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Libertarian venture capitalist funding more than 150 candidates in PA School bd Race
https://whyy.org/articles/big-money-is-pouring-into-pa-school-board-elections-proxies-in-wars-over-covid-and-culture/. . .
The force behind the money, venture capitalist Paul Martino, 47, has been emphatic about two points: his spending campaign is bipartisan, and his only official position is that schools should allow students to learn in person.
However, a review of the political action committees and candidates that received money from Martino found that nearly everyone who benefited is a Republican —many of whom reflect the GOP’s nationwide push to clap back against COVID-19 mitigation efforts and curricula that confronts America’s legacy of racism.
Throughout the pandemic, school board meetings in Pennsylvania and across the country have turned increasingly hostile, as they become proxy sites for the biggest fights on the national stage. Fierce debates over masks, vaccines, and other COVID safety measures, along with fights over curriculum decisions rooted in the racial reckoning in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder have dominated meetings. Some school board members have faced violent threats, and meetings have been abruptly halted, sometimes due to people refusing to wear masks.
“There have always been sporadic outbursts of attention and controversy” around school board decisions, Henig said, citing fights over teaching creationism versus evolution as an example. “What’s different now, I think, is that these are not so much a smattering of outbreaks in particular communities but it’s a simultaneous outbreak in multiple communities.”
The force behind the money, venture capitalist Paul Martino, 47, has been emphatic about two points: his spending campaign is bipartisan, and his only official position is that schools should allow students to learn in person.
However, a review of the political action committees and candidates that received money from Martino found that nearly everyone who benefited is a Republican —many of whom reflect the GOP’s nationwide push to clap back against COVID-19 mitigation efforts and curricula that confronts America’s legacy of racism.
Throughout the pandemic, school board meetings in Pennsylvania and across the country have turned increasingly hostile, as they become proxy sites for the biggest fights on the national stage. Fierce debates over masks, vaccines, and other COVID safety measures, along with fights over curriculum decisions rooted in the racial reckoning in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder have dominated meetings. Some school board members have faced violent threats, and meetings have been abruptly halted, sometimes due to people refusing to wear masks.
“There have always been sporadic outbursts of attention and controversy” around school board decisions, Henig said, citing fights over teaching creationism versus evolution as an example. “What’s different now, I think, is that these are not so much a smattering of outbreaks in particular communities but it’s a simultaneous outbreak in multiple communities.”
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