DeSantis-backed candidates prevail in Florida school board elections

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) had a successful night in school board elections Tuesday where a majority of his endorsed candidates won, including in areas where school boards were previously run by liberal members. 

DeSantis posted a list of 30 school board candidates he endorsed before elections last night, saying the candidates were “committed to the student-first principles of the DeSantis Education Agenda.”

Out of the 30 candidates, 21 of the candidates won, four will be in runoff races and five lost. 

Among the wins, the DeSantis-backed candidates were able to flip multiple school boards that were previously liberal-leaning to conservative-leaning. 

The 1776 Project PAC, a conservative education political action committee that helped some of the school board candidates, tweeted that the Miami-Dade school board is now flipped conservative after two DeSantis-endorsed candidates, Roberto Alonso and Monica Colucci, won spots on the school board. 

“Miami Dade is now the LARGEST county in America with a conservative school board majority,” the group said. 

Sarasota County saw its school board flip from a three to two liberal majority to a four to one conservative majority. Duval County also now has a conservative-majority school board after the elections.  

“Congrats to Bridget Ziegler, Robyn Marinelli, and Timothy Enos,” the 1776 Project PAC said of the Sarasota races. 

“The Community has spoken & it is crystal clear – they are demanding a reset of the School Board. And that’s what they are going to get,” Ziegler tweeted after winning the election. 

School board elections have been a central issue in education as Republicans and Democrats have butted heads over masks in schools, critical race theory — a graduate-level legal theory that looks at American institutions, history and policy through a lens of structural racism existing within them — and what ages are appropriate to teach children about LGBTQ topics. 

Education issues have come to a head in Florida where some school boards, including in Miami-Dade, defied DeSantis when he banned mask wearing in schools last year. 

School boards in Florida also face the issue of a teacher shortage, which DeSantis is attempting to resolve by recruiting veterans into teaching roles.