Unbiased. Straight Facts.
Big tech is recruiting influencers to pitch data centers to locals. But the grassroots pushback is proving just as viral.
Heidi Overton currently serves as a White House aide and regularly briefs the president on health-related issues.
The Florida school board that Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis all but hand-picked has lost its conservative majority after this week’s elections. The Sarasota County School Board found itself at the epicenter of fights over some of the state’s more controversial policies surrounding book bans and COVID-19 pandemic mask mandates.
Download the Straight Arrow app today to get the stories that matter free from manipulation, bias or agenda.™
Point phone camera here
Democrat-backed candidates flipped two of the board’s seats and another race is headed toward a runoff. But no matter who wins the Nov. 3 runoff election, the board — which is nonpartisan — will have a Democratic-leaning majority thanks to the two wins.
Three of the board’s sitting Republican members chose not to run for re-election earlier this year.
The two more progressive candidates vying for their seats, former teachers Megan Tennimon and Beth Mayberry, won their elections by more than 10 percentage points against Republican-backed candidates. They ran on issues like school funding, academic achievement and helping kids in under-served areas, according to WUSF.
Current school board members Tom Edwards and Liz Barker also lean progressive. With the additions of Tennimon and Mayberry, progressives will have majority control over the five-member board for at least the next two years.
“I really think at the end of the day, regardless of political affiliation, our community was just tired of the culture wars, the political theater and being the center of national attention for all the wrong reasons,” Tennimon told The Washington Post on Tuesday.
Another candidate endorsed by the local Democratic Party, Jimmy Glover, won the majority of votes in his race against two Republicans, but since none of them crossed the 50% threshold required to win, it will go to a runoff election against Republican Heidi Brandt in November.
If Glover wins, the board will be completely Democrat-backed. He would also be the first person of color to serve on the board, Sarasota County Democratic Party chair David Dean told The Washington Post.
The Sarasota school board has made national news for its stances on certain issues, like a ban on teaching students about sexual orientation and gender identity. There was also a sex scandal involving the board’s head, Moms for Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler, whose husband was also accused of sexual assault but never charged.
Ziegler also supported initiatives to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and to investigate how much undocumented students were costing the district, WUSF reports.
According to media bias experts at AllSides
Awarded a perfect reliability rating from NewsGuard
A school board that helped shape some of Florida's most contested education policies has shifted to a progressive-leaning majority, directly changing who controls curriculum, book access and district priorities for Sarasota County families.
The board that oversaw book bans and restrictions on teaching sexual orientation and gender identity will now be controlled by candidates who ran against those policies.
The newly elected members ran on school funding, academic achievement and services for under-served students, signaling a reordering of the board's stated priorities.
The outgoing board head supported cooperation with ICE and investigated undocumented students' costs to the district; the incoming majority did not campaign on continuing those initiatives.
According to media bias experts at AllSides
Awarded a perfect reliability rating from NewsGuard
According to media bias experts at AllSides.
Perfect reliability rating, according to experts at NewsGuard
Finally, unbiased news that lets you see both sides. It’s refreshing to have facts without the spin.”
This app gives me the news without pushing a political agenda, which is rare to find.”
Straight Arrow is fearlessly exposing the hard truths on the stories that matter most to you. No manipulation. No bias. No agenda. It’s harder than ever to discern fact from fiction, and mistrust of the media is at an all-time high. We exist to empower and equip you with the facts, so you can be free of the noise and anxiety of biased media.
Fear No Fact.
Get the Straight Arrow app
Start your day with fact-based news.
Learn more about our emails. Unsubscribe anytime.
Terms and Conditions
|
Privacy Notice (Updated)
|
Copyright Policy
|
Your Privacy Choices
|
Sitemap
© 2026 Straight Arrow News
Democrat-endorsed candidates win seats on Florida school board known for conservative stances – Straight Arrow
