John Nichols: Big money, bad media, secret agendas: Welcome to America's wildest school board race
School board elections are supposed to be quintessential American contests. Moms and Main Street small-business owners and retired teachers campaign by knocking on doors, writing letters to the editor and debating at elementary schools. Then friends and neighbors troop to the polls and make their choices.
That's how it still works in Madison.
But what happens when all the pathologies of national politics — over-the-top spending by wealthy elites and corporate interests, partisan consultants jetting in to shape big-lie messaging, media outlets that cover spin rather than substance — are visited on a local school board contest?
Emily Sirota is finding out.
The mom of 10-month-old Isaac, Sirota's a social worker and community organizer with a degree from the University of Denver and a history of working in the community. She's running for a seat representing southeast Denver on the city's school board in one of three school board contests that the city's voters will decide Nov. 1.
If Sirota wins, her election would in all likelihood shift control of the nonpartisan board, which is currently split 4-3 in favor of so-called "reformers," who critics describe as "the forces trying to
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