‘You gotta swing,’ DeSantis says after nearly half of school board endorsees lose primaries

Gov. Ron DeSantis at the St. Petersburg College Midtown Center in St Petersburg on July 24, 2024. (Photo by Mitch Perry/Florida Phoenix)

Gov. Ron DeSantis endorsed 24 candidates for school board statewide. Six won their races Tuesday, another seven progressed to runoffs in November, and 11 lost.

The governor reacted to the results Wednesday morning, calling his quest to swing school boards to the right an “uphill battle.”

“We were helpful as much as we could be, probably more so two years ago, but all these candidates work really hard. And it’s important, especially when you have an uphill battle, you gotta do it,” DeSantis said during a news conference in Sarasota.

“And you’re usually not going to win those the first time out, but what I found, just as a former baseball player, you know, you don’t swing, you’re not going to hit a home run. So, you gotta swing and you gotta be in the game,” he said.

“You shouldn’t be ceding any of these elections,” DeSantis added of his intention is to counterbalance teachers’ unions’ influence.

“This is their Super Bowl. I mean, they take the money, the dues, and they put it into electioneering. And, particularly in a nonpartisan election, they can market their candidates one way to some voters, another way to others, and that’s been going on for a long time,” the governor said.

“You’re now in a situation where someone’s celebrating on the Dems’ side that they held an area, a school board, in a blue district? I mean, usually, that would just be a fait accompli.”

Partisanship

DeSantis released his endorsements on July 19; the Florida Democratic Party released its slate on July 26.

DeSantis said those who lost Tuesday have something to build on for future election cycles.

The governor has a political action committee that will advocate against amendments on November ballots to legalize recreational marijuana and guarantee a constitutional right to abortion, which he implied may have diverted his support for his school board endorsements.

“You know, 2022, we put a lot of resources in; we weren’t in position necessarily to do that because we’ve got so much other stuff going on,” DeSantis said.

The November elections will determine whether the state continues to hold nonpartisan school board elections; Amendment 1, proposed by the Florida Legislature, would require them if it wins the support of 60% of voters.

Battling it out

Two DeSantis-backed candidates won Duval County School Board seats — Tony Ricardo and Melody Bolduc — while a third, Becky Nathanson, lost.

Bolduc won against Democratic-endorsed candidate Sarah Mannion. The other Democratic-endorsed candidate to lose was Jeremy Rogers, to Laurie Lawson-Cox — a DeSantis endorsee — in Leon County.

Of the other nine "Take Back Local" school board candidates endorsed by the Florida Democratic Party, two will face run-offs and seven won outright. Of the seven who won, five were incumbents.

The two facing runoffs are Stephanie Arguello in Seminole County and Max Tuchman in Miami-Dade. Tuchman will face Mary Blanco, a DeSantis-endorsed candidate, and Arguello will face incumbent Abby Sanchez, endorsed by the Florida Education Association.

Bryan Griffin, DeSantis' communications director, replied on X to a Politico story titled, "DeSantis takeover of Florida school boards has big setback."

"Odd headline for the morning after key DeSantis endorsements helped flip the Duval (Jax) school board to a 5-2 conservative maj... [sic] and a DeSantis endorsement won in deep blue Leon... and a DeSantis endorsement is in a runoff in Miami Dade," Griffin posted . "It's all tough races that matter now."

"There were A LOT of uphill battles in historically blue districts today, but you don’t shift the culture by only supporting winnable races," Jeremy Redfern, DeSantis' press secretary, posted to X Tuesday night. "Flipping the Duval County School Board is a win for students and parents in a historically blue county."

Evan Power, chair of Republican Party of Florida, posted to X that Duval voters had flipped "a historical liberal board red. This is what happens when you turnout every Republican possible! "

'Culture wars'

In announcing his endorsements, DeSantis said his candidates “have pledged to serve with a focus on student success, parental rights, and curriculum transparency.” He has supported efforts to remove material he and his supporters deem offensive, including books about LGBTQ people, or divisive, such as materials discussing race relations.

Of four candidates in Indian River and Hillsborough counties, DeSantis did not pick up any. His endorsees did pick up wins in Martin County with Marsha Powers and Brevard County with John Thomas, as well as Bill Ribble in Lee County.

The two who lost in Hillsborough County, Layla Collins and Myosha Powell, were up against Democratic-backed candidates Nadia Combs and Jessica Vaughn.

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Democrats took wins across the board with their Broward County endorsements for Debbi Hixon, Sarah Leonardi, and Rebecca Thompson. Thompson, won by the smallest margin, at nearly 33%; Hixon and Leonardi won by more than 40%. Thompson's win removes Torey Alston, appointed by DeSantis in 2022.

Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried, who cast her early ballot alongside Rogers last week, proclaimed during an online news briefing Wednesday that "Ron DeSantis' culture wars are over."

"What we saw last night is that Floridians across the state are tired of the divisiveness," Fried said. "They are tired of the culture wars. Ron DeSantis lost badly. He tried to flip school boards races, not because of trying to teach our children, but to try to indoctrinate them. And that ended last night. We, the people, have taken back the school boards last night, and so that is the message that we are going to continue from now until … November."

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