The feud between Gov. Gavin Newsom and conservative members of a southwest Riverside County school board intensified Wednesday, July 19, with news that the state will ship textbooks to Temecula and fine the school district $1.5 million.
Newsom’s announcement came the day after the Temecula Valley Unified School District board voted 3-2 to once again reject a state-approved elementary school social studies curriculum.
RELATED: Temecula school board again rejects social studies curriculum
An earlier rejection stemmed in part from concerns that the curriculum’s supplemental materials mentioned slain LGBTQ civil rights leader Harvey Milk, who was called a “pedophile” by two members of the board’s conservative majority.
Newsom, a liberal Democrat who’s made a national name for himself by attacking Republican governors and the GOP agenda, vowed to send textbooks to Temecula if the board didn’t approve the curriculum in time for the mid-August start of the new school year. The textbooks will cost $1.6 million, Newsom spokesperson Izzy Gardon said.
“The three political activists on the school board have yet again proven they are more interested in breaking the law than doing their jobs of educating students — so the state will do their job for them,” the governor said in a news release.
He added: “After we deliver the textbooks into the hands of students and their parents, the state will deliver the bill — along with a $1.5 million fine — to the school board for its decision to willfully violate the law, subvert the will of parents, and force children to use an out-of-print textbook from 17 years ago.”
In order to fine the district, the governor will have to wait to see if the legislature passes AB 1078, a bill that would impose fines on school districts for not providing students with adequate instructional materials.
The bill from Assemblymember Corey Jackson, D-Perris, passed the Assembly and is due to be heard by a Senate committee in August.
“When enacted, AB 1078 will apply immediately and retroactively,” Gardon said via email. “The governor is working with legislative partners to ensure the Temecula school board is held accountable.”
District officials could not be immediately reached for comment Wednesday afternoon.
During Tuesday’s meeting, school board President Joseph Komrosky denounced Newsom as a tyrant bent on usurping local control and promised to send the textbooks back to Sacramento if the governor shipped them.
The board’s latest vote to reject the curriculum — instead relying on a curriculum approved in 2006 that doesn’t meet state standards, per district staff — followed a five-hour meeting filled with emotional testimony from board supporters and critics.
At a May meeting, Komrosky asked “Why even mention a pedophile?” in reference to Milk, a San Francisco supervisor who was assassinated in 1978.
On Twitter, Newsom, a liberal Democrat and a former San Francisco mayor, called Komrosky’s comment “an ignorant statement from an ignorant person” on Twitter, adding “Congratulations Mr. Komrosky you have our attention.”
Komrosky later said he wasn’t referring to Milk’s sexuality, but to Milk’s intimate relationship at age 33 with a 16-year-old boy. A Milk biography chronicled the relationship but gay rights activists have said suggestions that Milk was a pedophile are defamatory.
Tuesday’s meeting focused less on Milk, but on other concerns the board’s conservative bloc — Komrosky, Danny Gonzalez and Jen Wiersma — had with the curriculum, which supporters said had been vetted by 1,300 district families and 47 teachers.
Wiersma said she was concerned the curriculum was biased toward “social issues” instead of history, while Gonzalez said there wasn’t enough parental involvement in the curriculum’s development.
Since winning seats in November with the support of a Christian conservative political action committee, the board majority has turned normally dull, sparsely attended school board meetings into culture-war battlegrounds.
The board majority’s backers, mainly Christian conservatives, say the trio are standing up for parents’ rights and shielding children from pornographic and profanity-filled material. Critics accuse them of trying to impose a Christian nationalist agenda that marginalizes people of color and LGBTQ families.
The board majority is now the target of a recall attempt.