I designed this document as a mobilization tool. In other words, while I hope you find it informative, what really matters is that we use the information here to act. Specifically, I hope this document can help people:

1. Support school board candidates who resist book bans and stand up for all students in their district.
2. Connect like-minded voters with each other and with groups already working in each district.
3. Tie extremist candidates to their extreme positions.

To use this document:

• Collaborate. This is a working document, and I want to add updates from people closer to the action than I am. If you know something that should be added, please email me: booklovingtexanvotes@gmail.com.
• Check back. Candidate filings were just finalized in late February, and some school districts still haven’t updated their webpages with candidate names. Some candidates still don’t have websites. Information is going to come in quickly, so check back often!
• Start with groups on the ground. One of the most important sections on each page is the “Contacts on the ground” box–these are people who either know a lot about what’s going on in a district or have already been working to prop up good candidates and challenge powerful PACs. If you want to organize in a district, start by contacting them.
• Share. The more people who see this and use it, the better.

Terminology & Designations:

Candidates highlighted in red are either members of pro-censorship groups (Moms for Liberty, local PACs) or have the support of such groups.

Candidates highlighted in orange echo pro-censorship talking points but don’t have documented links to those groups.

Candidates highlighted in green either have a record of standing up for academic freedom, diversity and inclusion or have been targeted by pro-censorship groups and thus need support. This is not necessarily an endorsement–in races with multiple candidates, there may be more than one candidate worthy of this designation.

Candidates not highlighted could be great, or awful, or somewhere in between. As I get more information on them I’ll add it in the notes and change their designations if necessary.

“Contacts on the Ground” are local resources for organizing and information. If this is you, please let me add your name/group here!

• #FReadom
• Book Ban Busters (Red Wine & Blue)
• Dr. Tasslyn Magnusson’s Book Censorship Database (EveryLibrary Institute)
• Mothers Against Greg Abbott
• TxLEADSEd
• Pastors for Texas Children 
• Texas Educators Vote
• Texans for the Right to Read
• We Make the Future
• Book Riot (includes weekly roundup of censorship news)
• Blue Action Democrats / Safe Schools for All / 2 Million Texans

Contested Races

Candidates

Position 1

Position 2

Position 3

Position 4

Tonia Jaeggi

Cleveland O. Lane, Jr. 

Todd LeCompte

George Edwards, Jr. 

Julie Hinaman (I)

Ayse Indemaio

Michelle Fennick

Leslie Martone

Justin Ray

Christine Kalmbach

Frances Ramirez Romero

Notes on Red Flag Candidate(s)

Position 1

• Todd LeCompte announced his candidacy on Facebook this April with a complaint that schools are focusing too much on “social justice ideology, instead of academics.”
• LeCompte tried to get Mike Curato’s book Flamer removed from Bridgeland High School by arguing that it’s illegal for a school library to carry the book. Notably, LeCompte argued that the book is obscene under the Texas Penal Code, meaning it’s not protected by the First Amendment.
• LeCompte attended and spoke at a meeting of book banners in Tomball this summer that was so extreme its original sponsors, the Yellow Rose of Texas Republican Women, pulled their sponsorship after previewing the featured speaker’s presentation. In that presentation, the speaker argued that libraries need to stock books that show the “negatives” of homosexuality, and shared strategies for getting “thousands” of books removed from schools.
• LeCompte’s campaign treasurer is Monica Dean, who regularly speaks at board meetings about books she finds inappropriate. In June, she berated the board, asking, “Did you bring out the best for children by stocking the library shelves with sexually explicit books so innocent children could access them? And yet they still remain on the shelves, as we speak. And online. How about allowing an afterschool club to invite a drag queen to speak? Did you bring out the best for children by exposing them to harmful material on chromebooks or tenets of CRT in lesson plans?”
• In April, Dean expressed her anger that The Handmaid’s Tale graphic novel was retained after a district committee found it “meets requirements for retention, varying levels of difficulty, and diversity of appeal.” And in April of 2022, she clutched her pearls about The Glass Castle, a book I’ve taught several times, asking, “Will Cy-Fair clean up the campus and online offerings and choose to be educators instead of groomers?”
• LeCompte has made fewer board meeting appearances than his treasurer, but he did speak at the January 2022 meeting suggesting that equity initiatives teach minorities to be victims and could lead to people being fired for the color of their skin. “Seems like lots of things being discussed in the school district is more focused on race these days, rather than performance,” he said.
• LeCompte has been endorsed by Conservative CFISD, a book-banning organization, and by Texans for Educational Freedom, an anti-public-education, pro-censorship group that has been financing candidates across the state in recent elections.

