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08/17/2021 01:50 PMA group calling itself Republicans for Education announced a primary challenge to the Board of Education (BOE) candidates endorsed by the Republican Town Committee (RTC) in the second organized effort to offer alternatives to the controversial grassroots activists who’d otherwise be assured of winning seats on the BOE this November.
Jim O’Keefe, who spent many decades involved in Republican politics in Guilford, is spearheading the effort and is also a candidate, joining the three incumbents who were ousted at a caucus in July.
According to a press release, the five Republicans for Education candidates were “not satisfied” and expressed “total dismay” when the grassroots group, known as Truth in Education or TIE, won the caucus vote by a hefty margin. TIE candidates individually won as many as 120 votes to take over the party’s BOE slate.
“It was agreed that a primary was both necessary and in the best interest of Guilford to challenge the caucus result,” the release reads.
A town-wide vote of registered Guilford Republicans will now decide between the five TIE members and the Republicans for Education on Sept. 14.
O’Keefe is joined by incumbents Amy Sullivan, Ted Sands, and Joseph Golino, as well as William Mulligan, who served on the building committee for the high school, according to the release.
Earlier this month Independent Party put forward a group of three candidates and cross-endorsed two Democrats in another attempt to offer an alternative to TIE candidates, saying it wanted to offer voters a “moderate” option and calling the endorsed Republican slate “extreme.”
TIE, which has made the teaching of what it calls critical race theory its primary focus over the last several months, has compared equity initiatives in Guilford schools to fascist indoctrination, making often wild accusations that the district is bullying White students. The group has affiliated itself with a wider, nationwide conservative movement that has used what it calls critical race theory as a vague rallying cry to oppose inclusive race and gender curriculum or pedagogy.
After being on vacation for most of the summer, O’Keefe told the Courier that he returned and began reading local news coverage of TIE and the political upheaval.
“I think if I had known that that was coming, I probably would have come back from vacation to attend [the caucus],” he said.
While saying he wasn’t disputing the process by which TIE received the RTC endorsement—which he saw as democratic, above-board, and following all the rules—O’Keefe added he thought the caucus had been “co-opted” by the TIE people, whose “narrative was not consistent with the truth at least as I’ve been able to find it.”
“Hopefully we can put this all to bed in a few weeks,” he added.
O’Keefe, who served for more than two decades on the RTC as well as two terms on the Board of Finance, couldn’t recall a Republican primary since the early 1990s, a process in which he was also involved. He said the RTC didn’t interview candidates this election, at least not extensively, which left an opening for TIE.
The signatures required for the primary to be triggered—more than 215, according to O’Keefe—were gathered in about three days. Many people who he spoke with expressed outrage at the fact that TIE would be representing Republicans, according to O’Keefe.
“I’ve heard many people that were just outraged that this group was representing our party,” O’Keefe said. “I would take them off the cliff and say, ‘Hey, this is the democratic process, like it or not.’ If we believe in our democracy and the way it’s set up, these things happen, and if you don’t agree with it, you need to think about whether or not you want to do something differently.”
O’Keefe said he was aware of the Independent Party slate, and feared there was a good chance that Republicans could be shut out entirely from the BOE if Democrats and Independents swept the open seats.
Republicans for Education made it clear it backs district leadership and other BOE members in denying that actual Critical Race Theory is taught in the schools, calling TIE’s campaign “divisive rancor with a false narrative.”
“[Republicans for Education] is committed to continuing relationships with all stakeholders to assure our school system remains a system second to none in serving our community’s needs,” the release said.
Critical Race Theory is an advanced, post-graduate framework that was originally conceived and named by legal scholars in the late 1980s. While Superintendent of Schools Dr. Paul Freeman has said that some Guilford curriculum shares extremely broad principles with the theory, there is no evidence that Guilford is teaching Critical Race Theory to students of any grade or age.
Representatives of TIE could not immediately be reached for comment.
The Republican primary has been scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 14. It is open only to registered Guilford Republicans.