![]() ![]() They wait for hours for the chance to yell at local officials about books and masks, spurred on by a belief that an erosion of “moral values” signals an educational apocalypse.Ī September 2021 plea from the National School Boards Association asked the federal government to step in to protect board members from abuse. ![]() The symptoms of DeSantis’s state leadership are visible at school board meetings, where people, often not locals, arrive early to form lines with lawn chairs, as if it’s a sporting event. This strategy, carried out largely against marginalized groups, makes him, in Williams’s opinion, less “Trump-lite” and more a different brand of extremism. But to stay relevant to his base, he must keep fueling the right-wing media machine with attacks on others. In doing so, DeSantis has made a calculation that his supporters, many of whom delight in his cruelties, won’t label him a schoolyard bully. He’s able to do that through the schools.” “A lot of what we see with him is performative politics,” Williams said. We promised them things that we never were going to give them in order to have their votes on Election Day.”īy attacking the school system, DeSantis is trying to deliver to that third and banking on being able to appeal to more mainstream voters by portraying his actions as arising from his distorted notion of “freedom.” While DeSantis tries to craft a working-class image for himself, he’s a Yale and Harvard grad who comes directly from the elites that he works to vilify. “There was a third of the party that was extremist and unafraid to admit it,” retired GOP campaign strategist Mac Stipanovich told one news outlet. Stephanie Williams, a University of South Florida political scientist, called the governor’s “process” an “appeal to radicalism.” Teachers, librarians, parents, and even some Republican strategists echo the sentiment.
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