This is a question that I hope someone in Florida will answer.
On several occasions in the past year, Governor DeSantis has appointed his loyalists to fill vacancies on local school boards.
In one county, his appointees fired the district superintendent and school board attorney at their first public meeting.
Just days ago, he appointed a campaign donor to the Miami-Dade school board.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
DeSantis does whatever he wants to do because he can ! He is completely unchecked because one party RULES in Florida…there are no Democrats elected to any state offices thanks to the Governor and Legislature gerrymandering the entire state ! When one party has complete control you get DICTATOR DESANTIS !
Just providing a footnote for your accurate comment. He’s a man of his people:
https://www.politico.com/2022-election/results/florida/statewide-offices/
I don’t know all the details about all the politics associated with school boards in Florida, but I do know that DeSantis has been working to undermine local rule. In 2020 he instituted an eight year two term limit on school boards, and he also eliminated salaries for school board members. Coming from the Northeast, I had only seen mostly unpaid civic minded people that generally ran for school board. I know new members get appointed by the governor. In Broward County where there was resistance to DeSantis’ iron fist governance, he vacated some positions under claims of corruption and appointed cronies to serve in their stead. In true fascist form he seems to be able to fabricate a reason for his actions against those that disagree with him.
I also know that in neighboring Escambia County where there is a significant minority population in Pensacola, there was a large campaign funded by lots of dark money that convinced voters to change their superintendent position from an elected to an appointed position. DeSantis then appointed an ally who is converting segregated Warrington Middle School from a public school to a charter school due to “low test scores” next year. DeSantis wants to control all the levers of power in the state.
Here’s how I think it works: School board members are elected. However, the governor can fill vacancies when board members quit or are removed. Board members can be removed by the State Board of Education, which is appointed by the governor. So, the State Board removes a local board member for what is thinks of as cause, and the governor appoints someone to finish out that person’s term.
cx: for what it thinks of as cause
If ever this Nazi gets to be president the country is doomed
You are spot-on in your assessment of DICTATOR DESANTIS !!!’
DeSantis believes in the Nanny State, as long as he is the Nanny.
It’s a brilliant PR strategy. That’s why?
He gets free advertising and spreads his message.
“Big” issues and hot political topics get in the national news, the newspapers, and Sunday talk shows. And, for dedicated social media addicts.
LOCAL school district issues make LOCAL newspapers, the coffee shop talk, and waiting-for-the-kids-at-school gossip.
And, they’re all talking about schools teaching white guilt, grooming, wokeness, books to ban, and other issues he knows will get votes and donations.
The smarter Repugnicans know that the trendlines are against them. The country is becoming less white by the day, and young people, as polls show, are against the Repugnicans ON EVERY ISSUE. So, roll that out for a few years, and they become a minority party to such an extent that no amount of gerrymandering and voting restriction will keep them in office. Even Donald Trump, as dense as he is, as lacking in understanding of almost everything, has commented on this in speeches–that if things continue as they are now developing, before long, the Repugnicans will go the way of the Know Nothings.
So, they have a small window of opportunity. They must seize power now and enact massive voter restriction AND indoctrination of the young if they are to continue to exist. So, there’s an arms race going on between their attempt to change the legal framework in this country and the changing demographics and political makeup of the country. The Pugs are heartened because now they have a Trumpy Extreme Court to help them achieve their goal of remaining viable.
Two other things I want to point out: 1. The Pugs are much better organized in terms of the money spent on propaganda venues and think tanks, where thinking tanks, to cook up nonsense like The Great CRT Scare. 2. They have continual massive rallies among the members of their base. These take place every Sunday at the megachurches near you. These are the size of small European Countries. Drive by one next Sunday. Notice the thousands of cars in the lot. Better yet: go inside. Attend a service in one of these enormous auditoriums. Watch the bonding exercises. Watch the political indoctrination. These are not places where there is a division between church and state. They teach and enact theocracy. And state violence to enforce that.
Progressives in the U.S. have no institutions equivalent in political force to those intuitions. Your daughter’s yoga class? Uh, nope. Namaste.
cx: to those megachurches
Bob: I have an educator friend who started going to one of these megachurches. African-American, growing up in New Orleans, she found a very welcoming atmosphere at one of these megachurches when she moved here. Then they went political. The messages changed to vote the way I tell you or be a part of the degradation of society.
She went somewhere else.
Here’s another thing: If what the Christian Evangelicals say about ultimate matters were true, then nothing else would remotely matter in comparison to adherence to the faith and the world of the Lord. Christian nationalism is stupid, yes. It is ignorant, yes. But it is entirely consistent. It would be inconsistent to hold their religious beliefs and believe in a separation of church and state. These absolutists are just like the Taliban. There is mere earthly law, made by people, and it must take a backseat to heavenly law, made by the only being whose “vote” actually matters.
Know your enemy.
It’s important, therefore, to attack the evil or Christian nationalism at its root, which is religious superstition. Teach young people what nonsense this is. Every chance you get. Don’t “respect” this nonsense, this superstition. Out it, at every opportunity, as the nonsense that it is.
cx: the evil of Christian nationalism
And do not forget Marsden”s evaluation of the fundamentalist mindset. They apply empiricism to scripture. Using scripture as a sort of scientific set of postulates, they form their positions based on logic. Thus, in the mind of the believer, they are the intellectuals, surrounded by base ignorance. Hence all this hostile arrogance you see coming from the fundamentalists clothed as it is in love and kindness (we love all sinners; we want them to change to be saved like us). The remarkable thing is that the same political battle we are seeing in the realm of national politics went through the Southern Baptist Church in the 90s. I have a friend who grew up inside SB politics, and witnessed this, as his father was forced out of a position when the “conservatives” disrupted the denomination. They forced out “liberals” in Baptist universities. They worked to create controllable administration. Sound familiar?
It does indeed.
Years ago, I taught in a Catholic girls’ school. One of the religion teachers–a young priest–tried to get me to read the Summa Theologica. He waxed eloquent about it. “It’s so logical. If you simply accept a few premises, . . .”
LOL. Of course, from the truth of a falsehood and of its opposite–that is, from a contradiction, you can prove anything to be true by the principle of explosion.
Premises:
Trump is smart.
Trump is not smart (i.e., Trump is stupid).
Argument:
Trump is smart, or Bill Gates is The Rightful Master of the Education Universe.
Trump is not smart; he is stupid.
Therefore, Bill Gates is the Rightful Master of the Education Universe.
Any absurdity can be argued from a contradiction.
I believe that the Florida governor has always had the ability to replace school board members in the event of death, resignation, firing, etc. However, the appointments haven’t been as controversial as they’ve been under DeSantis, of course. I’m also sure that previous governors probably consulted with school districts on a slate of possible replacements too.
DeSatan is also endorsing troglodyte candidates for school boards across the state. Florida, the freedom state. Where people are free to think whatever the governor thinks and teach whatever the governor thinks. Because, Glorious Leader.