Against a backdrop of fractious school board meetings, and a slate of firebrand candidates running for the local school board, Indivisible Northern Nevada is endorsing one Republican, one nonpartisan and two Democratic incumbents (although they are all officially listed as nonpartisan) running for reelection as Washoe County School District Trustees: Joseph Rodriguez (for District C), Elizabeth Smith (District D), Adam Mayberry (District F-At Large) and Ellen Minetto (District B).
“While these four incumbent trustees have worked tirelessly to deliver our children accurate and honest education, a small but vocal group has put forward a slate of candidates who want to censor the lessons taught in our classrooms, deny certain children equal participation in school activities, ban books, and whitewash our history,” the recent press release indicated.
Operation Sunlight which has been backing far-right candidates in several local elections is endorsing Melanie Sutton for C, Cathy Kennedy-Reyes for B, Edgar Hitti for D and Graeme Reid for F.
Trustees make just over $700 dollars per month but they can each impact the body’s direction and decision making. One Trustee already in line with far-right ideology, Jeff Church, elected in 2020, censored in 2021, remains in his seat for two more years. Two like-minded Trustees are able to bring items forward to the body’s agenda for discussion, which means that a single elected Church acolyte could have immense impact on the tone of meetings going forward.
Particularly worrisome for some are the races for B and C.
In the C race, candidate Sutton previously attracted attention for being cited in June 2021 for possession of a dangerous weapon on school property after being seen at the Washoe County School District’s main compound with a gun on her hip. There was also a police report about her in October last year after a trustee “reported possible threats made during a board meeting at public comment.” “I am your fricking domestic terrorist…,” and “we need to blow up this school district,” she was heard saying. The police report indicated the comments were reviewed but not determined to contain any specific threat or overt criminal activity.
Screengrab above from the Operation Sunglight website. It was also behind the recent failed attempt to recall Board President Angie Taylor. The businessman behind Operation Sunlight Robert Beadles said parents weren’t given the chance to speak at public meetings, which Taylor repeatedly denied, pointing to marathon sessions of public comments.
The Operation Sunlight promotional link about her (above) is with the SaveWCSD website. Their about page claims “our district has led our schools and students off track with politically-based, activism-focused curriculum changes.” Other Sunlight backed candidates also get full pages on the SaveWCSD page.
On Sutton’s own page, the candidate writes: “…these schools are no place for people to send their children to receive an education. I began homeschooling two years ago; I have three sons and a daughter.” On her first 2022 Contributions and Expenses report, up to April 15th, it’s indicated she received $5,000 from Nicole and Robert Beadles, the self-proclaimed cryptocurrency savant behind Operation Sunlight.
Another Sunlight challenger candidate, Kennedy-Reyes, opposes alleged “Social Justice” curriculum, as well as Critical Race Theory. She received $5,000 from Coral Bay, a Beadles-linked entity which gave over $5,000 last year to governor’s race candidate Joey Gilbert, also close to this school movement and whose own billboards indicate Save Nevada’s Schools. Watchers of the B race say they haven’t noticed her opponent Minetto doing any campaigning.
Reid for his part writes: “The role of WCSD should be singular – to provide a first-class education to all students. It is not to advocate for political causes. It is not to reinvigorate racism. It is not to indoctrinate students.”
Reached by Our Town Reno for additional comment on why Indivisible Northern Nevada is endorsing candidates during the primaries for the first time, in this case the incumbents, member Kimberly Carden described them as “fair and … doing the best work for the community.”
The wider Indivisible umbrella is a nationwide movement of thousands of volunteer-led local groups that engage in progressive advocacy and electoral work.
“School board meetings used to be quiet meetings where they talked about new buildings or building improvements and operating expenses and that kind of stuff,” Carden added. “And in the past year or so, they've kind of devolved and that's not just Reno, but it's nationwide. We’ve been watching the chaos that's been going on, the lying and the incompetent analysis that's been put forward by some members of our community.”
Carden stressed the importance of what she called a well functioning school board, which she said would help with retention of teachers and staff. “If they're working well together, then the board is able to fight for increased per student funding from the state. They could also fight for reducing class sizes, replacing outdated textbooks. I mean, they're children so you want your kids to have the best education that the county can possibly offer.”
Calen Evans, the president elect for the Washoe Education Association and the STEM education coordinator at the Lemelson STEM Academy, is also endorsing incumbents. Other union groups have been among the contributors to incumbent campaign coffers.
“School board races have never been as important as they are right now because we have groups within our community who are actively trying to get candidates who seem to really only have a goal of divisiveness, a focus on these social issues and really just putting out complete misinformation,” Evans said. “That’s really troubling, especially as an educator and watching these school board meetings, the amount of misinformation, with a hundred percent conviction and, you know it's just complete misinformation. I mean, they're like all out lies that are happening and it's really just scare tactics. It's fear mongering to get people in our community to vote a certain way.”
A former Trustee for District D, Kurt Thigpen, who is openly gay, resigned last year after facing an avalanche of threats and hate messages in texts, social media and emails. Many others in Washoe County and elsewhere say the current climate for teachers, school administrators and trustees, is one where they have felt terrorized from the constant harassment they face through messages, phone calls and public comments, over masking, debates over transgender students, and the teaching of U.S. history.
Evans says it’s a diversion to other matters that do need serious attention. “We have legitimate issues in our school district that we need to deal with, without question. I don't think anybody who is in the arena of education can say whole heartedly that we don't have legitimate concerns. I think what's unfortunate is because of these groups and the misinformation, we're focusing on issues like CRT … And so now we're focusing our attention on things that don't even exist, right? Like there's no CRT being taught in our community, but it's just, they're just using that tactic to kind of fear monger, and then it's taking away people's attention on what we should be focusing on is the fact that we're one of the lowest funded and under resourced school districts in the entire country… So we have, you know, one of the highest teacher turnover rates, we have the largest class sizes in the entire country here in Nevada. These are legitimate issues that we need to address, but instead we're over here just focusing on these issues that really are only fabricated in order to get people scared.”
Evans says members of the Washoe Education Association share his concerns as they view the challenger candidates as “anti-teacher.”
“The majority of educators should be very concerned with the school board races and understanding that if certain people get elected, it is going to drastically impact our profession in a negative way,” he said. “So I think it's just important that we do a good job at informing our membership … about the importance of these races.”
Evans asks other voters and parents not to fall for misinformation. “If you have questions about what's going on in your child's classroom, talk to their teachers, right? Like talk to the people that are actually in the classroom, because what I can guarantee you is the people that are saying all of these things that is going on in our school district, none of them are teachers. None of them are in the arena of education, but for some reason they know exactly what's going on. We don't have time to indoctrinate the children in our community when our focus is on helping better their situation in life. I think it's just really important that voters take the time to really do the research on these candidates, and check to see because you know, they're just making a lot of false claims that can easily be debunked by just doing some basic research on it.”
The Operation Sunlight backed candidates also draw from organizing by Karen England the Sacramento-based executive director of the Capitol Resource Institute, which fights for “religious freedom, life, the family, and parental rights,” according to its own wording.
“You guys have a serious problem with activist teachers pushing politics in the classroom, and there’s no place for it, especially for our fifth graders,” England told Washoe County School District trustees last year. During the meeting, she suggested outfitting teachers with body cameras to ensure they weren’t practicing indoctrination.
England is also the founder and executive director of the Nevada Family Alliance, previously known for opposing drag queen story hour at Washoe County libraries. Its about page says it is “Nevada's preeminent voice for parental rights & religious freedom.” The Facebook page has been around since at least 2016. Its latest offering is a Pdf of “a parent’s guide to saving America’s public schools.”