School Board Races Rife With Rhetoric Trumpeted By Buffalo Shooter

HUDSON VALLEY, NY — Many of the extremist views evident in a manifesto attributed to the gunman who opened fire in a New York grocery store, killing ten people, are regularly being parroted by supporters of candidates in tomorrow's school board elections.

On Tuesday, voters in school districts across the Hudson Valley will decide if so-called "woke-culture" has run amok or if years of progress towards equality and inclusiveness are in danger of being rolled back as radical views on race long touted by extremists gain a foothold in local politics.

A national tragedy has put those beliefs into sharp focus.

According to NBC News, the document law enforcement officials believe was written by the 18-year-old shooting suspect cited “critical race theory,” a recent right-wing talking point that has come to generally encompass teaching about race in school, as a motivation for the deadly rampage.

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• Anti-CRT Group Congratulates Lakeland On Superintendent's Ouster
• Clarkstown Filled With Argument Over Student Slideshow
• Putnam Parents Challenge Book On Summer Reading List
• Yorktown Argues Over School District's Diversity Initiative
• Rally Held Against CRT, Transgender Policies In Loudoun
• Carmel Schools Chief Resigns, Cites Fake Twitter Account
• After Racial Slurs, Lakeland Teachers Urged To Show Support
• Cox Out As Superintendent Of Clarkstown Schools

Many of these troubling sentiments can also be found explicitly stated by school board candidates' most fervent supporters and, in a growing number of cases, by the candidates themselves.

This month, a school board candidate withdrew from the race in Carmel after years of bigoted social media posts were revealed by journalists and residents. Robert "Bobby" Palazzo, whose campaign for a seat on the Carmel Board of Education focused on preventing educators from indoctrinating students on CRT and gender topics, claimed that his racist posts he intended as humor had been taken out of context and overdramatized.

CRT is a decades-old legal and academic framework that looks at and critiques how race and racism shaped U.S. laws and institutions that remain in place today. The phrase has become a catchall for various claims about racism and race relations in the United States having nothing to do with critical race theory itself.

Palazzo is not alone in his grievances about how matters of equality and inclusion are treated in the classroom. Before his racist comments led to him withdrawing from the race, he enjoyed the support and endorsement of sitting school board member John Curzio.

In October, a group devoted to stopping diversity, equality and inclusion programming in local public schools congratulated Lakeland parents on the ouster of the district's superintendent in response to an equality and inclusiveness curriculum.

The departure of Brendan Lyons after just 14 months at the helm "affirms the efforts of the community members and parents who have been fighting for transparency to ensure that the children of Lakeland Central School District will not be indoctrinated," said Angela Barone Sculti, founder and CEO of Save Our Schools for Westchester Children.

Bitter political fights over an opposition to "critical race theory" have seen a national culture war increasingly fought in local elections. And the battle isn't limited to a single school district.

According to a recent report from The Journal News Education Reporter Gary Stern, this national culture war has landed solidly in campaigns for school board seats in the Hudson Valley.

Races with school board candidate campaigns based largely for or against a populist opposition to the teaching of equality and inclusiveness in classrooms can be found in dozens of races across the Hudson Valley, including New Rochelle, Nyack, Yorktown, Bedford, Eastchester, Clarkstown, Mahopac, Blind Brook, Carmel and Putnam Valley.

In the absence of a controversial budget proposal, school board elections don't historically motivate voters to get to the polls, but this election cycle, the ugliness on display would indicate that at the very least, political operatives have placed a much greater importance on the race and the divisive cultural issues that won't necessarily appear on the ballot on Tuesday.