Position 2

• George Edwards, Jr. is a retired accountant with a history of voting in Republican primaries. His campaign secretary is a member of Conroe book-banning group The Force for CISD.  
• Edwards has been endorsed by the Republican Party of Texas. He has also been endorsed by Texans for Educational Freedom.

• Ayse Indemaio has made removing books from schools the centerpiece of her campaign. Her campaign website connects to her Texas Messengers website, which lists as her accomplishments that she “proved the No Place for Hate program socially shamed children, was divisive, and of questionable sources, resulting in the program being suspended” and “brought to light the blurring of biological sexes being taught in elementary lessons, educational games, books and counselor training, and got some removed.”
• Indemaio spoke at the same Tomball book-banning meeting LeCompte attended this summer, saying she was radicalized to go after books after discovering that a book her then-3rd-grader son was reading “had the word ‘racism’ in it nine times.” “I started to think maybe I shouldn’t be trusting the schools,” she said.
• In a bizarre rant at a board meeting in April of 2022, Indemaio accused incumbent Julie Hinaman of conspiring with members of Cypress Families for Public Schools (then Cy-Fair Civic Alliance) to get Flamer returned to library shelves. “I want to NOT thank a board member,” she said, “who took extra care and effort and worked and went out of her way to get the book Flamer back in our libraries after it was pulled by the Bridgeland High School administration.”
• In addition to board member Lucas Scanlon and book-banning former Conroe ISD trustee Dale Inman, Indemaio has the endorsement of Tammy Nakamura, the Grapevine-Colleyville ISD trustee who claimed last year to have a list of teachers she wanted to chase from the district for political reasons, and Andrew Yeager, one of the extremists who has reshaped the Carroll ISD board in Southlake.
• Indemaio also has the support of Conservative CFISD, a group focused on banning books from the district.

Position 3

• Podcaster and former mayor of Jersey Village Justin Ray announced his campaign with a video in which he said, “I’m running to protect Cy-Fair from the pitfalls too many school districts across this country have fallen victim to. Instead, we have to reinforce that education, individual freedom, merit, and personal responsibility are the keys to success.”
• Ray has expressed support for Katy ISD’s recently enacted anti-trans policies which, among other draconian measures, would require teachers to “out” students by informing parents if a student “requests he or she be identified as transgender, change his or her name, or use different pronouns at school.”
• Ray is claiming the endorsement of Texans for Educational Freedom, a wealthy group opposed to public education that has been pumping money into school board races across the state.

Position 4

• Christine Kalmbach’s campaign website avoids the incendiary controversies that seem to drive the campaigns of LeCompte and Indemaio, but Kalmbach has a history of public comments every bit as extreme as those two.
• She ran for the Texas House in 2022, but lost in the primary. In an illuminating campaign survey for that race, she listed her favorite book as “The Bible first, then books on learning and biographies.” She also listed her priorities as “eliminating lockdowns, CRT, Comprehensive Sex Ed, and special classes.” Also: “Parental Rights, School Choice” and abolishing property taxes. In an interview for Community Impact she echoed those themes, saying that she hoped to “Stop the alarming agenda being pushed on children— Comprehensive sex ed, CRT, SEL and gender confusion.”
• Kalmbach’s opposition to sex ed runs deep. In 2012, she argued against the district’s adoption of a sex ed curriculum that one parent called “soft porn.” “I don’t need the school district showing my student how to put a condom on,” said Kalmbach.
• Kalmbach wrote the legislature in support of HB 900, the bill that could remove thousands of books from Texas schools that was recently enjoined by a Trump-appointed judge. Kalmbach wrote: “This bill is an outstanding example of what the State can do to mitigate exposure and exploitation of students in regards to lewd, lascivious and objectionable material in our schools and their libraries. Children are being exposed to disgusting content without their parents knowledge or consent. Please everyone should support and endorse this HB900 bill by Patterson!” 
• Kalmbach is a member of book-banning group Mama Bears Rising, and has been endorsed by the True Texas Project as well as Texans for Educational Freedom.

Alternative Candidate(s)

Position 1

• Tonia Jaeggi is a realtor and CFISD graduate who has been deeply involved in the district for years, serving on the Long Range Planning Committee, Superintendent Parent Leadership Committee, and the 2019 Bond Committee and volunteering at many of the district’s schools. Jaeggi has volunteered for an astounding 5000 hours in the district, and in 2022 was named a “Hero for Children” by the State Board of Education.
• Jaeggi is endorsed by Cypress Families for Public Schools.
• Volunteer for or donate to Tonia Jaeggi.

