Posted on March 22, 2021

Teachers Compile List of Parents Who Question Racial Curriculum, Plot War on Them

Luke Rosiak, Daily Wire, March 16, 2021

A group of current and former teachers and others in Loudoun County, Virginia, compiled a lengthy list of parents suspected of disagreeing with school system actions, including its teaching of controversial racial concepts — with a stated purpose in part to “infiltrate,” use “hackers” to silence parents’ communications, and “expose these people publicly.”

Members of a 624-member private Facebook group called “Anti-Racist Parents of Loudoun County” named parents and plotted fundraising and other offline work. Some used pseudonyms, but The Daily Wire has identified them as a who’s who of the affluent jurisdiction outside D.C., including school staff and elected officials.

The sheriff’s criminal investigations division is reviewing the matter — but the group’s activities might be no surprise to top law enforcement because the county’s prosecutor, narrowly elected with the help of $845,000 in cash from George Soros, appears to be a member of the Facebook group.

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The late-stage result of an experiment in saturating children’s education systems with the language of torrid oppression looks a lot like Beth Barts, a white, 50-year old former educator who was elected to the school board in 2019.

Barts has a reputation for lashing out at parents who either questioned what she calls the “equity” agenda or advocated for the reopening of schools. For her pattern of social media conduct, Barts’ colleagues censured her in a closed meeting on March 4, saying Barts failed to “welcome and encourage active cooperation of Loudoun County residents,” the Loudoun Times reported. {snip}

Barts deleted her Twitter account, but the events appeared to trigger more erratic behavior on the private Facebook group, with Barts rallying a crew who were convinced that Loudoun’s other school board members, mostly Democrats supportive of “equity” efforts, were insufficiently aggressive in pursuit of their stated racial aims.

At the same time, other parents who believed that causing young children to focus too much on race could diminish tolerance and harmony, rather than improve it, were gaining traction. Groups called the Virginia Project and Parents Against Critical Theory held a webinar called “What is CRT and its impact on Loudoun County Schools” on March 7.

“I wanted to share that I’m very concerned that the [anti-] CRT movement for lack of better word is gaining support,” Barts wrote to the “anti-racist” Facebook group March 12. She said she hoped to “call out statements and actions that undermine our stated plan to end systemic racism.”

In response, a local mother named Jen Durham began what turned into a massive thread, writing:

This is a call for volunteers to combat the anti-CRT activities of the P.A.C.T. folks, the stoplcpscrt website, and the like. Looking for folks who are interested in volunteering to organize, lead, execute, and donate regarding the following points:

  • Gather information (community mailing lists, list of folks who are in charge of the anti-CRT movement, lists of local lawmakers/folks in charge)
  • Infiltrate (create fake online profiles and join these groups to collect and communicate information, hackers who can either shut down their websites or redirect them to pro-CRT/anti-racist informational webpages)
  • Spread information (expose these people publicly, create online petitions, create counter-mailings)
  • Find a way to gather donations for these efforts. Volunteering is great, but these activities can be costly and not everyone has extra funds readily available

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“I’m losing any hope that remaining civil towards these people changes anything,” she wrote. “Avoiding these people isn’t enough to stop the spread of their evil rhetoric.”

“Anyone know any hackers?” she reiterated.

Members of the “Anti-Racist” group sprang into action, listing dozens of parents, often including where they lived, their employers, or their spouses’ names.

Durham, who posted under the name Jen Morse, works outside of education, for the American Society of Ophthalmic Administrators. But it was a former teacher, Hilary Hultman-Lee, who executed on the idea most prolifically.

“Regarding the anti-CRT movement, we’d like to compile a document of all known actors and supporters. Please comment below with legal names of these individuals, area of residence and or school board Rep known, known accounts on social media, and any other info that you feel is relevant,” wrote Hultman-Lee, who at one point taught Latin at Potomac Falls High School and who is listed as doing business with the school district as an education consultant.

They erred on the side of accusing the innocent. In response to one name Hultman-Lee added, another member asked, “Why is she on this list? I haven’t seen her support anti-CRT?”

Hultman-Lee responded, “I put a question mark next to her bc I’m curious about some of her comments re the Dr. Seuss nonsense and racial equity generally. Happy to remove if I’m off the mark.”

“No no, I wouldn’t go so far as to take her off. However, from what I’ve seen she is very carefully neutral,” the parent replied.

It was Loudoun County that first put Dr. Seuss in the news for deemphasizing him because of “strong racial undertones.” Hultman-Lee added a man whose evidence of guilt was a screenshot in which he said he had reviewed a Dr. Seuss book and “ask anyone to show me what is racist.”

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Andrea Weiskopf, a teacher at River Bend & Seneca Ridge Middle School, named a father who has criticized critical race theory. The NAACP, which Weiskopf (who is white) works closely with, previously sent an “URGENT” email to school officials alerting them that the man is married to a teacher. We “are hopeful she does not share the same ideologies as her husband. Please confirm receipt of this message,” it said, according to an email obtained by The Daily Wire.

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On Twitter, Weiskopf offers the motto, “an educator in a system of oppression is either a revolutionary or an oppressor.”

As part of the school system’s racial initiatives, Loudoun pays 93 teachers $3,820 extra a year to take on additional duties as “equity leads.” For Dr. VonEnde Coleman, that appeared to mean joining the mob against parents. “As an equity lead at one of the high schools, please let me know how I can help,” she wrote.

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A third moderator is Jamie Ann Neidig-Wheaton, a one-time George Mason University adjunct professor. “The racists have a Go Fund Me,” she said, referring to Parents Against Critical Theory (PACT). “Burn it down.” {snip}

Cortney Austin Smith, a mother in Leesburg, Virginia, listed those who had questioned government officials. “Ian Prior spoke about First Amendment concerns… Austin Levine criticized the School Board,” she wrote.

She then changed her Facebook profile picture to a graphic that said “I don’t argue with people who Harriet Tubman would have shot.” Maddox, the Town of Leesburg Diversity Commission member and group moderator, replied on the photo, “Yes!!!!!”

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A mother named Emily J. Morford wrote down the name of Ian Prior, a former Department of Justice official in the Trump administration, alongside Aliscia Andrews, a former Republican congressional candidate {snip}

Prior told The Daily Wire that he first met Morford at a Halloween party and that Morford, who is white, later texted his wife to claim that unspecified minorities were offended by his pro-police “thin blue line” flag.

“I said ‘reasonable people can have different opinions based on their life experiences and other things, and if you want to discuss my beliefs, you know where I live.’ I didn’t expect that she would use that information to target me as part of a doxxing and hacking campaign,” he said.

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Prior said he believes Durham violated a Virginia law that says “Any person who commands, entreats, or otherwise attempts to persuade another person to commit a felony other than murder, shall be guilty of a Class 6 felony” and that participants entered into a conspiracy to deprive him of his First Amendment rights.

David Gordon, director of the Virginia Project, sent screenshots to Loudoun Sheriff Mike Chapman, writing “We have been presented with evidence of open organization of criminal activity intended to infringe 1st Amendment rights.  We believe one intended target of this activity is our presentation on Critical Race Theory. Please note in particular the threat to hack websites, which from firsthand experience we know is not an idle one.”

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There is little evidence that Loudoun in the years preceding the schools’ racial focus was the site of widespread unrest of any kind. Black residents have a median income of $112,000, and the semi-rural county has precisely zero areas resembling inner cities. Blacks make up only 8% of the population, yet voters chose a black woman to chair the county board of supervisors.

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