Extremist legislators have been relentlessly and unjustifiably attacking libraries and librarians since out-of-state dark money groups placed them on the target list a couple of years ago. The Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF) and its faithful legislative acolytes recognized the vote-getting potential of this fake culture war issue and jumped on the bandwagon. They have been cheered on by Moon and her minions.

False claims that libraries were dishing out filth to young kids resulted in passage last year of a bill imposing a $2,500 bounty for making “available” books deemed “harmful to minors.” The bill had obvious constitutional problems, but that was beside the point. The purpose of the bill was to intimidate libraries into purging their shelves of anything that might be in any way suspect. Governor Little rightfully vetoed the bill, but libraries and librarians are being targeted again this year. The grief that librarians have faced from the continual sniping has taken its toll. The Idaho Library Association recently disclosed that more than half of Idaho librarians are thinking of leaving library work and many are moving out of state. I’m aware of a couple that just left for library jobs in Pennsylvania.

The radicals have also chased off Idaho teachers with a laundry list of trumped-up charges, including that they are grooming kids, indoctrinating them with critical race theory and exposing them to pornography. When Idaho’s 2023 Teacher of the Year was attacked, she moved to Illinois where people would appreciate her excellent work.

We have all heard of medical doctors, particularly OB-GYNs, leaving Idaho because its toughest-in-the-nation abortion laws have intimidated them out of treating women with troubled pregnancies. Thanks to Attorney General Raul Labrador, a woman cannot receive care for a dangerous pregnancy in a hospital emergency room until she is on death’s doorstep. In the words of the statute, the doctor can only act “ to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.” No wonder Idaho doctors are moving away.

Idahoans, particularly in our northern climes, will have an additional reason to hire a mover if a pending bill is enacted into law. Senate Bill 1220 would essentially gut Idaho’s domestic terror law. That law was passed in 1987 in response to the bombing of Father Bill Wassmuth’s home in Coeur d’Alene by members of the violent white supremacist Aryan Nations group. The law made it a serious felony for those who commit criminal acts that are “dangerous to human life” and intended to “intimidate or coerce” either the general public or governmental policymakers. The law announced to the world that Idaho would not put up with violent political zealots.

The sponsor of SB1220 argued that it would protect the speech rights of groups like Moms of Liberty. Pardon me, but if that group were to engage in violent acts of intimidation, like the terror bombing of a civil rights icon’s home, wouldn’t most decent Idahoans hope the state’s laws could deal with it? Besides, Moms for Liberty has its hands full nowadays, dealing with the admitted three-way sex scandal in Florida among its founder, her husband and another woman.

While these appalling political actions by IFF and the Dorothy Moon enablers have caused many decent Idahoans to move out of the state, the same actions have attracted an inward movement of like-minded extremists into the state. David Neiwert, a distinguish Idaho journalist, has written a must-read article titled “Idaho’s traditional Republicans realizing their new far-right transplant overlords are radicals” disclosing that the in-migration of radicals from other states has been happening for years. They will continue to come in droves because out-of-staters are reading the ugly headlines and taking them as a sign that Idaho has put out the welcome mat for practically every brand of political and religious fanatic. At least the moving companies are profiting.

Section 5. SECTARIAN APPROPRIATIONS PROHIBITED. Neither the legislature nor any county, city, town, township, school district, or other public corporation, shall ever make any appropriation, or pay from any public fund or moneys whatever, anything in aid of any church or sectarian or religious society, or for any sectarian or religious purpose, or to help support or sustain any school, academy, seminary, college, university or other literary or scientific institution, controlled by any church, sectarian or religious denomination whatsoever…

Some people, who simply don’t know what they are talking about, falsely claim the Blaine Amendment is a “dead letter” or that it has been overruled by the United States Supreme Court. They argue that the Amendment should be removed from the Idaho Constitution because it is just meaningless verbiage. That is patently false. The Supreme Court has decided two cases dealing with the Blaine Amendment and neither has overruled it. In the latest case, Carson v. Makin, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote: “A State need not subsidize private education. But once a State decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.” The words may seem familiar because Roberts previously stated them to be the law of the land in a case from Montana in 2020.

