Antioch Unified School District Board President Hit With Recall Petition

If your quote is correct, the Notice should refer to Section 11020 of the Elections Code, not the Education Code.

A much faster way to remove Ellie from office and more emotionally satisfying would be to:
1. Stuff Ellie down the muzzle of a cannon.
2. Elevate the muzzle approximately 15 degrees above the horizon.
3. Discharge the cannon.

I don’t live in Antioch, but I have been following the case of Ellie Householder very closely for months.

I met Ellie when she was in college, and found her to be a normal, likable person. When she was elected to the Board of Education, I assumed it was just a normal start to a political career. It was after seeing community comments on her public official Facebook page that I first realized there was a large contingent of the Antioch public opposing her, and so I googled what she had been up to, began watching past recordings of her meetings, and now regularly watch Antioch BoE meetings live. It’s hard to describe the situation without sounding hyperbolic.

Ellie weaponizes race to shut down debate and cast her opponents’ positions as invalid. When she demanded that the Board abandon its written procedures for appointing a student trustee, she openly and plainly said that the reason why they would not agree with her was because the applicant was a student of color and the other board members were racist. When Ellie saw a video of a black student being detained, she immediately focused on the color of his skin and cast him as a victim in need of a white savior, ultimately making him into a prop for her to grandstand on top of. Even the little things, like her constant reference to Trustee Lewis as “Trustee Dr. Lewis,” her need to constantly reference Trustee Lewis’ level of education, come off as patronizing to me. The fact that Ellie has vocal critics in Antioch’s Black community, despite the fact that she constantly tries to position herself as their champion, is no accident.

Ellie displays eye-popping disrespect for her fellow board members – the clearest example was when she encouraged intimidation of her fellow board members on Twitter, and in response to them raising concerns told them that they were just likely too old to understand how Twitter worked. Ironically, she recently cast herself as a victim of “cyber bullying” by this news publication because a Facebook commenter on their page shared a picture of her with a Hitler mustache – suggesting she actually doesn’t know how Facebook works.

It also suggests she doesn’t understand her responsibilities as an elected official. The fact is, criticizing your elected leaders is not cyber bullying. While many in the Antioch community appeared divided by whether or not the Hitler image was appropriate, I think those who think that comparisons to Hitler should be saved solely for those who are actively trying to commit genocide have missed the point. Comparing Ellie to other dictators like Mussolini or Stalin would perhaps be more appropriate, but no one would get it if someone photoshopped Ellie with a bald head or a regular mustache like Stalin had. The Hitler mustache is one of the few instantly recognizable symbols of dictatorship, and criticizing Ellie as behaving like a dictator is not only appropriate, it’s warranted.

Beyond the disrespect and refusal to entertain the possibility that she could learn from others, Ellie has brazenly abused her power as a trustee. Her unilateral pulling of the agenda item to remove her, in spite of the fact that Hernandez and Lewis almost certainly would have supported her, was just jaw-dropping. I honestly did not understand why the issue couldn’t be brought back later. Ellie kept making references to the fact that the issue had already been voted on and those on the losing side of a vote couldn’t bring back an issue, but she had never put the issue to a vote, she just pulled it off the agenda. Her refusal to allow the superintendent or other trustees to speak on the issue was also beyond ridiculous – as if taking the item off the agenda wasn’t enough, she also can’t be bothered to allowed those who disagree with her decision to offer a word in edgewise.

The no-confidence vote itself is staggering, the fact that almost 700 people could come to a 97% agreement on such an enormous issue as expressing no-confidence in their elected leader. If you are so toxic that nearly all of the teachers in your district want you out, that is saying a tremendous amount – *especially* with someone like Ellie, who is a major supporter of unions and idolizes Robert Reich.

Someone asked Ellie on Twitter why she isn’t stepping down after the no-confidence vote, and her response was “that’s not how democracy works.” She is wrong – people gracefully step down from their elected positions in office all of the time. I wonder, did she think Nixon was anti-democratic for stepping down? Was Cuomo? The real answer is that she hasn’t stepped down because she doesn’t feel shame for her actions. Like Trump, she has some innate insecurity that causes her to double-down on her positions rather than questioning her own assumptions, and someone like that is not capable of feeling shame or learning from others.

Unfortunately, this recall will likely not work. I have done enough research into Antioch’s history to know that past recall attempts have failed, for the fact that require a massive percentage of registered voters to sign a petition, a very steep burden for the initiative’s proponents to reach. My advice to them would be to comb through past board meetings, compile a collection of Ellie’s worst moments (there are a lot of them) into a short video, and go door-to-door with a tablet to share this video while collecting signatures. Seeing is believing.