Bethany Mandel, the controversial right-wing pundit, home-schooling advocate, and prolific social media poster, is running for county school board — as a Democrat.
Though the school board race in deep-blue Montgomery County, Maryland, is technically nonpartisan, Mandel’s campaign published a graphic on Tuesday listing her as a Democrat. The move quickly raised eyebrows online, and prompted a community note on X (formerly Twitter) stating, “Bethany Mandel has identified as a Republican numerous times on her personal Twitter account.”
…
Those who know Mandel recognize her for writing molten-hot takes and far-right political commentary. The most infamous was a column, published in the wake of the violent white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, titled “We Need to Start Befriending Neo Nazis.” (Mandel is Jewish.) Her content can be cringey, like her column defending Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ wife: “If Casey DeSantis is a Karen, she’s our Karen.” She’s posted dehumanizing rhetoric, too. “Not nuking these fucking animals is the only restraint I expect and that’s only because the cloud would hurt Israelis,” she’s written about Palestinians.
Classic gop fraud
I can’t count the number of times a Democratic candidate has tried this shit in a deep red district. As soon as I hear about it happening, then… y’know… one time.
Didn’t Kyrsten Sinema basically do this?
Yes, basically. But she did hold office as a dem for a term before she flipped. Though she was basically Joe Manchin in horn-rims and a skirt, at best.
No thank you.
This needs to not be legal.
As a condition of running for a nonpartisan office I think you should be forbidden to claim association with any political party.
Which party a school board member was a part of was incredibly impactful during the pandemic and directly influenced what actions were taken to protect the students. ‘non partisan’ is a myth in this day and age.
People should not be required to pick between teams and should instead be able to choose their opinion on individual issues. Parties just remove middle ground and force voters to cluster together. What if you were against an issue that your party championed? Doesn’t matter, you either need to get on board or change teams.
Killing the political party seems like it would be in the people’s best interest.
For lots of local offices, there can almost no information about the candidates…but I’ve found that if you take 5 mintes to search facebook, the extremists are pretty good about outing themselves…especially if you take the time to learn a few dog whistles.
Attention seeker seeks attention.
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"We Need to Start Befriending Neo Nazis.” (Mandel is Jewish.)
“Not nuking these fucking animals is the only restraint I expect and that’s only because the cloud would hurt Israelis,” she’s written about Palestinians.
Oh hey, looks like you already started making those friends. What a worthless cunt.
I wonder if she figured out what “woke” is yet?
Conservatism is the opposite of whatever liberals stand for, updated daily.
“Playing along with delusions isn’t a kindness to those suffering from other psychological conditions.”
Yet, you worship Donald Trump. Curious!
School boards have political parties?
Homey this is America in the 21st century. Hamburgers have political parties.
My previous favorite hamburger is 2 faced. In my state they have no mask restrictions, in other states they operate in they prohibit masks under any condition. Now I spend a bit (4x as much as I used to spend, 2x as much as current prices) more at a local place, and my burger looks like one you’d see in an advertisement, every time.
Name and shame.
I’m surprised, disappointed, that it was swept under the rug that well, but I guess “food company commits to spreading the next virus as much as possible” is a relatively mild headline in the modern day.
https://www.foxla.com/news/in-n-out-burger-employees-mask-ban “The policy further states this will help “balance two things that In-N-Out is known for – exceptional customer service and unmatched standards for health, safety, and quality.””
“We are introducing new mask guidelines that emphasizes the importance of customer service and the ability to show our associates’ smiles and other facial features while considering the health and well-being of all individuals,”
Hamburgers, probably. Chicken sandwiches we know do
I’d vote for anyone running on the buffalo or Nashville hot platforms.
Sorry, all the candidates are running on the Chick Fil A platform
It’s literally in the summary
Yes I read that, I was expressing shock at the concept itself. Sorry for any confusion
I didn’t mean to be curt either. My reply could easily be seen as dickish, so my apologies. But yes in the USA school board elections are ‘non-partisan’, but any keen observer can glean the partisan leaning of a candidate. It looks as if in this case one must be even keener than usual.
As a gently raised Canadian I too was very confused.
But then the whole “registered party member”, primary voting thing doesn’t really exist here either. Like parties have internal democratically held meetings to figure out their best candidates… But I could technically go to and participate in every party meeting if I wanted to figure out their schedule. People just can’t run for office for multiple parties in an election.
Personally I find it a little fucked up that you register your intentions and essentially choose your political circular mail during the initial voting process in the first place. It would not be out of character from this outsider’s perspective if school boards in the US were a partisan affair because there’s already more infrastructure to create a distinct two party supremacy down there then we of the north are used to.
Just explaining our electoral system to my American friends usually has them very jealous at the general lack of extra steps. Complaining that we still have very much have proportional representation issues to address on the Canadian side usually falls on deaf ears.
As somebody whose dad was involved in getting 2 schools built while I was in school and was also president of the schoolboard for a time before that, I can confidently say that anybody who runs for a schoolboard position is doing so because they have an agenda.
Oftentimes, that agenda is “I want our schools to be better for our kids,” but not always. Sometimes, people run because they have differing opinions on what making schools better means, but sometimes (and rather often right now, it seems) you get somebody whose only goal is to burn it to the ground. Those are the kinds of people who care about political parties in schoolboards - because they’re so obsessed with the us vs. them of their politics that it shapes the rest of their lives.
Local politics can be a cutthroat and dirty game. I’ll always remember my dad telling me about how he was walking out of a town meeting one time when he saw an old lady point to him and loudly say to her friends, “That’s him! That’s the enemy!”
They do where I live, yes. I know they don’t everywhere though.
Run as a Dem and win: LLUL DEMZ ZO ZTUPID
Run as a Dem and lose: WAAAAHHHH CENZURSHIP CANZEL CULTURE
Calling it.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Bethany Mandel, the controversial right-wing pundit, home-schooling advocate, and prolific social media poster, is running for county school board — as a Democrat.
Though the school board race in deep-blue Montgomery County, Maryland, is technically nonpartisan, Mandel’s campaign published a graphic on Tuesday listing her as a Democrat.
The most infamous was a column, published in the wake of the violent white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, titled “We Need to Start Befriending Neo Nazis.” (Mandel is Jewish.)
Mandel’s campaign is part of a broader push by conservative culture warriors to take over school boards and decide what children can be taught.
Oklahoma’s Republican superintendent of public schools recently appointed the woman who runs Libs of TikTok, the anti-LGBTQ meme account, to a state library advisory committee.
In a column defending her refusal to use trans people’s chosen names and pronouns, she wrote: “Playing along with delusions isn’t a kindness to those suffering from other psychological conditions.”
The original article contains 1,226 words, the summary contains 156 words. Saved 87%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Can’t tell if shes 35 or 53
“If not me, then who?” An opposing candidate, that’s who, even if that opposing candidate is my cat, you flaming sack of kookery.
Is that what he looks like? Oh yuck! No wonder she’s such a bitter hag
I’ve registered as republican a long time ago to vote in their primaries so just in case the republican nomination won the general election, it was at least someone I could somewhat tolerate until the next election. People do do this.
There’s a difference between changing registration to vote in a primary and changing party label to run for an actual seat.
Did you run for political office as a Republican at any point?
Shes lying about her party affliction in an attempt to win an election. These are wildly different things.
her party affliction
The best typo.