What the Court was saying is that if, and only if, a state establishes a program to provide taxpayer money for private schooling, it must also provide program money for religious schooling. Some politicians are trying, for the first time in Idaho history, to force Idaho taxpayers to pay for private schooling, which would then open the back door to require taxpayers pay for religious schooling. So-called “school choice” legislation is a workaround to evade and subvert Article IX, Section 5. Whether the use of public funds for private schooling is by means of a tax credit or school voucher or some other form, it is still a raid on the public treasury in subversion of the Blaine Amendment.

If the Legislature were to provide public money for private and religious education at a time it is failing to adequately fund public schools, it would invite a lawsuit for violation and subversion of the Blaine Amendment. Quite frankly, the public school system has been chronically underfunded for well over a decade. That is just on the instructional side. In 2005, an Idaho Supreme Court decision held that the Legislature was violating its constitutional mandate to provide for the construction and maintenance of public

school buildings. The Legislature has done very little since then to own up to this responsibility. If the Legislature were to carry out its duty to use state funds to build and maintain school buildings, it would lift a heavy burden from local property taxpayers.

The State is vulnerable to a school funding lawsuit, even in the unlikely event that the voters were to decide to repeal the Blaine Amendment. A poll commissioned by the Idaho Statesman in 2022 disclosed that 63% of respondents opposed using taxpayer money to help residents pay for private schools. Try to find a rural school patron who thinks it would be a good idea to divert public funds from public schools to pay for the education of city kids in private and religious schools.

House Joint Resolution 1, a proposal to repeal the Blaine Amendment, has just been presented in the Legislature. It is a recognition that the use of taxpayer money to support religious schooling would presently violate the Idaho Constitution. If the resolution is approved, the voters would decide in the November election whether to repeal the Amendment. Perhaps it is time to let Idaho voters show their strong opposition to using their tax money to subsidize private and religious schooling. Until that time, all types of school choice proposals should be placed on hold.

I had the privilege of observing Justice O’Connor in action on three occasions in the 1980s and came away mightily impressed. The first instance was in 1983, when the Supreme Court finally heard argument in a case filed in 1975 by former Idaho Attorney General Wayne Kidwell against Oregon and Washington. Kidwell rightly claimed the downstream states were endangering salmon and steelhead runs by overfishing. In 1980, the Court sent the case to trial, which resulted in a decision against Idaho. As Idaho’s AG at the 1983 hearing, I argued that enough fish should be allowed to return to Idaho to perpetuate the runs and provide Idahoans with an allocated share.

It was clear during the hearing that Justice O’Connor understood the need to protect and perpetuate the runs for the benefit of everyone. A number of her male colleagues could not seem to grasp that basic concept. When the decision came out, O’Connor wrote an outstanding opinion favoring Idaho. Unfortunately, it was a dissent that only two other Justices agreed with. It was not a total loss because the majority ruled that states which share a natural resource must “take reasonable steps to conserve and even to augment” the resource for the benefit of all. However, the majority refused to implement a conservation and allocation formula because the runs in the 5-year period selected by the trial judge were so depressed that a formula would be pointless. In other words, there were not enough fish to mess with during those 5 years, so why bother?

O’Connor argued that the use of the 5 years of depressed runs was a serious error and that it was precisely because the runs were so endangered that Idaho had made its case. Had the good old boys on the Court paid attention to her well-reasoned opinion, our wild runs of salmon and steelhead would undoubtedly be in better condition today.

The second case arose in 1980, when Legal Aid attorneys filed a suit challenging the conditions of confinement for juveniles at Idaho’s State Hospital South in Blackfoot. The suit was brought on behalf of a mentally challenged 15-year-old boy, Jeff D., who was not being provided with necessary mental health services. The State recognized it was in the wrong and eventually agreed to a settlement that was better than the judge might have granted, but which required the Legal Aid attorneys to waive any claim for attorney fees against the State. However, after settling, they renewed their attorney fee request and the case ended up before the Supreme Court in 1986. O’Connor was active and engaged during the argument, but did not write a separate opinion. She and four others joined Justice Stevens’ opinion, ruling in favor of Idaho. Even though the fee issue was fully resolved, the underlying Jeff D. case still lives on to this very day.

