{"id":816267,"date":"2021-09-26T09:14:08","date_gmt":"2021-09-26T13:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=816267"},"modified":"2021-09-26T09:14:11","modified_gmt":"2021-09-26T13:14:11","slug":"in-post-covid-election-democrats-claim-they-fought-to-open-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/in-post-covid-election-democrats-claim-they-fought-to-open-schools\/","title":{"rendered":"In Post-COVID Election, Democrats Claim They Fought To Open Schools"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fin-post-covid-election-democrats-claim-they-fought-to-open-schools%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=816267&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>In 2020, Americans\u2019 lives were disrupted as teachers refused to work even as parents still had to go to their jobs. How would moms and dads manage to not get fired, while watching their kids all day and serving as de facto teachers?<\/p>\n<p>In some Democrat-controlled states, politicians did not seem to care. National statistics show that whether a school district was closed for an extended period was correlated <a href=\"https:\/\/reason.com\/2020\/08\/19\/school-reopenings-linked-to-union-influence-and-politics-not-safety\/\">less<\/a> with how severe coronavirus was there, than the political power of unions. Shortly before the pandemic, Virginia state legislators expanded the power of public-sector labor groups. And few states\u2019 children missed out on more months of crucial learning than Virginians.<\/p>\n<p>It was an eye-opening experience for many parents, particularly in traditional Democratic strongholds like northern Virginia. They saw that teachers unions were a special interest no different than oil companies \u2013 one that wielded massive influence over elected lawmakers, and whose interests were not necessarily aligned with their own and those of their children.<\/p>\n<p>The school closures were a breaking point, and many parents began questioning whether they had made a big mistake by automatically voting Democrat in down-ballot elections, often based on nothing but buzzwords invoking national political issues.<\/p>\n<p>But now that one of the first post-COVID elections is at hand \u2013 Virginia has the unusual practice of holding elections for governor and the state legislature during odd-number years, and early voting opened September 17 \u2013 Democrats are attempting to erase the recent history that every parent lived, and claim that they actually were fighting to open schools.<\/p>\n<p>They typically use a phrase favored by the teachers\u2019 unions \u2013 that they wanted schools \u201copened safely,\u201d a deceptive turn of phrase meaning not opened until enough demands from the union, some of which had little to do with safety or even education, were met.<\/p>\n<p>Joshua Cole, a Democrat representing the Fredericksburg area, is running ads saying he \u201cworked to get schools back on track, opening safely.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Schuyler VanValkenburg, a former teacher now representing a swing area of Henrico County, claimed he \u201cgot to work in the House of Delegates, bringing together Democrats and Republicans to open schools safely.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Alex Askew, a Democrat representing the military town of Virginia Beach, said he \u201cstrengthened education by\u2026 Helping our schools secure funding to reopen safely.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Dan Helmer, who in 2019 unseated a nine-term Republican incumbent in Prince William and Fairfax counties, took credit for a \u201croad map to safely reopen public schools.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Republican State Leadership Committee said the campaign-season reversal amounts to \u201cgaslighting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Last school year, with no sign of liberal-controlled jurisdictions opening schools anytime soon, Republicans in the legislature drafted <a href=\"https:\/\/openstates.org\/va\/bills\/2021\/SB1303\/\">SB 1303<\/a>, which required all school districts to offer education five days a week. Of its 10 sponsors, only two were Democrats.<\/p>\n<p>Republicans wanted the bill to take effect right away, but the version that gained enough Democratic support to secure passage delayed implementation until the fall of 2021, a year and a half after schools were first shut down. None of the Democrats who took credit for \u201copening\u201d schools voted for an amendment that would have made it immediate.<\/p>\n<p>By the time of those votes in February 2021, data showed that closed schools had led to massive levels of failure and inequality in the state \u2013 all during the ten-month period between March 2020 and January 2021. Reopening schools by September 2021 meant up to another seven months of lost learning. Records obtained by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/news\/email-records-revealed-how-teachers-unions-are-fighting-to-keep-virginia-schools-shuttered\/\">National Review<\/a> showed that unions sent thousands of emails to Democratic state lawmakers about school re-opening.<\/p>\n<p>Other Democrats, such as Fairfax\u2019s Kathleen Murphy, are proudly advertising their alliance with the teachers union this election, appearing to think that traditionally Democratic voters will still fall captive to tribal appeals, such as mentions of Donald Trump, even if those have little to do with state policy in 2021 and are unlikely to have a palpable effect on families\u2019 lives the way schools do. Such a strategy seemed to work for Gavin Newsom, the California governor who survived a recall election this year.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_289600\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-289600\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-289600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/murphy-180x300.jpg\" alt width=\"180\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/dw-wp-production.imgix.net\/2021\/09\/murphy-180x300.jpg 180w, https:\/\/dw-wp-production.imgix.net\/2021\/09\/murphy-346x576.jpg 346w, https:\/\/dw-wp-production.imgix.net\/2021\/09\/murphy-768x1278.jpg 768w, https:\/\/dw-wp-production.imgix.net\/2021\/09\/murphy.jpg 915w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 180px) 100vw, 180px\" \/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-289600\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Facebook screenshot<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>But others in Virginia are moms like Saundra Davis, a lifelong Democratic voter up to and including a vote for Joe Biden in 2020. Politicians\u2019 deference to teachers unions to the point where her children were being deprived of an education spurred her to support Republican candidate for governor Glenn Youngkin. \u201cThe science said that the schools were safe but the unions didn\u2019t want to reopen in spite of the fact that kids in private schools in Virginia and public schools in other states were having in-person class,\u201d she <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fairfaxtimes.com\/articles\/fairfax_county\/longtime-democratic-voter-stars-in-campaign-video-for-youngkin\/article_ab5628e6-1c9e-11ec-a053-bb75dd9b94ec.html\">said<\/a>, according to the Fairfax Times.<\/p>\n<p>The National Education Association donated <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vpap.org\/donors\/136275-national-education-assn\/\">$400,000<\/a> to the campaign of the Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Terry McAuliffe.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Related: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/youngkin-gov-candidate-plan-indoctrination-rigor-schools-virginia\">Virginia Gov Candidate Unveils Plan To Stop Standards-Lowering, Ideology In Schools<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><i>The Daily Wire is one of America\u2019s fastest-growing conservative media companies and counter-cultural outlets for news, opinion, and entertainment. Get inside access to The Daily Wire by becoming a&nbsp;<\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\"><i>member<\/i><\/a><i>.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In 2020, Americans\u2019 lives were disrupted as teachers refused to work even as parents still had to go to their jobs. How would moms and dads manage to not get &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-816267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=816267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=816267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=816267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=816267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}