The Washington Post - USA (2022-05-23)

MONDAY, MAY 23 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

Politics & the Nation

BY LAURA MECKLER

An investigation commis-
sioned by the National School
Boards Association concluded
that the group was in close touch
with the Biden administration in
the weeks before it asked Presi-
dent Biden for federal law en-
forcement to counter “domestic
terrorism” at school board meet-
ings.
After receiving the NSBA let-
ter, Biden himself called the pres-
ident of the NSBA board to thank
her, a fact she declined to discuss
publicly at the time because she
did not want to further the per-
ception that the group was “in
cahoots” with the White House,
the report found.
The independent report re-
leased Friday afternoon found
the group was not acting at the
White House’s behest. But it was
consulting with, and pressing,
the administration to act on what
its executive director considered
a serious threat to local school
board members from activists
who showed up angry and some-
times vocally confrontational at
meetings.
The letter prompted an enor-
mous backlash among Republi-
cans, conservative parent groups
and members of the NSBA itself.
In the aftermath of the contro-
versy, nearly half of the state
school board associations left the
group or said they planned to.
In response, the NSBA has
approved policies emphasizing
its support for “local control” and
its commitment to “parent en-
gagement,” the core tenets of
conservative education politics
today. The group emphasized
that it is nonpartisan.
The NSBA letter, sent in Sep-
tember, came at a time when
parents and other conservative

activists were crowding school

board meetings, often screaming

and disrupting the proceedings

or sometimes acting violently or

threatening to do so. They were

angry about pandemic-related

restrictions such as mandatory

masks and about how schools

were teaching and talking about

race.

“A s these acts of malice, vio-

lence, and threats against public

school officials have increased,

the classification of these hei-

nous actions could be the equiva-

lent to a form of domestic terror-

ism and hate crimes,” the letter

said.

The Biden administration re-

sponded almost immediately. At-

torney General Merrick Garland

directed the FBI to work with

U.S. attorneys across the country

to meet with federal, state and

local leaders to discuss the

threats.

The letter did not use the term

“parents,” but because school

board activists are typically par-

ents, critics believed that con-

servative parents were being

called terrorists. Protests came

from Republicans in Congress,

the NSBA board and activist

groups, who charged that the

NSBA was taking sides against

conservatives in a highly politi-

cized environment.

If the school board associa-

tion’s goal was to tamp down

conservative parent protests, it

had the exact opposite effect. It

shifted the focus away from some

frightening threats and decidedly

aggressive behavior — in Lou-

doun County, Va., for instance, a

school board member endured

months of abusive, profane and

threatening emails, Facebook

messages and phone calls — to a

defiant defense of free speech

and local control.

A few weeks after the letter

was sent, as complaints piled up,

the NSBA apologized, saying

“there was no justification for

some of the language included.”

On Friday, the group went fur-

ther, denouncing the letter alto-

gether.

“The letter directly contradicts

our core commitments to parent

engagement, local control and

nonpartisanship,” said a state-

ment from John Heim, who was

installed as executive director

after the controversy. “The senti-

ments shared in the letter do not

represent the views or position of

the NSBA. The NSBA does not

seek or advocate for federal law

enforcement intervention at lo-

cal school board meetings.”

The NSBA published the 57-

page report and 551 pages of

documents that support it. The

NSBA is hoping that the report

along with its new policies will

persuade state associations to

return to the group. As of Friday,

eight states had left the group

with an additional 14 saying they

plan to, the NSBA said.

Already, 22 states have created

a new association, called the

Consortium of State School

Boards Association. Rick Lewis,

executive director of the Ohio

School Boards Association, said

Saturday that Ohio has no inter-

est in rejoining the NSBA, even

given the new policies. “This

[new] group’s moving along,” he

said.

The investigation, conducted

by the law firm Michael Best &

Friedrich, put the blame for the

letter almost entirely on former

executive director Chip Slaven,

who was fired as the controversy

mounted. He shared the letter

with the association’s four offi-

cers before sending it but not

with the entire board of direc-

tors, as some later said he should

have. (The report noted that

there was no precedent or policy

that required Slaven to share

communications with the board

before sending them.)

In a statement, Slaven said

there was nothing wrong with his

original letter.

“The attack on public schools

is very real, as evidenced by the

many false attacks on NSBA’s

letter,” Slaven said. “The organi-

zation owes no one an apology

for standing up against violence

and threats. I am saddened to see

that the current leadership of

NSBA appears to be afraid to

stand up for local school board

members and the students who

attend public schools.”

The report found that Slaven

had toned the letter down from

the rhetoric of an early version

drafted in part by staff. For

instance, he removed a sugges-

tion that the Army National

Guard and its Military Police be

deployed to certain school dis-

tricts.

The original letter was co-

signed by Slaven and Viola M.

Garcia, a member of a school

board in Te xas. Soon after Garcia

received the call from Biden, she

was appointed to the National

Assessment Governing Board.

Some have suggested that the

White House wanted the NSBA

letter to justify its own desire to

crack down on conservatives at

school board meetings and that it

rewarded Garcia for sending it

with the appointment. The re-

port found no evidence of that.

Nicole Neily, president of the

conservative group Parents De-

fending Education, helped mobi-

lize opposition to the original

letter. She said Friday that the

report confirms her early allega-

tions that the White House and

the NSBA were working together

behind the scenes. Her group’s

open records requests provided

evidence of the behind-the-

scenes communications and fu-

eled the controversy.

“Thanks to today’s report, we

now know that these concerns

were well-founded,” she said.

“Trust between families and the

education establishment has

frayed over the past two years,

and incidents like this are one of

the many reasons why.”

School board group says i t wrongly took sides on p rotests

ERIC LEE FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

A rally h osted by Matt Walsh, a conservative talk show host, is held outside the Loudoun County

School Board Building in Broadlands, Va., last year.

Review finds contact

with White House before

request for federal action

“As these acts of malice,

violence, and threats

against public school

officials have increased,

the classification of

these heinous actions

could be the equivalent

to a form of domestic

terrorism and hate

crimes.”

NSBA, in a letter to President Biden

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