In my third trip to the Supreme Court, Justice O’Connor wrote a majority opinion, holding against the State. A jury had convicted Laura Lee Wright of lewd conduct with her daughters, ages 5 ½ and 2 ½. The trial judge found that the younger daughter was unable to testify to the jury, but allowed a pediatrician to testify as to what she had told him about the abuse. Wright was convicted for abusing both, but the Idaho Supreme Court overturned the conviction for abusing the younger daughter on hearsay grounds.

The State sought and was granted review by the nation’s high court. In Justice O’Connor’s 1990 opinion, she and four other members ruled the admission of the pediatrician’s testimony violated Wright’s constitutional right to confront her accuser. Had there been indicators that the testimony was particularly trustworthy, the conviction might have been upheld. Justice O’Connor wrote in a scholarly fashion, providing needed guidance in sex abuse cases involving younger victims. I did not agree with the ultimate outcome, but I respected the manner in which she handled the case.

By demonstrating great skill and dignity as a jurist, O’Connor helped to shatter the glass ceiling for women in the legal profession. I recall that my 1964 law school class at Northwestern Law School in Chicago started with 168 students, only 8 of whom were women. Now, law schools across the country have a slight majority of female students. A world of job opportunities in the legal and judicial arenas have opened up for women, thanks to the path paved by Sandra Day O’Connor. May she rest in peace.

It is instructive to consider this legislator’s view of the initiative process because it tells us much about what has happened in our Legislature since the closed GOP primary came into being in 2012. Following the defeat of the three Luna education laws by citizen referendums that year, the Legislature enacted a law in its 2013 session, making it much more difficult to get an initiative or referendum on the ballot. It was Clow’s first legislative session and he, who has often been considered a moderate, stood up for the people’s initiative rights, being one of very few Republicans who voted against the law.

Just eight years later, after Idaho voters resoundingly approved Reclaim Idaho’s initiative to expand our Medicaid program, Clow joined most of his GOP colleagues in approving a law making it virtually impossible to pass another initiative or referendum. The Idaho Supreme Court struck the law down for depriving Idahoans of their constitutional right to make laws with the initiative and use the referendum to veto legislative enactments.

In 2022, Clow opposed an initiative to increase K-12 funding by about $330 million per year. But, when the Governor called a special session to nip the initiative in the bud and raise funding slightly more than the initiative, Clow voted for that legislation. He now opposes the Open Primaries Initiative. What happened between 2013 and the present?

I would submit that the closed GOP primary, aided and abetted by the malign influence of the Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF) and its dark money allies, has created a toxic atmosphere in the Legislature, making it difficult for well-meaning legislators like Clow to do their jobs. Republicans who exercise independent judgment and fail to heed IFF’s “guidance” on culture war issues end up with low ratings on IFF’s various rating indexes. They are vilified by IFF’s gigantic propaganda media machine. They are labled as “moderates” or RINOs–Republicans in Name Only. They are primaried in the low-turnout GOP primary by IFF-approved, extreme-right candidates.

And if there is anything the Freedom Foundation hates, it is the right of Idahoans to get around an IFF-dominated Legislature by running initiatives and referendums. The IFF has made every effort to nullify that sacred right. They wield considerable influence over the laws produced by the Legislature, which they largely control, but they have much less ability to control the outcome of initiative and referendum elections.

Clow is not a puppet of the IFF, as many legislators are, but with the increasingly extreme Legislatures that have resulted since the closing of the GOP primary in 2012, he could be excused for casting a few votes in favor of IFF’s priorities. The way to free up legislators to vote reasonably and pragmatically on substantive issues–those that will improve the lives of Idahoans–is to eliminate the closed GOP primary and allow all Idaho voters to take part in selecting those who will hold important elective offices.

Clow ends his opinion implying that voters, unlike legislators, do not have the ability to carefully and responsibly make laws. In truth and fact, Idaho voters have always sparingly and responsibly exercised their initiative rights. They don’t blindly sign initiative petitions. If they have concerns about what a measure may do, they have the brains to ask questions before signing. When compared with Idaho’s recent legislative sessions, which have been so utterly dysfunctional and non-productive, Idaho’s initiative sponsors and voters have a remarkable track record.

Idahoans are enthusiastically embracing the Open Primaries Initiative and it is virtually certain to be on the 2024 general election ballot. Its approval next year will restore reasonable, responsible and responsive governing in the Gem State.