• Cleveland O. Lane, Jr., is an Associate Professor at Prairie View A&M University with a doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction from A&M. Lane has 26 years of experience in education, and has volunteered for a number of district outreach groups.  
• Lane has been endorsed by Cy-Fair Strong Schools.
• Volunteer for or donate to Cleveland O. Lane, Jr.

Position 2

• Incumbent Julie Hinaman has served on the board since 2019, and is emphasizing her experience and competence as a sitting trustee. She also has extensive experience volunteering with and leading in CFISD, having served as chair of the CFISD Community Leadership Committee and co-chair of the CFISD Long Range Planning Committee, as well as working on several PTO and booster organizations. She’s also a parent to two CFISD graduates. 
• In three of the last four elections, Hinaman has voted in the Republican primary.
• Hinaman has been endorsed by Cypress Families for Public Schools and Cy-Fair Strong Schools.
• Volunteer for or donate to Julie Hinaman.

Position 3

• Michelle Fennick is a fourth-generation educator who holds a PhD in educational administration and has trained principals in several Houston-area school districts. In addition to teaching, she has worked as a coach, assistant principal, principal, and adjunct professor, and previously served as Director of Instruction at Campbell Middle School in CFISD.
• Volunteer for or donate to Michelle Fennick.

• Leslie Martone is president of the Cy-Fair Chamber of Commerce, and in that capacity she helped bring Lone Star College’s campus to Cy-Fair.
• Martone has consistently voted in Republican primaries. She’s a graduate of CFISD schools, and an Aggie. Her two sons graduated from CFISD schools as well.
• Martone has been endorsed by Cypress Families for Public Schools and Cy-Fair Strong Schools.
• Volunteer for or donate to Leslie Martone.

Position 4

• Frances Ramirez Romero is the mom of two CFISD graduates and has been a teacher, PTO president, and regular volunteer in the district. She has regularly spoken at board meetings. Among other topics, she has argued against vouchers and advocated for the equity plan and representative hiring. At the contentious meeting after Scott Henry’s racist comments in January of 2022, Romero said, “It is important that in a school district with a 78% non-white population, that the faculty reflect the demographics of all of our kids. Teachers, administrators, and all staff are role models and can impact student success. A component of this is students seeing a reflection of those who look like them–but also those who are different.” She concluded, “There is no reason that academic distinction and outreach to a diverse workforce have to be mutually exclusive.”
• Romero has been endorsed by Cypress Families for Public Schools and Cy-Fair Strong Schools.
• Volunteer for or donate to Frances Ramirez Romero.

Contacts on the Ground

If you’re looking for a way to help out in CFISD, these two groups are an excellent place to start:

• Cypress Families for Public Schools is a nonpartisan group dedicated to protecting the district’s public schools. In the interest of informing district voters about trustees’ positions and experience, they have hosted a candidate forum and published a useful candidate questionnaire, and they are organizing volunteers behind the slate of strong candidates.
• Donate to or volunteer for Cypress Families for Public Schools.

• Cy-Fair Strong Schools is another great nonpartisan CFISD group working hard to protect and improve CFISD schools. Make sure not to miss the PAC’s informative blog.
• Donate to or volunteer for Cy-Fair Strong Schools.

Organizing steps/upcoming events

• PLEASE CONTACT ME TO ADD–Canvasses, organizing meetings, other events!

Contested Races

Candidates

Place 1

Place 2

Jessica Wark

Rhonda Rogers Williams

Mike Moore (I)

Alejandra Muñoz 

Nancy Alana

Notes on Red Flag Candidate(s)

Place 1

• Rhonda Rogers Williams has the support of the district’s Christian Nationalist faction, including political consultant Nate Criswell. Williams is also endorsed by Monica Brown, who regularly appears at board meetings to demand book removals and who even called the police on Granbury ISD libraries after a book review committee returned books to the shelves that she thought constituted obscene material.
• Williams wrote to the legislature in March in support of book-banning bill HB 900, saying, “Please rid our schools of filthy sexually explicit books.”
• At a sort of campaign launch party in August, Williams threw red meat to the district’s extremists, saying, “Our children are our future and need our guidance. Guidance to make sure our schools promote education and not sexual materials or age inappropriate materials. I am not for any critical race theory curriculums in our schools.”

Place 2

• Alejandra Muñoz is running alongside Williams and, like Williams, has the support of Nate Criswell and Monica Brown. She also has the support of Kyle ‘KD’ Sims, a McKinney-based social media influencer in a cowboy hat who hops from district to district in North Texas demanding that school boards remove books.

