DeSantis plots to ‘flip’ Broward School Board

Gov. Ron DeSantis loves to rattle Broward’s political cages. He’s good at it, too.

Fresh off his blowout reelection victory, he needs a new fight against an evil enemy, one he can use to fire up his base.

The obvious target is the Broward County School Board. Even better: Throw in a backup bogeyman, the Broward Teachers Union.

“The School Board races in 2024, I think, gives us an opportunity to flip some more of these boards,” DeSantis told supporters at a statewide conference in Orlando that sounded like a partisan rally.

The “Freedom Blueprint” gathering last Monday was about harnessing the momentum of the recent election, where conservative School Board candidates scored victories with his support and help from ultra-right groups like Moms for Liberty.

Pro-DeSantis candidates won in Orange, Osceola, Pasco, Hillsborough, Duval and elsewhere. The success gives conservatives fresh momentum to censor more books they don’t want other kids to read, micro-manage how teachers teach, convert our kids’ futures into a blunt partisan instrument, and cripple teacher unions.

An especially sweet victory for DeSantis would be to grab control of the Broward School Board after he failed to do so when he suspended four board members and restocked the board with short-term loyalists. The newbies steered more money to charter schools and made a failed attempt to fire Superintendent Vickie Cartwright.

“Obviously, Broward is a tougher nut to crack than many of the other counties,” DeSantis told the Orlando crowd.

Then, according to an online video of his speech, the voice of Broward School Board member Brenda Fam is heard.

A socially conservative lawyer from Davie, Fam pulled off an upset November victory to the delight of DeSantis supporters in Broward, but she did not receive his endorsement.

“You’re Broward?” DeSantis asked Fam. Obviously unaware of who she was, he asked: “Are you a parent?”

“Elected — the only Republican,” Fam said to loud cheers.

“Is there someone on the board that we can beat in 2024 in your board?” DeSantis asked Fam. “Who?”

“Actually, there’s several people you can beat,” Fam replied.

She did not name names, but said where: “Over in Fort Lauderdale, by the beach.”

“That’s red!” DeSantis said. “Yes, the beach is red! We can win that. Yeah, I think we can win that.” More applause.

The area described is in District 3, held by Sarah Leonardi, who is up for reelection in

2024. Leonardi is an English teacher who has pointedly criticized DeSantis on social media — another reason he’s likely to come after her.

It’s no longer far-fetched to imagine DeSantis gaining control of public education in Broward. This is why his reappointment of Daniel Foganholi in place of the elected Rod Velez matters. That shifts the board’s political balance more toward DeSantis.

Velez won his election and scored two legal victories, but with the District 1 seat still vacant 30 days after a scheduled swearing-in (a point Velez’s lawyers hotly dispute), DeSantis filled the South Broward seat with Foganholi, who lives in Coral Springs. Velez has a 27-year-old aggravated battery felony conviction. His right to vote was restored, but not his right to run for office.

“I think that one guy (Velez) is ineligible, and I don’t think he’s going to win his case,” DeSantis said. (Velez won his case, two days later).

But DeSantis seemed to have made up his mind: “More help is on the way in Broward,” he said in Orlando. The governor ignored Velez’s clemency petition, but he had time to issue an executive order appointing Foganholi.

“Tyrannical,” said Velez’s lawyer, Rep. Mike Gottlieb, D-Davie.

Beyond School Board politics, DeSantis and his legislative allies will target teacher unions by stopping automatic deductions of union dues from teacher paychecks, a proposal that will spark another furious battle in Tallahassee over “union-busting.”

DeSantis can’t wait for this fight. He claims members of Broward’s union tried to disrupt his debate with Charlie Crist at the Sunrise Theatre in Fort Pierce on Oct.

24.

“My opponent wheeled in people from the Broward Teachers Union,” DeSantis said. “They all had the same shirt on. They screamed the whole time.”

The crowd was rowdy and unruly, but reports from the scene described noisy partisans for and against both candidates. Outside the theater were pro-Crist and pro-DeSantis camps. Competing chants of “Abortion is murder” and “My body, my choice” can be heard online.

BTU President Anna Fusco was there, and says DeSantis is wrong.

“Only I and a friend from Broward went to the debate, and that’s a fact,” Fusco said in an email. “I didn’t scream or heckle and the shirts everyone wore were pink Charlie shirts from the campaign.”

She said DeSantis’ agenda to control public schools under the guise of parental rights is “deplorable.”

It also seems more plausible than ever.