It is certainly fitting that Americans join together on Veterans Day to honor and thank those who stepped forward to serve the country. But there is so much more that individuals can do throughout the year to show their appreciation and support for our veteran population. Idaho currently has about 160,000 veterans.

Although the veteran suicide rate appears to have declined in the last several years, it is still a major tragedy. About 17 veterans die by suicide every day in the U.S., according to the Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA). The veteran suicide rate is 57.3% higher than non-veterans. DVA data shows that Idaho’s suicide rate is significantly higher than the national average.

These figures are likely a floor because a recent study suggests that veteran suicides may have been significantly undercounted. That is, deaths attributed to other causes, mainly drug overdoses, may actually have been veterans taking their own lives. The study indicates the real daily figure might be closer to 44 suicides per day.

Whatever the death rate, we can and must do better to save the lives of veterans. Individual Idahoans can help. We can all reach out to veterans we know who appear to be troubled. They should be informed of resources available to help veterans with suicide, substance abuse and mental health issues. DVA operates a Veterans Crisis Line that can assist on a confidential, 24/7 basis. Idaho has its own highly-regarded crisis line, the Idaho Crisis & Suicide Hotline.

The Idaho crisis line can always use additional financial support and people can find a donate button on its website. We should all make it known to our federal and state legislators that adequate funding is necessary for these and other veterans programs in order to keep faith with those who have served us well. Specific mention should be made to our Congressional delegation of the need for DVA to provide better opioid addiction treatment for newly transitioned veterans. A recent Inspector General report indicates that such treatment is currently inadequate.

Another area where individual Idahoans can lend a hand to veterans is with regard to foreigners who served alongside our military personnel. Foreign nationals who served in the U.S. military and individuals who worked for American forces in our recent wars have not received the path to citizenship they were promised. Those of us who served with foreigners regard this as a serious and regrettable breach of trust.

The Veterans Service Recognition Act (HR 4569) provides for the naturalization of foreign nationals who have served or are serving in the U.S. military. The Bill passed the House last year, but not the Senate. It is supported by many organizations, including the American Legion, and should be enacted into law. Idahoans should call upon our Congressional delegation for action on the bill. During several months with the Army in Okinawa in 1968, I served under Captain Dietmar W.L. Zurell, a German national serving to acquire citizenship. He was a great addition to our American family.

Idahoans can also urge our delegation and the President to speed up processing of visas for Iraqis and Afghans who put their lives at risk by helping Americans in those two wars. We have recently heard of the problems that Afghans have encountered in getting visas, but there are up to 100,000 Iraqis who are still waiting for our promises to be kept.

I spent most of my service in Vietnam living and working with South Vietnamese soldiers. We were friends. We trusted one another with our lives. They believed in America and one of my greatest regrets is that we did not lift a finger to keep them from a dreaded fate when the Communists took over their country in 1975. We should never turn our back again on those foreign friends who risked their lives for American troops.

The majority’s worst decision came in June when it voted to appoint Branden Durst as superintendent of schools. Durst was not only unqualified for the position but his main claim to fame was working for the IFF, which is dead set against public education. That fueled a recall election which resulted in the repudiation of the majority. What made this so remarkable is that WBCSD is in a very conservative area. Although he lost statewide in the 2022 GOP primary election for Idaho Superintendent of Public Instruction, Durst came out way ahead in Bonner County–6,648 votes, which was 50% more than the combined total of his two opponents. Just one year later, after WBCSD voters had gotten an up-close view of Durst, they wanted absolutely nothing to do with him.

Voters across the state should take heed as we approach election day on November 7. There will be school board and city elections in many localities. Candidates with an ideological ax to grind will be running in many of those elections and may win if voters do not inform themselves and turn out to support reasonable, pragmatic candidates.

Voters should find out the elections that will be held in their area and become informed about the candidates in the running. If candidates are endorsed by a political party, be wary of those candidates. School and city elections are nonpartisan. Political parties should butt out. The two recalled WBCSD school board members were endorsed by the local GOP. Since most county GOP committees have been taken over by extremists, the candidates they endorse will be ideologically driven. I find the Ada County GOP voter guide to be helpful in identifying those who should not get elected.

