevent teachers from participating in training that "presents any form of race or sex stereotyping or blame" and from talking to their students about "widely debated and currently controversial issue of public policy or social affairs," as The Dallas Morning News reported.

In addition, students would not be able to get school or extra credit for political activism.

As the Dallas Observer reported, Braun has said critical race theory is "the single most divisive threat" to education.

Chip and Joanna Gaines donated $1,000 to Braun's campaign, as reported by The Dallas Morning News. The outlet also reported that Chip Gaines' parents donated $2,000 to the campaign.

The Gaineses' endorsement was previously listed on Braun's campaign website, but that section of her site is no longer live.

Braun will compete against incumbent Mindy McClure in a run-off on June 5.

Texas isn't the only state to push anti-critical race theory legislation in recent months. Oklahoma passed a similar bill at the beginning of May, and legislation has been proposed in Louisiana that would bar teachers from teaching race or sex as systematic.

On May 20, Georgia's governor Brian Kemp wrote a letter asking the Georgia State Board of Education "to take immediate steps to ensure that Critical Race Theory and its dangerous ideology do not take root in our state standards or curriculum."

And on Tuesday, Tennessee's governor Bill Lee signed a bill into law that forbids educators from teaching that "an individual, by virtue of the individual's race or sex, is inherently privileged, racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or subconsciously."

As the AP reported, opposers of the new law fear it will make teachers avoid the topic of race or racism altogether.

The Gaineses and Braun did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.