During Tuesday's recall election for the San Francisco school board, three progressive members out of seven members total were voted out, including School Board President Gabriela López, Vice President Faauuga Moliga, and Commissioner Alison Collins. All three were recalled by more than 70% of voters, as reported by The Washington Post. All seven members of the school board pre-recall were Democrats.
While some are worried this is a signal to progressives that we need to quiet down on equity and justice issues, that’s perhaps more than anything a signal that we absolutely need to keep fighting for what matters most—and not to let issues between all sides of the Democratic Party make us vulnerable to conservatives. San Francisco is a liberal city, but (clearly) not immune, so it’s also a reminder that we can’t look at elections as simple issues of red versus blue. What specific issues likely impacted this recall? Let’s check them out below.
People pushing hard for the recall election argued the board’s only priority should have been reopening schools amid the novel coronavirus pandemic. For reference, San Francisco stayed remote for public school students aduring the 2020-2021 school year and returned to in-person classroom learning in fall 2021. In contrast, private schools and public districts in the general area went either hybrid or fully in-person before then.
Supporters of the recall were (apparently) pretty furious about the board’s efforts to rename more than 40 schools in the district in the name of racial justice and honoring real history. The idea was that a number of schools had names tied to racism and slavery. Some people felt frustrated that this was a focus instead of all time being dedicated to reopening schools. (None of the school names have been changed at this time, according to CNN.)
Lowell High School was another divisive issue. Lowell is a highly competitive, elite magnet high school program with a population that’s mostly white and Asian. The board wanted to see an admission system that was based less on archaic systems of “merit” in an effort to make the academic opportunity more equitable for Black and Latinx students. The board’s switch to a lottery system did not go over well with all residents, especially those who felt they’d worked hard to achieve certain scores or grades in order to gain admission.
“San Francisco is a city that believes in the value of big ideas,” a statement from Mayor London Breed reads in part. “But those ideas must be built on the foundation of a government that does the essentials well.” Breed will select replacements who will serve the remainder of the ousted board members’ terms.
Ultimately, this situation feels like a circumstance where Democrats and progressives were fighting one another, more so than they were fighting Republicans. Unfortunately, conservatives did weigh-in, and weigh in happily, as they’ll take any opportunity to stomp on progressive movements. Many progressives feel this recall is basically a second version of the attempts to recall Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom. Plenty of folks also feel this recall was simply about money, as a regularly scheduled election is set for about nine months from now, anyway.
