Tallahassee, Florida — Gov. Ron DeSantis’ “parental rights” campaign didn’t win him the Republican nomination for president, but he’s still fighting the fight on another front: Florida schools. The movement could have an impact on public education long after he leaves office.
Although the seat is officially nonpartisan, DeSantis has endorsed 23 school board candidates across 14 counties this cycle and targeted 14 incumbents. Part of his agenda is to confront what he calls “woke” ideology in public schools.
Much of the political debate over race has revolved around “parental rights” at a time when both political parties are fighting to attract a competitive voting bloc of suburban women. The modern parental rights movement began as opposition to pandemic precautions in schools and is now fueled by discontent over classroom instruction about identity, race, and history.
Katie Blacksburg wants to make school board meetings boring again. But her campaign for a vacant seat on the Pinellas County School Board on Florida’s Gulf Coast is far from that.
The mother of three has faced online criticism since launching her candidacy, been branded a child abuser by opponents and has beefed up security at her home.
Blacksburg, a registered Republican and former legislative aide, supports school choice and parental involvement in the classroom, but says activists behind the parent rights movement have gone too far.
Blacksburg has found herself at odds with the local chapter of the conservative group Moms for Liberty, whose activists have denigrated her online and posted information about her children and home. The chapter president did not respond to phone calls and emails from The Associated Press.
“I don’t want to feel unsafe in my own home. And I don’t want my children to feel unsafe in their own home just because I decided to run for office,” Blacksburg said.
Blacksburg is vying for one of three seats on the Pinellas Board of Trustees, a seat that could determine the region’s political dominance depending on the results of the Aug. 20 election.
Historically known as one of the state’s most swing counties, Pinellas has shifted to the right in recent years. As at school board meetings across Florida, conservative activists there have read explicit passages from books, likened certain educational materials to pornography, and labeled educators “groomers.”
“It’s disgusting,” Blacksburg said. “And it’s for shock value.”
Part of the political storm sweeping the Florida School Board, critics say it has undermined its mission to improve student achievement. According to state data, only 53 percent of Florida students are reading at or above grade level.
“This group is trying to spread misinformation and discredit teachers,” Blacksburg said. “People are tired.”
Conservative activists and elected officials often seek to win majority seats in local school districts from the largest employers and landowners in the area.
DeSantis gained national recognition for exploiting the culture wars, banning education on sexual orientation and gender identity, and limiting what can be taught about racism in Florida schools.
He joined a movement of mothers seeking to overturn school boards across the country.
“I think moms are a key political force in the 2024 cycle,” DeSantis said at the group’s national conference in Philadelphia in 2023.
“He knows who the real conservatives are in my race,” Pinellas County Board of Education candidate Daniel Marolf said after receiving DeSantis’ endorsement.
“My values are really about protecting children,” she said. “It’s about getting parents involved.”
The Pinellas school board election has drawn the attention of other top candidates.
Florida Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, whose seat was targeted by national Democrats as a potential winner, campaigned alongside school board candidates backed by Moms for Freedom, including Marolf and Pinellas Moms, Stacy Geyer and Erica Picard.
“We started door-knocking with them this morning,” Luna said in a video posted Aug. 3. “We want them to take over the school board.”
Other supporters include the Florida Faith Foundations, a group of pastors who work to elect “the most biblical candidate” to combat the “spirit of antichrist” at work in American life.
“There are too many liberals, too many anti-theists running for office in this country,” FFF President Anthony McDaniel said in a YouTube video. He did not respond to multiple emails from The Associated Press.
“So what do we do?” McDaniel said. “Let’s elect a conservative, competent Christian to the Pinellas County Board of Education.”
Critics say that when conservative school boards gain power, there’s often a pattern: They attack the superintendent.
“I saw it firsthand on my own board,” said Jennifer Jenkins, a Brevard County school board member who defeated then-incumbent Tina Deskovich, who later founded Moms for Liberty.
After newly elected commissioners took office in November 2022, superintendents in Brevard and three other counties were forced to step down, a move critics say has thrown school districts into disarray and cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars.
In Pinellas, DeSantis-backed candidate Erica Picard said she supports her district’s superintendent, who currently has the board’s support.
“They think that everyone at Moms for Liberty is out to get everyone. That’s not true,” Picard said. “I want to be very clear: I’m running my own campaign.”
Other board members who share DeSantis’s views have worked to expand prayer in schools, oppose LGBTQ History Month celebrations and scrap sex education textbooks.
Progressive advocacy groups have sprung up to counter conservative candidates with their own money and messages. The Florida Democratic Party has fielded 11 school board candidates.
Back in Brevard County, Jenkins decided not to run for reelection. Instead, she launched a new PAC called Educated We Stand to support candidates who oppose the right-wing shift in education.
“Extremism in public education is not acceptable to the average family,” Jenkins said.
___ Kate Payne is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
