Barbara Cargill, who chairs the Texas State Board of Education and is running for re-election to her District 8 seat this year, still thinks she is one of a minority of “conservatives” on a state board in which 11 of 15 members are Republicans. And she also wants voters to know that she’s working to […]
TFN
Conservative Website Dings Texas Ed Board Candidate on ‘Pilgrims Were Commies’ Nonsense
The conservative website Texas Insider calls Gail Spurlock’s bizarre history lesson about the Pilgrims its “quote of the week” “from Republicans behaving badly.” Spurlock is running in the GOP primary for the Dallas-area District 12 seat on the State Board of Education. From Texas Insider: “If one states the Pilgrims were radicals seeking a communist-socialist […]
Caving to the Demands of Religious Extremists
Their failure to dictate which candidate will be the Republican Party’s presidential nominee this year doesn’t mean that religious-right leaders and activists aren’t shaping this year’s campaign. Just this week, for example, intense pressure from religious-right groups essentially forced openly gay political strategist Richard Grenell to resign from Mitt Romney’s campaign staff. A Republican adviser […]
Texas Ed Board Candidate Doubles Down on ‘Pilgrims Were Communists’ Claim
Gail Spurlock, a Republican candidate for the District 12 seat on the Texas State Board of Education, has written a “clarification” of her contention that the Pilgrims nearly destroyed their colony and themselves because they practiced communism. In an email being circulated today by supporter Donna “Jeffrey Dahmer Believed in Evolution” Garner, Spurlock suggests that […]
Handful of Contests See the Most Money in Texas State Board of Education Races
In the 1990s, San Antonio businessman James Leininger — the religious right’s sugar daddy in Texas — poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into State Board of Education (SBOE) races. That money helped hard-right social conservatives build a multi-year campaign to take control of the board — and turned subsequent board debates over textbooks and […]
