CA Republicans are Running on Education: Why Republicans Nationwide Should Follow Their Lead in the Midterms
Op-Ed | By Sierra Knoch | September 9, 2025
This year the CAGOP convention was full of energy and hopeful candidates. The big topics were the governor’s race and of course stopping Gavin Newsom’s prop 50 power grab. But I spoke to several candidates up and down the ballot this weekend and an interesting trend emerged that Republicans in blue states across the nation should take note of. After Trump’s executive order to dismantle the Dept. of Education, the process of returning the power of education back to the states is already well underway. This means that in blue states, the education failures families are experiencing are now squarely on the Democrats shoulders. Republicans in California are capitalizing on this and reaching out to independent voters and even democrat working class voters on the issues families are experiencing in the public school system. This is what the voters want. People are unhappy with the low performance in K-12 schools and the lack of ideological diversity in the universities. They are unhappy being subjected to a very limited view with no transparency for taxpayers and parents on where the money is being spent.
According to Candidate for Governor of CA Steve Hilton, “Nearly 70% of Black students and 64% of Latino students do not meet basic standards in reading in California. California spends more than $22,000 per student each year, among the highest in the nation, yet outcomes continue to decline. This is not a funding problem. It is a leadership and accountability problem. Politicians backed by teachers unions have removed phonics-based reading instruction, abandoned Algebra in middle school, stripped away consequences for failure, and added ideological curricula that crowd out basic skills.”
The data is clear. Democrat policies are actually harming their own voters the most as inner city schools continue to decline and minority students fall behind. David Pan, a Republican congressional candidate from the battleground cities of Anaheim and Santa Ana in California has a simple solution. He says, “One of the big things I have been focusing on is education. School choice is a really popular topic with the voters in this area. It’s 65% Hispanic, 13% Vietnamese, working class people. They really value education. Unfortunately, with the way that the teachers’ unions have controlled public education a lot of the schools are really not performing so well so the idea of school choice is really popular with people. Charter schools and school vouchers I’ve found that these are really important issues. The democrats have had a lock on these areas…but we’re getting the message out to people and they’re responding. This is really what it’ll take is walking the streets and talking to people just explaining the types of values that we have the types of ideas that we have that are really very practical and common sense.”
School choice is of utmost importance to these communities because they are not happy with the public schools. These are people who often do not have alternative options for their kids, but they are fed up with kids who come home from school not knowing how to read or do math.
Fixing education is also a winning issue among education workers — a group of potential Republican voters who could be persuaded with the right outreach. Candidates like Sonja Shaw, current President of her local school board, who models a successful example in her school district of banning woke ideology in the classroom without micromanaging teachers will actually win over those who work in education. The reason is because woke ideology and corruption in democrat run education systems has led to teacher burnout and pay cuts for those in the classroom, all while they watch state education dept. bureaucrats and woke outside groups get rich off dollars that come straight out of their paychecks. These are special interest groups that have no business affecting our kids education standards but they are funded by the teachers’ unions.
Sonja Shaw who is running for CA State Superintendent said, “It’s [The education industry] is an average of $119-$130 billion dollar industry in CA and the sad part is 47% of our kids cannot read, write, or do math at grade level…That’s our biggest challenge is the money going towards special interests and unions to do activist work instead of actually the real work in the classroom to allow the teachers to do the job that they’re supposed to.”
In her district they have tried to clear radical ideologies out of the classroom and are seeing the results. Test scores are increasing. Kids are getting opportunities for their future so they can actually become productive and successful members of society. But across California kids are still suffering. Shaw clearly explained the reasons why saying, “We’re gonna break apart the partnerships in crime they have up there [Sacramento] filtering all the money to all these kinds of special trainings and ideologies that are being pushed in the classroom…you’re not gonna take the money you’re not gonna be able to ruin our kids future”.
She also talked about how she’s partnered with teachers along the way to protect kids in schools. Shaw said, “We are not partnering with third party and special interests that are hurting and ruining our children’s future, we make sure that our experts are able to do their job. What we did in our own district is ensure that our teachers, our admin, are able to do their job…Our good teachers are under a lot of pressure. Their union is doing a horrible job at getting them [teachers] a seat at the table. What we’re doing locally, that’s partnering with our teachers. Our good teachers are coming to board members like myself throughout California because they know we have their best interests in mind…I think it’s just building that partnership and that relationship. We did it in our community and we continue to do that.”
Teachers unions who have abandoned teachers across the nation to push an agenda have angered union members who pay dues and see their money going towards protests and backroom deals while their own job is made harder by ideological crusades that cause chaos in classrooms. There are only a small number of teachers who want to push radical ideologies in the classrooms yet they are ruining it for everyone. Shaw said on partnering with teachers, “We draw the line, though, and we say very clearly, if you’re one to be pushing any kind of ideology in the classroom, we don’t want a partnership with that. We’re not going to try to make deals behind the scenes with that. Look, we want to give you whatever is needed for the classroom and obviously for you to be able to provide for your family…Let’s have these conversations. Let’s see what you guys need and let’s push it forward. One thing I do want to mention, like when it comes to education, there are so many great things that we could be doing at a state level and funding
it, that help the teachers in the classroom and simplify what the pressures are to be able to help them streamline everything in the classroom. I just want to give the teachers every opportunity to be able to have the tools to get our kids good opportunities for their future.”
In Democrat-run school systems across the nation we see the most basic needs for things like safety, and properly working technological equipment being abandoned yet they find money to enrich their business partners, spouses, and relatives via the trainings and ideological agendas that Shaw referenced. This leaves students, parents, and education workers frustrated.
But this is bigger than just one school board or even one state like California. And parents across the nation will vote to protect their kids if they are given the right candidates. Shaw said, “It’s to push an agenda and we all know where it’s going. It’s to destroy and break up families to ultimately take control of the children…Our kids are looking at us and counting on us to provide them a pathway for the future. Do not give up on them. Yes it is hard but it’s worth it, this is California and we all know to the rest of the nation whatever happens in California there goes the nation…if we don’t stop it we’re just the guinea pigs of what’s coming to the rest of everybody else.”