Some letter writers in the October 15 issue of the Idaho Press made noteworthy observations. Invoking the WBCSD debacle, Jim Runsvold urged the re-election of Manuel Godina, Travis Manning and Andrew Butler to the Caldwell School Board. He pointed out that one of the challengers, Nichole Trakel, is endorsed by Moms for America, a Florida dark money outfit that is dedicated to fanning the culture wars.

We probably don’t need help from Florida extremists to educate our kids.

Another writer, Tom Newton, observed that the incumbent “non-partisan” Caldwell School Board members “bring a wealth of knowledge, experience, and a positive attitude to the present board.” He questions the wisdom of voting for three partisan challengers who “collectively” push to bring a political agenda to the board. Sounds like the situation confronting WBCSD voters just prior to their low-turnout election in 2022.

Voters should be wary of school district candidates who want to bring religion into the schools, who wish to divert public money to private and parochial schools and who push culture war issues. Keeping them off of the boards in the first place is one heck of a lot cheaper and much less disruptive of school operations than trying to recall them later.

Equally important are the city elections that will soon be upon us. Again, it is critical that voters look into who is running in their locality and check out where they stand on the issues. Letter writer Sandra Haltom says that Meridian mayoral candidate Mike Hon is “not a viable choice,” pointing out that he led the failed charge to “dissolve our library district” and ended up pitting “neighbor against neighbor.” She urges the re-election of Mayor Robert Simison, who has done a fine job of governing that city.

Summing up, people need to get out to vote in these low-turnout, off-year elections. It really matters for these important governmental units that are closest to the people. Even though voters may not think they can make a difference, just look at what happened in WBCSD. The folks in that very conservative part of the state demonstrated that you can be conservative without being into crazy culture war issues. If they can throw the extremists out of WBCSD, it can be done anywhere in the Gem State. Idahoans should “West Bonner” extremist candidates across the state on November 7.

And, boy did the voters of West Bonner County School District (WBCSD) rise up and repudiate the IFF-supported trustees who took over the board in a low-turnout election in 2021. Keith Rutledge and Susan Brown, together with a third IFF-supported trustee, have had WBCSD in turmoil ever since that election. Most notably, they hired Branden Durst, an unqualified IFF henchman, as superintendent of schools. It all came to a head on August 29, when a massive voter turnout recalled those two trustees in a landslide vote exceeding 60%.

After the election, Mr. Durst hatched a desperate scheme to tie the hands of the incoming trustees and keep his job. He was taken to court for trying to overturn the will of the voters. The judge correctly saw the maneuver as an effort to subvert the law and brought it to an abrupt halt.

The alarm bells at IFF should be ringing because Idahoans have awakened to the fact that it and its followers have nothing to offer in the way of sound public policy. They thrive on creating conflict and division with non-issues. Idaho teachers are not teaching critical race theory or grooming kids or teaching a “woke” agenda, whatever that is. They are doing their level best to educate our kids, often without adequate resources. That’s just what the teachers were doing at WBCSD before Durst came on the scene.

I’ve spoken with a wide array of traditional Idaho Republicans in the last couple of years about the political trajectory of our state and they are sick at heart with the conflict and turmoil stoked by IFF and its minions. WBCSD patrons took care of addressing that very issue in their school district recall election. I am convinced by what I hear from my Republican friends that we will see much of the same reaction across the state in the 2024 elections. A number of disruptive Republicans will be defeated in the primary election by responsible Republicans. And, the people will adopt the Open Primaries Initiative (OPI) in the general election as a permanent means for ridding Idaho of IFF’s hard-edged, non-productive style of politics.

There will be a furious fight over the initiative in the coming month because IFF’s big guns, Brent Regan of Coeur d’Alene and Bryan Smith of Idaho Falls, know it will destroy the iron grip they have on the extremist branch of the Idaho Republican Party. As Mr. Smith said in Idaho Falls on August 23, “If Idaho gets ranked-choice voting, we’re finished. It’s that simple.”  The OPI will hit the IFF and its minions much like the WBCSD voters hit the IFF trustees in the recent election.

One of the reasons the extremists have not been dealt with already is that many Idahoans have had an inflated view of their numbers. They are much louder and more in your face than the majority of Idahoans. Plus, they seem to have an element of menace about them that causes sensible, conflict-averse folks to hunker down. The WBCSD election revealed that even in a conservative community, the reasonable folks greatly outnumber the conflict minded.

