Ballotpedia tracked 96 school districts across 16 states that held elections on Nov. 2 where candidates took a stance on race in education, coronavirus responses, or sex and gender in schools. There were 310 seats up for election, all but seven of which have been called.
In each of these races, once we knew the winner, we began to research whether he or she incorporated a stance opposing any of the identified issues listed above. As a shorthand, we have developed three categories in which a winner might fall: anti-CRT, not anti-CRT, and unclear.
Today we are looking at these results through the lens of which way their counties voted in the 2020 presidential election. Note that county and school board boundaries do not perfectly align. A county might contain multiple school districts. As a result, in this analysis, voters in a school district might represent only a portion of all the voters in the county in which it is located.
Of the 96 school districts we tracked, 65 are located in counties that Joe Biden (D) won in 2020 and 31 are located in counties won by Donald Trump (R). Overall, there were 60 counties with an identified school district.
Of the 65 school districts located in Biden counties, 26 (40%) elected at least one anti-CRT candidate on Nov. 2 compared to 18 of the 31 (58%) located in Trump counties.
A further breakdown shows that, in districts located in Biden counties, 50 anti-CRT candidates won (23%) versus 139 not anti-CRT candidates (65%). In districts located in Trump counties, 39 anti-CRT candidates won (44%) versus 30 not anti-CRT candidates (34%).