Alternative Candidate(s)

Place 1

• I’ve found very little information about Jessica Wark, except that she regularly votes in Republican primaries. She was honored with a “Superfan” award in April 2023 by the district for her volunteer work with the Brawner Elementary PTO.

• Incumbent Mike Moore is a parent of two GISD students, and his wife is a district employee. Moore has been a trustee since 2017. He’s a consistent Republican primary voter.
• While Moore expressed support for Superintendent Jeremy Glenn after Glenn told librarians to remove LGBTQ books and “hide” any viewpoints other than conservative ones, he has pushed back on extremism in the district, not only voting to censure Lowery, but also sharing a Facebook post from a local teacher bemoaning the “vitriol and hate that is being constantly spewed at teachers not only in Granbury, but across Texas, and across the country.”
• Donate to or volunteer for Mike Moore (website pending).

Place 2

• Nancy Alana, who taught and worked as a principal in the district before serving as a trustee for 12 years, has a solid Republican primary voting history and is an administrator of the group United Republicans of Hood County. She is running alongside incumbent Moore–she’s using the slogan “We need Moore Alana” (witty!).
• In a sign of just how extreme things have become in Granbury, Alana told the Texas Tribune in 2022 that she “shares views similar to those of Graft and Gore on books and curriculum, but was pegged by some far-right Republican activists as too passive for their vision of a more uncompromising ‘new Granbury.’” Further, “Alana said she worried that the focus on culture-war battles over books and curriculum could distract leaders from important issues like overcrowding in the growing district.” Melanie Graft  is one of the district’s loudest anti-LGBTQ and anti-book voices; Courtney Gore, who defeated Alana in 2021, applauded the removal of hundreds of books from libraries in 2022.
• At the end of public comment during a contentious board meeting in March, Alana spoke to remind the board that their job is to make schools better for the district’s students, chided those trying to “create drama for personal attention.” Alana also pointed out that public schools work with students “from all political backgrounds.”
• Donate to or volunteer for Nancy Alana (website pending).  

Contacts on the Ground

• Former Granbury ISD trustee Chris Tackett and his wife, Mendi, have been documenting the district’s slide into Christian Nationalism for years. The two are tenacious and absolutely worth following on social media for information on GISD.
• Adrienne Martin has been courageous in speaking up for Granbury students at board meetings, and has also been a key source of information on district happenings.  

Organizing steps/upcoming events

• PLEASE CONTACT ME TO ADD–Canvasses, organizing meetings, other events!

Contested Races

Candidates

District 3

District 4

Dani Hernandez (I)

FeLiza (Fe) Bencosme

Patricia K. Allen (I)

Meg Seff

Notes on Red Flag Candidate(s)

District 3

• FeLiza (Fe) Bencosme  appeared on the Angela Box Show over the summer and expressed support for the state takeover of HISD. “There were a lot of changes that needed to be made that never would have been made with an elected board,” she said. That’s a strange and wildly anti-democratic thing for a candidate for that elected board to say. Bencosme also specifically endorsed appointed superintendent Mike Miles’ decision to fire librarians in struggling schools and turn their libraries into discipline centers. “I think it’s a good move,” she said.  
• Her interviewer, Angela Box, described parents objecting to the takeover as “for lack of a better word, ghetto-ass parents.” Not only did Bencosme not object, she agreed, saying, “I saw community leaders, respected community leaders who have time on Sunday morning talk shows yelling through a bullhorn.”
• Bencosme has published a book entitled You Are Not Your Race: Embracing Our Shared Identity in a Chaotic Age, which she says she wrote to “counter flawed racialized theories causing harm to children and the posterity of the nation.”
• Bencosme is a member of the book-banning conspiracist group (and Moms for Liberty spinoff) Families Engaged for Effective Education. She has described HISD’s sex education program as “teaching perversity,” expressed support for Katy ISD’s draconian anti-LGBTQ policies, and described HISD’s current policies as a “sexualized curriculum.”

District 4

• Meg Seff has been planning her run for the Houston ISD board since at least August of 2022, when she started looking for campaign support in the Northwest Harris County True Texas Project Facebook page. A consistent Republican primary voter, Seff has continued courting extremists, emphasizing “parental rights” as an issue that matters to her on her campaign website.
• To her credit, Seff has been critical on social media of the state takeover of HISD, specifically calling out schemes to replace school libraries with discipline centers.