People across the state should take heart that they can stand up, speak out and vote the disrupters out of office, replacing them with officials who will deal with the real problems facing the state and its communities. We all owe the good folks of West Bonner a heap of thanks for showing us the way.

Several Republicans have pushed back from reprimands issued against them by party functionaries for not strictly adhering to the narrow, extremist agenda imposed by the so-called Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF). GOP Representatives, including Lori McCann, Mark Sauter, Julie Yamamoto and Matt Bundy, have been targeted for representing constituent concerns rather than IFF priorities. According to Bundy, “It’s a dangerous trend where legislators are not allowed free thought or independent thinking, where we can vote based on our own constituencies and on our own conscience.”

At the recent GOP convention in Challis, Governor Brad Little and 14 House Republicans received a “no confidence” vote for opposing legislation that would clog the courts with nuisance suits against local libraries. That overreach was accompanied by the purging of some party officials that Moon apparently thought was necessary to fulfill her view of the Republican Party as a “private club” for just her and her cohorts.

The unrest and pushback by responsible Republicans and their voters will play a large part in a groundswell of support for the OPI, particularly through the course of what promises to be a dysfunctional 2024 legislative session. The Moon branch of the GOP will provide compelling reasons for doing away with the closed primary. They won’t be able to hold back from being their own worst enemy in this fight.

And just as the Moonies are trying to portray the OPI as some sort of liberal plot, word came out of Montana that reasonable Montana Republicans were fed up with party primary elections and planning to run an initiative to open them all the way up, just like the OPI would do. Their initiative calls for an open top-four primary, which is the main feature of the OPI. With our sister state Republicans also pursuing a top-four, it will be much more difficult for Moon and the IFF to peddle the false claim that the OPI is some sort of liberal plot.

The real reason the extremists hate OPI is because, as spelled out by IFF honcho Bryan Smith, “If Idaho gets ranked-choice voting, we’re finished. It’s that simple.” It will destroy their iron grip on the GOP. It will be a big win for traditional Republicans.

On another front, Idaho’s newly-elected Attorney General has suffered a string of defeats in federal and state courts. On August 25, he and several staff members were disqualified from suing his client, the State Board of Education, for alleged violation of Idaho’s Open Meeting Law. Even rookie lawyers know it is unethical to sue your own client. He was previously disqualified from taking legal action against several top officials of the Department of Health and Welfare, also on conflict of interest grounds.

On July 31, Labrador was prohibited from suing doctors who refer patients out of state for abortion pills and services. Two weeks earlier a federal circuit court blocked the state from enforcing a ban on transgender athletes. A week earlier a federal judge prevented the state from enforcing a trans student bathroom bill. It is likely that an Idaho law criminalizing doctors for rendering gender-affirming care to minors will also be blocked.

Getting back to the OPI, Labrador clearly lost the lawsuit challenging the misleading ballot titles he conjured up to undermine the initiative. Despite his best efforts to spin the decision as a win, that spin cannot get around one simple fact–Idaho courts only award attorney fees to the winning side. Reclaim Idaho was awarded its attorney fees and a hefty fee award will soon be made against Labrador.

So, there has been an abundance of bad news for the GOP’s extremist branch. Might be a good time for some soul searching. Casting off the IFF shackles would be a healthy start.

Keith Rutledge and Susan Brown were elected to the school board in 2021 with IFF’s support. Along with a third IFF-supported trustee, they have had WBCSD in turmoil ever since. They refused to support a school levy in May that was intended to cover about a third of the district’s operating budget. That put the district in a real financial bind.

The trio then voted in June to hire an unqualified individual, IFF employee Branden Durst, as school superintendent. For inexplicable reasons, they have failed to pursue an emergency certification that might allow Durst to legally act as superintendent until he can become qualified for the position. On August 16, the State Board of Education notified Rutledge that the “board’s decision to allow an uncertified individual to serve as superintendent violates Idaho law.” The notice outlined four other board deficiencies.

