Conservative PACs are throwing millions behind Republican school board candidates

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Conservative political PACs are spending millions of dollars to help elect Republican candidates to school boards across the country this election cycle.

While school board elections have traditionally been of low interest, both to voters and donors, focus on the boards has exploded in recent years thanks to the parental rights movement. The primary PAC pushing to reform boards nationwide is the 1776 Project PAC, which is spending millions to campaign for dozens of candidates.

“Places we’re not supposed to typically win, we’ve won in,” the group’s founder, Ryan Girdusky, told the Associated Press. “I think we can do it again.”

Other conservative organizations that have traditionally focused on bigger government roles are shifting their sites as well. The American Principles Project has seen its donations surge since it bolstered the campaigns of four school board candidates in Polk County, Florida.

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“We lean heavily into retaking federal power,” APP president Terry Schilling told the Associated Press. “But if you don’t also take over the local school boards, you’re not going to have local allies there to actually reverse the policies that these guys have been implementing.”

School curriculums and policies became a hot topic for many conservative politicians after Republican Glenn Youngkin capitalized on the issue to take governor’s office in Virginia.

Parents in Virginia were outraged at their schools’ handling of sexual misconduct cases involving transgender students and also decried the teaching of Critical Race Theory, among other things.

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a parental rights in education bill earlier this year, banning the discussion of gender or sexual identity in classrooms in third grade or under.

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DeSantis also took the unprecedented step of endorsing a suite of school board candidates across his state, even while withholding his endorsement from many Republicans running to represent Florida in Congress.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.