Teachers unions in the Orange Unified School District push to recall newly elected board members Rick Ledesma and Madison Miner who have been outspoken advocates for pro-parent rights in schools.
Teachers unions in the Orange Unified School District are attempting to recall two newly elected board members Rick Ledesma and Madison Miner, both of whom have been outspoken advocates for pro-parent rights.
Ledesma and Miner both received their titles in late 2022 after being voted into their positions by the community. However, following the ousting of Superintendent Gunn Marie Hansen in January 2023 a group rallied behind a recall in retaliation to the incident, according to Ed Source.
Since the drop of Hansen, the school district pushed for the recall decision, making their move official on Dec. 5, 2023 through a notice of election in order to determine whether or not Miner and Ledesema will be recalled this year.
Both board members have since slammed the recall against them, stating that the reason for the push to oust the two members is due to their pro-parent stance. In a recent joint opinion piece for The Orange County Register, the elected members called out the unions for attempting to “know more about what is best for children than their own parents,” emphasizing that they have been “defending parents’ rights” since being elected.
“The audacious view that bureaucrats, powerful unions, and failed politicians know more about what is best for children than their own parents is pervasive in today’s discourse. It is also the underlying reason the Orange Unified School District (“OUSD”) recall was initiated against us,” Miner and Ledesma wrote.
“When we won our elections to the OUSD Board less than two years ago, we did so on the promise of defending parents’ rights, fighting for curriculum transparency, working to improve test scores, prioritizing student safety, and ensuring education is not replaced with indoctrination.”
Ledesma and Miner additionally addressed claims about their proposals stating that they passed a “parents’ bill of rights” in order to “increase curriculum transparency” and have “fought to prevent the sexualization of children in schools,” according to their op-ed.
“While this should in no way be controversial, we have also fought to prevent the sexualization of children in schools. There is no conceivable reason to foist sexually explicit materials on small children, yet our attempts to prevent that from happening are among the reasons why we are facing a recall,” Miner and Ledesma stated.
While Ledesma and Miner’s seats both expire in November 2026, if the recall is pushed through, they will not be allowed to be immediately appointed back to their seats by the board and would instead have to run during the general elections in 2024, according to The Orange County Register.
Voting centers for the recall are expected to open on March 2, with election day on March 5.
