The politics of education and parents’ rights have changed the Virginia governor’s race from a Democratic coronation to a toss-up, and conservative activists hope the issue at the center of the suddenly competitive race will be a model for Republican campaigns going forward.
Six months ago, few gave Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin much of a chance to win the governor’s mansion in the increasingly Democratic state. Now, with Election Day on Tuesday, polls indicate Youngkin is close to or even slightly beating Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe.
Youngkin plans to make his closing pitch to voters in Leesburg, Virginia, about 50 miles from Washington, D.C., and the seat of Loudoun County, which is now the center of national debate over parental rights, public school curriculum, and the direction of public education.
Ian Prior, the executive director of Fight for Schools, a political action committee that has backed Youngkin’s election efforts, told the Washington Examiner it’s impossible to understand Youngkin’s surge in the polls without understanding what has occurred in Loudoun County and the role that parental organization has played.
“Youngkin has really been listening to his potential constituency,” Prior said. “McAuliffe is catering to the [teacher] unions and [union president] Randi Weingarten.”
Parents in Loudoun and the rest of Virginia began organizing in response to pandemic-induced school closures in early 2021, Prior said. The efforts intensified when reports surfaced that members of the Loudoun County school board created a Facebook group that school officials used to strategize introducing aspects of critical race theory into school curriculum.
Critical race theory is often described as a lens for viewing the struggles of black people through U.S. history, but others criticize it as promoting racial division. The incorporation of the theory into K-12 classroom instruction has drawn the ire of parents and activists who are concerned children are being taught to view other people through a racially charged perspective.
Loudoun County parents were incensed over the Facebook group, and the teaching of critical race theory became a regular topic at school board meetings, with scores of parents speaking out on the issue during public comment periods.
Later, further infuriating local parents, the Loudoun County school board started pushing a policy allowing bathroom access based on gender identity rather than biological sex, which Prior said is when “all hell broke loose.”
The pinnacle of the conflict between parents and the school board occurred at a June 22 meeting, at which Loudoun County parent Scott Smith confronted the board over the proposed bathroom policy.
Smith’s daughter had been sexually assaulted by a male student wearing a skirt in the women’s bathroom of Stone Bridge High School. The incident was reported to school officials on May 28, nearly a month before the board meeting.
Smith was arrested at that meeting following a struggle with law enforcement and after a woman at the meeting allegedly told Smith she didn’t believe his daughter had been raped. Smith would later be found guilty of disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. His daughter’s attacker was convicted of the assault in October.
Corey DeAngelis, executive director of the Education Freedom Institute, told the Washington Examiner parents are “a new special interest group.”
“They care more about their children’s educational needs than anyone else, and the past year and a half has awakened a sleeping giant,” DeAngelis said.
“The broader issue is parental rights,” Prior said, criticizing McAuliffe for catering to the “educational industrial complex” in Loudoun County.
DeAngelis said the education issue has become a lose-lose issue for Democrats.
“If Democrats come out in support of educational freedom, they will get pushback from the teachers unions,” he said. “If they come out against educational freedom, they will get pushback from parents.”
MCAULIFFE SAYS PARENTS SHOULDN’T TELL SCHOOLS WHAT TO TEACH, HANDING YOUNGKIN A CAMPAIGN AD
One significant gaffe by McAuliffe helped bring education to the forefront of the state’s gubernatorial election and become a strength for Youngkin, a surprising development for an issue often considered a strength of Democratic candidates.
In the Sept. 29 gubernatorial debate, McAuliffe said he didn’t believe that “parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”
The Youngkin campaign immediately capitalized on the debate clip and used the soundbite for nearly all of its ads in the closing weeks of the race.
Within days of the debate, reports surfaced the Loudoun County school board had allowed the assailant of Scott Smith’s daughter to attend a different school, where the student was subsequently charged on Oct. 6 with a second sexual assault.
In the RealClearPolitics polling average of the race on Aug. 26, McAuliffe led Youngkin by nearly 7 points. But Youngkin began cutting into that lead in October, days after the McAuliffe debate comment, and now holds a nearly 2-point lead. A Fox News poll showed substantial gains for Youngkin on the issue of education, flipping a 2-point deficit on the issue into an 8-point lead.
DeAngelis compared the Virginia election to the 2018 Florida gubernatorial election that saw Republican Ron DeSantis prevail by the slimmest of margins, noting the Wall Street Journal claimed at the time the parent vote helped DeSantis over the finish line in a nail-biter of a race. The piece cited a CNN exit poll that showed the now-Florida governor had significantly overperformed with black women, compared to other statewide Republican candidates.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
“If Glenn Youngkin pulls off this win, he’ll similarly have thousands of parents who want more of a say in their children’s education to thank,” DeAngelis said. “That’s an important lesson for both parties.”