WBCSD has reportedly lost 33 employees in recent months because of the board’s actions. Not to worry, though, because Durst is hiring right-wing zealots to replace some of them. They include Melissa Reilly, who appears to share the bigoted view of her white nationalist husband Dave Reilly, and Brandy Pardee, a leader with “Stop Idaho RINOs.” As far as the failed levy goes, Durst is glad it failed. The board majority seems to be fine with all of the upheaval Durst has visited upon WBCSD, which may account for the fact that school patrons were able to get a recall vote scheduled for Rutledge and Brown for August 29. It would obviously have been better if more school patrons had gotten out to vote in 2021 to keep the IFF candidates from seizing control.

School board elections are coming up soon in many school districts across the state and it is almost a certainty that the IFF or some like-minded folks will try to get disruptive candidates like Rutledge and Brown elected. How better to accomplish the goal of deconstructing public education in Idaho?

More than ever, Idahoans will need to check out the credentials of those running to control their local school board, so as to ensure that only candidates who are dedicated to making schools and kids successful are entrusted with these important positions. Some of those Idahoans can help their local schools by becoming candidates themselves.

The best way for citizens of good faith to protect our schools is to step forward to serve or urge others to do so. A candidate needs to be an elector of his or her school district and a resident of the trustee zone in question. Candidates may file, starting August 28, but must file no later than 5:00 pm on September 8. Additional information on how to file can be obtained from the clerk of their local school district board.

School elections are not the only important elections to be held on November 7. Cities and some independent districts will be holding elections and, given the desire of organizations like IFF to stack such positions with extreme-right candidates, it is important that reasonable, pragmatic candidates step forward for those positions. Also, conscientious voters must inform themselves to ensure that disruptive individuals like those who seized control of WBCSD do not obtain the reins of power.

IFF helped to get far-right candidates Keith Rutledge and Susan Brown elected to the school board in November of 2021, making a three-trustee majority that has been creating havoc ever since. The majority refused to support a $4.7 million two-year levy that was intended to cover about a third of WBCSD’s annual operating budget. Thanks to a good deal of misinformation leading up to the May 15 vote, the levy failed by just over 100 votes, putting the district in an extreme financial bind. The blame for the failure falls upon the IFF-supported majority.

Now, the board majority has voted to install an unqualified IFF employee as superintendent of WBCSD. After a three-ring circus of missteps, the majority voted on June 28 to hire Branden Durst, a problematic person to say the least, as the person in charge of running the district. Judging from his track record, he certainly is capable of running the school district into the ground. That would be in keeping with the IFF’s avowed goal of getting the government out of the business of educating our children.

The tragedy is that the interim superintendent, Susan Luckey, a 2018 Distinguished National Principal who has spent nearly four decades in the district as a teacher and principal, was readily available for the position. Many long-time residents of Priest River were greatly distressed about the hiring debacle, pointing to the IFF’s track record of fighting against adequate funding for public schools. WBCSD patron Nicole Gunning-Butler expressed fears of IFF’s, “relentless attempts to dismantle rural school districts and advance their extreme political and religious agenda.” She and her husband, who graduated from Priest River High School and served in the U.S. Navy, have two children attending schools in the district.

School district patrons are concerned about the appearance of backroom dealing by the board majority in arriving at the hiring decision. The Idaho Education News has highlighted what appear to be violations of Idaho’s Open Meeting Law by the IFF-supported board, as well as the board’s refusal to respond to public record requests.

WBCSD patrons are not taking these shenanigans lying down, however. Rather, they are showing that concerned citizens around the state can fight back against those who would subvert our public school system. Local folks got busy organizing petition drives to recall Rutledge and Brown. They turned in their petitions at the end of June with more than enough signatures to recall both of the troublesome trustees. They gathered 337 signatures to recall Rutledge, although only 243 were necessary to schedule an election. Brown received 243 recall signatures, while only 180 were needed. If the two do not voluntarily step down, an election will be held on August 29.

Durst does not have the credentials to serve as superintendent and must receive provisional certification from the Idaho Board of Education in order to act in that role.

That is where the rest of us can lend a hand in order to protect WBCSD from further disaster. Idahoans concerned about persons hostile to public schools being given important education positions should make their concerns known to members of the Idaho Board of Education, as well as Governor Brad Little. If the board majority tries to keep Durst without the certification, a patron lawsuit could send him packing.

The IFF is trying to commandeer other rural school district boards across the state. The WBCSD experience shows that IFF can fail, but it depends upon concerned citizens rising up to protect their schools.