The article analyzed the damages of the ultraconservative culture war to public education in Brazil, specifically in higher education. The main objective was understanding how the culture war aligns with the neoliberal agenda to dismantle public and free universities. The inquiry analyzed the strategies of the ultraconservatives to gain political power and the peculiarities of the culture war in Brazil. The research methodology was an empirical analysis (2004 to 2022) based on the Google Trends tool to map the Google searches for keywords used by ultraconservatives in their attacks on public universities, search on websites (2018 to 2022) of cases of violence against scholars due to the content of their research; bibliographic research on the strengthening of the ultraconservatives in Brazilian politics; and critical analysis of the neoliberal reforms implemented after the 2016 judicial-parliamentary coup. The article concludes that both neoliberals and ultraconservatives attack public education. On the one hand, the neoliberals establish the economic bases for the precariousness of public universities; on the other hand, the ultraconservatives promote the demoralization of scientific institutions and block lines of inquiry. Thus, the culture war plays a fundamental role in the current phase of the class struggle. It delegitimizes critical thinking, encourages violence, and threatens the secular and democratic State.