Alternative Candidate(s)

District 3

• Dani Hernandez is a realtor and former bilingual teacher and school administrator with a degree in sociology from Boston University and a Masters in Education from the University of St. Thomas in Houston. She is the daughter of immigrants and a first-generation graduate of both high school and college. She says that one of her priorities as a trustee is “eliminating educational inequities and closing the achievement gap between children from different socioeconomic backgrounds.”
• Donate to or volunteer for Dani Hernandez. (website pending)

District 4

• Patricia K. Allen is a former teacher and principal with a doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Houston. She was elected to the board in 2019.
• Allen spoke out forcefully against the state takeover of the district, saying, “The board is supposed to be the voice of the people” and “as long as the district was moving forward, I think it should have been left that way.”
• Donate to or volunteer for Patricia K. Allen. (website pending)

Contacts on the Ground

• Houston Community Voices for Public Education is a group that “unites parents, educators, students, and community members of all identities to advocate for strong and equitable public schools.”
• HCVPE has been organizing resistance to the state takeover, holding “block walks for public education” as well as providing information on board meetings, district events, etc.
• Volunteer for or donate to Houston Community Voices for Public Education.

• Charles Kuffner’s website Off the Kuff  (“Texas’ longest running progressive political blog”) is a rich source of information on Houston ISD elections and Houston politics in general. In particular, do not miss his interviews of HISD candidates.

Organizing steps/upcoming events

• PLEASE CONTACT ME TO ADD–Canvasses, organizing meetings, other events!

Contested Races

Candidates

Two at-large trustees will be elected from the field of four.

Starla Sharpe

Chad Jones (I)

Cyndi Darland (I)

Melissa Ait Belaid

Notes on Red Flag Candidate(s)

At-Large Candidates

• Incumbent Cyndi Darland is the current board president, and a member of the incendiary Facebook group McKinney Talks Politics, where she regularly makes anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ comments in response to community posts.
• For example, regarding a Pride display at the McKinney public library that included the book Jacob’s New Dress, Darland wrote on Facebook, “God is going to need to apologize to Soddom [sic] and Gomorrah....”
• Darland responded to a survey question about book bans from the League of Women Voters by conflating books like The Bluest Eye, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, and Raina Telgemaier’s Drama (all of which have been restricted in Princeton ISD since 2022) with pornography: “Pornography in schools is illegal. That is not book banning. It is simply following the law. If you gave an under-aged child one of those books on the street- you would be arrested. I have had an in-depth talk with Collin County Sheriff Skinner about this topic. Penal codes are associated with these books. The Board and the Superintendent can be arrested for making pornography available to children.”
• Princeton ISD actually removed or restricted more books than any other North Texas district in 2022, and Darland is claiming that as one of her accomplishments as she runs for reelection. Announcing her reelection bid on Facebook, Darland bragged that in her first term as president, she championed “getting rid of pornographic material in our school libraries.” Again, the books she means include novels by Nobel-prize-winning author Toni Morrison.

• Chad Jones is another incumbent and the current board vice president. Jones responded with a troubling answer to the question on book bans from the League of Women Voters, saying, “I agree with banning controversial books that don’t serve a meaningful role in educating students. I think book reviews need to take place and criteria set for what material will not be acceptable. Any books that fall into that category will not be allowed in the school to begin with.”

Alternative Candidate(s)

At-Large Candidates

• Starla Sharpe was Princeton ISD’s first female trustee of color when she served on the board from 2021 to 2022. Though she is running in tandem with Chad Jones, her position on book bans is much better than his: “I support a balanced approach to book selection in schools, considering age-appropriateness and diverse viewpoints. Outright book banning should be a last resort. Instead, transparent procedures with review committees, including educators, parents, and experts, should address complaints. Goal being to create open, transparent dialogue, respecting diverse perspectives, and providing access to a wide range of literature. I think similar principles apply to content on the internet, emphasizing responsible use and education.”
• Donate to or volunteer for Starla Sharpe.

• Melissa Ait Belaid, who is running to be the “Teacher Trustee for Princeton ISD,” has worked as an educator and instructional coach for fifteen years.
• She has said that her vision for the district is “that our local schools would reflect the inclusive, multicultural education she sought for herself”
• Aid Belaid had the best answer to the League of Women Voters’ question on school book bans, stating, “I am committed to maintaining free access to books and educational materials aligned with student curiosity and developmental stage, including access to books and other educational materials that allow students to explore topics outside of prescribed curriculum. I support a formal appeal process to dispute the curriculum. Curriculum is set through the district, so choosing to remove books from curriculum would need to be up for annual review, with new consideration each year.”
• Donate to or volunteer for Melissa Ait Belaid.

Contacts on the Ground

• TBD

Organizing steps/upcoming events

• PLEASE CONTACT ME TO ADD–Canvasses, organizing meetings, other events!