Local ‘Nonpartisan’ Elections Aren’t Really Nonpartisan

In the 1960’s I learned the lesson taught by Democrats—there are NO non partisan races.  Democrats use school board members, planning commissioners, city council members as a farm team for State legislature office.  Plus they use local government to promote radical, wasteful and discriminatory policies.

“The argument for keeping city councils, school boards, and other local elections out of partisan glare is to ensure that only the best-qualified candidate serves all the residents. But isn’t that the goal for every elected office? Whether it’s state legislatures, U.S. Congress, governor, attorney general, secretary of state, vice president, or president, shouldn’t citizens always want the best-qualified candidate?

But what happens when you vote for a Republican who then supports the Democrat agenda that you believe has Marxist undertones? This recently happened to Republicans in a small California city located about 25 miles south of Los Angeles. Following several raucous school board meetings with overflowing crowds, a privately organized community town hall event, and several rallies that generated local and national media coverage, conservatives were dismayed that the Los Alamitos Unified School District unanimously passed the racist social justice/ethnic studies program (designed by the Soros-funded, left-leaning Southern Poverty Law Center). Daniel Pipes, of the respected Middle East Policy Forum, said of SPLC,”

As we pay attention to Congress, we need to pay attention to City Hall and the schools—radicals of today were taught in government schools yesterday.  Indoctrination works—it is time to return schools to the process of education.

Local ‘Nonpartisan’ Elections Aren’t Really Nonpartisan

By Robin M. Itzler, American Thinker,  5/23/21   

Unless you’ve been hiding in a basement like Joe Biden, most everything these days is partisan. This is especially true of “nonpartisan” school boards and city councils. Over the last few decades, while Republicans focused their patriotic American flag-waving enthusiasm on state and national elections, Democrats were busy filling school boards and city councils with members who embrace Marxist agendas.

With Democrats and Republicans having completely opposing views on vital issues, it is imperative that conservatives know the political party of everyone running for local office. That’s the first step. If the candidate is a Republican, the next step is learning whether that candidate will stand up for conservative principles even if he or she is the minority voice on the council or board. As witnessed too many times, having an “R” after your name offers no guarantees. (For more information, google “Mitt Romney,” “David Valadao” and “Liz Cheney.”)

City council and school board members make hiring decisions to ensure the day-to-day operations of their cities or school districts. While politics doesn’t affect every decision (such as naming parks, schools or libraries, where to put a statue, budget planning, contract negotiations, etc.), a candidate’s party affiliation cues voters as to how candidates might possibly vote on crucial issues. For example:

City Councils – Most city councils determine police department budgets and hire chiefs of police. A Democrat city council member might want to “defund or abolish the police” while a Republican city council member is more likely to support law enforcement and its “serve and protect” mantra.

School Boards – Progressives on many school boards want to indoctrinate students with racist social justice/ethnic studies curriculum (aka critical race theory). School boards are also determining what to teach students about American history. Should the curriculum have a positive focus with the Republican-supported “1776 Unites” that features African American historians, academics and advocates who promote founding American values like entrepreneurship, self-determination, and mutual social support? Or should the course be the Democrat-supported “1619 Project” that claims America remains racist to its core due to white privilege?

Political parties’ matter

The argument for keeping city councils, school boards, and other local elections out of partisan glare is to ensure that only the best-qualified candidate serves all the residents. But isn’t that the goal for every elected office? Whether it’s state legislatures, U.S. Congress, governor, attorney general, secretary of state, vice president, or president, shouldn’t citizens always want the best-qualified candidate?

But what happens when you vote for a Republican who then supports the Democrat agenda that you believe has Marxist undertones? This recently happened to Republicans in a small California city located about 25 miles south of Los Angeles. Following several raucous school board meetings with overflowing crowds, a privately organized community town hall event, and several rallies that generated local and national media coverage, conservatives were dismayed that the Los Alamitos Unified School District unanimously passed the racist social justice/ethnic studies program (designed by the Soros-funded, left-leaning Southern Poverty Law Center). Daniel Pipes, of the respected Middle East Policy Forum, said of SPLC,

The SPLC has turned into a left-wing hatchet group, using its accumulated prestige to go after legitimate organizations and individuals. Along the way, ironically, SPLC itself acquired some of the reprehensible characteristics it was created to fight…

Many Republicans felt betrayed by Diana Hill, the board’s lone Republican. With national media covering events in the small city, Hill could have introduced the conservative reasons against the social justice/ethnic studies curriculum, which many Americans see as critical race theory glossed over with pleasant-sounding names.

MassResistance Organization Director Arthur Schapper, who spoke at the community town hall meeting and attended the May 11 rally in front of the school district said in an email,

The fact that the lone Republican on the Los Alamitos Unified School board caved and voted for the corrupt, deceptive, and immoral “Social Justice Standards” demonstrates how political affiliation alone is not enough to ensure that elected officials will do what the people want. It is never enough to elect the “right people”. You must pressure them to ensure that they do the right things.

What is needed now more than ever is a MassResistance of parents and outraged citizens in general not just in Los Alamitos but throughout the country to push back on their elected officials and demand that they do the right thing for the students in the schools and the community as a whole.

Constant pressure through emails, phone calls, confrontations with the elected officials outside of the school board meeting hall are essential. Local parents need to organize and spread the word throughout their communities about the damaging, sickening programs that their local school boards are promoting. These elected officials need to re-learn the fact that they work for the people, not the other way around.

What is the answer? Americans who believe in faith, family, and country must become politically active so that conservative-leaning Republicans are elected, especially in “nonpartisan” local elections. Active means doing whatever you can – from writing letters to the editor and calling and emailing elected officials to joining politically active organizations and attending peaceful rallies. Even running for public office!

Founded on Judeo-Christian principles, the United States of America strives for perfection and opportunity for all. The challenge in 2021 and into next year’s midterm election is to keep America free by having conservatives focus on their own neighborhoods. This starts with electing conservative Republicans to school boards and city councils who will push back at Marxist members camouflaged as Democrats. As former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Tip O’Neill famously said, “All politics is local.”