Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin is out and about bouncing from town to town telling tales of parents and how much they matter in the realm of public education on his “Parents Matter” tour.
He’s calling these things listening sessions or community meetings or anything other than what they are – campaign support/fundraising events for local Republican candidates and his own upcoming but yet-to-be-formally-announced presidential bid. I know what I know because I, and others like me, attended/infiltrated one of these events on Monday.
After attending, here’s my informed takeaway: Parents in Virginia DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT matter to the governor and his GOP base. I now have irrefutable proof of this.
The event, held in the middle of the day on Monday and on our first day of school in Virginia Beach, was certainly scheduled to be convenient for parents, right? The dress code was business casual. Parents of school-aged children in public school settings should have a blazer handy for an informal meeting at a local recreation center in the middle of the day just to have their concerns heard.
We got there early because we wanted to get a good seat and it didn’t take long to see what was about to go down. While we waited we watched others arrive. And there they were – all the usual suspects – local Republican party frequent flyers. Elected Republican leaders. Elected Republican school board members. Republican candidate hopefuls. No elected Democrats and no Democratic candidates – except for me – a penetrator, a surprise guest, a monkey-fighting party crasher.
Ever walk into a room where you know you're not wanted (I hope you have never or will never know this feeling) and you feel the eyes upon you and the heavy disapproving energy? You know you’re not wanted because they send you every non-verbal message they can to let you know. Thank goodness the governor had Virginia Beach Police on site (wonder what that cost us) the Back the Blue crowd managed to keep their hate from traveling to their fists. But we could feel it – palpable, gross yet oddly motivational.
People, looking more like grandparents than parents are piling into the room. A stage is set up with two stools on it. Behind it are fancy, blue fabric banners boldly proclaiming, “Parents Matter.” Oh, and “Youngkin” – the banner says “Youngkin” too.
He enters the room and takes the stage with Delegate Karen Greenhalgh – maybe you’ve heard of her. She managed a local chain of “crisis pregnancy centers” that used manipulative language to prevent women from seeking abortions in Virginia. Her tools were misogyny, guilt, and The Bible. She was his co-host for this Republican rally masquerading as a community listening session on city property using city resources.
The governor began, after a group prayer, by pointing out all the Republican electeds and hopefuls and gave special reverence to our sheriff who will be retiring soon – Ken Stolle. We’ll talk about what Ken Stolle had to say at the end – it’s news you knew was coming.
Melissa Lukeson, my fellow rally crasher, documents the moment.
Youngkin says we lose five Virginians a day due to fentanyl and “reminds” everyone this is something that “doesn’t stop and ask if you are a Republican or a Democrat.” He frames it with an example of a 17-year-old boy, an athlete, who gets an injury and “borrows a Percocet from a friend” or “drops a packet in his vape” and it is laced with fentanyl and kills him. The majority older, white crowd was horrified.
I was horrified also – but mainly because I was left wondering if high school athletes and Republicans were immune to the threats of this deadly drug, would he even care?
And then pivoting to another talking point that foments his base, “One of those most difficult moments when a child might be questioning their identity in school, he said. “A parent has to be at the head of the table and certainly can never be excluded from the head of the table unless there’s a fundamental belief that there’s abuse.” This is about the Governor’s Model Policy for public schools and a provision that would force teachers to report gender non-conforming behavior to parents or guardians like tattle on the kid if they were using a name or nickname that fell outside of their gender at birth. And so what is a “fundamental belief?” It’s a belief backed by certainty. If a student says to a teacher, “Please don’t tell my parents, they’ll kick me out.. they’ll beat me, or they’ll kill me.” If the teacher isn’t certain that one of those things will happen, well then there is no fundamental belief, is there?
And my God the way these Republicans feel safe saying these covertly/overtly hateful things when they gather together is dangerous. They are not ashamed.
Here’s further proof this spectacle had zero to do with parents; he asks, “How many of you dropped kids off at school today?” A modest amount of hands go up, I’m no statistician and I also don’t have eyes in the back of my head but if there were a dozen of us out of a crowd of about 150, I’d be surprised.
Since I dropped my 17-year-old son off at his public high school that morning I put my hand up. And every opportunity I got to put it up again to ask a question, I did. Did I ever get called on as one of the small number of actual parents of school-aged kids in the room? You can bet your derriere I… DIDN’T.
Who did? A former Republican school board candidate who at least has kids in public school, a bunch of folks who don’t, and then one local activist who told me he knows he was called on simply because they didn’t want to face the wrath of not calling on him. But other than that, the governor controlled the narrative by steering this rally his way and not failing to bring up an abortion ban. He exclaimed he had gathered a consensus opinion through focus groups that the majority of Virginians would support a ban after 15 weeks. And there you have it. See, not about parents at all – instead, entirely about taking away rights from women, erasing the identities of LGBTQ+ kids, and alerting the GOP base that fentanyl kills conservatives too.
And he’s right, fentanyl doesn’t discriminate. But Republicans do. Discrimination kills, it kills LGBTQ+ kids, it kills women, it kills people of color.
But before I launch into why candidates like me who reject this extreme GOP platform need support in our races to keep Virginia safe for humans, here’s what you’ve been waiting for.
The sheriff I mentioned earlier, retiring on Oct. 1, indicated he previously told the governor not to run for president because “we needed” him in Virginia. At the end of the meeting he publically released him from that edict, essentially announcing to those in attendance that Glenn was going to go for it.
Well, I can’t go for that. No can do. None of us can. Democrats like me will not let this governor and his extremist agenda pump more power and money into the Republican party as he makes a play for POTUS but we need your help, we all do.
We are all up against this dangerous religious ideology that has no place in politics in America. Still, you can help us stick it to him by giving to Democratic House of Delegates nominees like Michael Feggans running in a competitive race against Karen Greenhalgh and like me, whose race is shaping up to be more competitive and winnable every day. Give to Victoria Luevanos who is running against long-time incumbent Senator Bill DeSteph, a darling of the energy companies and a local arms dealer. Give to Myra Payne who is facing off against Christie New Craig another forced birther in race for state senate. Give to Charlena Jones, a candidate for house running against incumbent Rob Bloxom Jr. who thinks women don’t deserve the right to choose, they just need easier ways to place their unwanted babies up for adoption.
Yes, we are up against the literal Guns, God & Babies bunch here in Coastal Virginia, but we are a qualified slate of candidates dedicated to keeping Virginia blue, abortion legal, and public education intact.
