You’re reading one story in WPLN’s series exploring the wide-ranging impacts of a hard-right political faction in Middle Tennessee. Find all parts here.

Residents packed the Oct. 18, 2022 meeting of the Sumner County School Board. On the agenda was a challenge to the book “A Place Inside of Me,” a picture book about a young Black child navigating his feelings after a police shooting.

The crowd was divided on whether to ban the book. And both sides were vocal, with one board member reminding the audience that law enforcement would remove people who spoke out of turn.

During public comment, Julia Garnett, a 17-year-old Hendersonville High School student, stepped up to the podium.

“I fear that soon it will be extremely difficult for marginalized communities in all levels of education to access books with diverse and inclusive themes and values,” Garnett said. “It starts with this book, but I ask you: What’s next?”

A majority of the school board voted to keep “A Place Inside of Me” on shelves, but efforts to restrict school library books in Sumner County have continued. Conflicts have cropped up over the director of schools and funding athletic facilities.

A common denominator in each of these controversies is a group called the Sumner County Constitutional Republicans, which holds the majority on the county commission already. Their platform is rooted in conservative Christianity, and they eschew Democrats and the Republicans who work across the aisle.

They hope to flip the school board to a majority of Constitutional Republicans in the upcoming March 5 elections, with endorsed candidates running in four of the six contests.

If they do win control, there are fears they could oust the district’s director of schools, Scott Langford, based on a long-held grievance, which critics say could have a chilling effect within the school system.

The decade-long grudge

The Sumner County Constitutional Republicans group was vehemently opposed to Langford’s appointment based largely on his track record as a former county commissioner. Langford was elected in 2014 and again in 2018, and he ran on investing in public schools. To do that, he and other commissioners voted to raise property taxes in the county, something Constitutional Republicans have not forgotten or forgiven.

At the same time, he worked for the county school system, as a principal and later as chief academic officer. Constitutional Republicans took issue with him approving the budget of his employer when he was chair of the county commission.

And last year, when Langford was appointed the director of schools, Constitutional Republicans claimed the hiring process was rigged. In multiple Facebook posts criticizing Langford, Constitutional Republicans remind followers of upcoming school board elections and their intentions to win a majority of seats.

Screen capture of a Facebook post from Sumner County Constitutional Republicans page on Facebook from Oct. 3, 2023.

If the group does win a majority on the school board, it could lead to the end of Langford’s tenure, Sarah Andrews, an outgoing school board member, tells WPLN News.

“I think the very first item of business would be for them to fire our current director of schools,” Andrews said.

This kind of move has precedent. Conservative groups like Moms for Liberty have won school board majorities and subsequently ousted superintendents in districts across the country, including in Florida, South Carolina and California.

Andrews said that if a new school board fires Langford, it could cause a larger exodus from central office, and then trickle down to classrooms.

“You start removing those layers of people, and your teachers start wondering who has their back,” Andrews said.

The path forward

For his part, Langford said he’s also concerned about his job security, but he remains hopeful that whoever wins the school board elections will be open to working together for the benefit of students.

“I’ll work with anybody. And I think that there are certainly people in that group that are willing to, willing to work. But I think the group, as a whole, is pretty steadfastly opposed to anything we’re doing as a school system,” Langford said.

School board member Allen Lancaster was endorsed by the Constitutional Republicans when he ran in 2022. But he notes there are differences between the ideology promoted on the Facebook page and how he conducts himself on the board.

He said he has a great relationship with Langford and talks to him almost every day.

Still, on big picture issues, Lancaster aligns with Constitutional Republicans. He said the group has become a “boogie man” for people who have historically held power in Sumner County. But he sees the group’s ideology as a “conservative Christian mindset.” That includes being frugal with tax dollars and restricting what kids can read at school.

“When it gets to graphic sexual content, you know, we’re pretty adamant that … that’s just something that shouldn’t be in a public school library,” Lancaster said.

The free speech advocacy group PEN America found that terms like “sexually explicit” and “obscene” are being used to “restrict a range of content, including books on LGBTQ+ experiences, stories that include any sexual references, sex education materials, books that include portrayals of death or abuse, and art books.”

More book bans, and potentially less student representation

More Constitutional Republicans on the school board would also likely mean more book bans. Candidates are running on protecting children from what they call “inappropriate materials” and the “radical woke agenda.”

For her part, student Julia Garnett, has continued advocating against censorship since she spoke against the book ban in October 2022. She formed a club against censorship and, more recently, has pushed the school board to continue letting students participate in book challenge review committees.

“As a queer student, I experienced a lot of, like, inner confusion because I didn’t have representation growing up,” Garnett said. “So I always think back to that experience, and I think that’s really helped me to grow, to be such an advocate for fighting for the rights of students and for books to stay on the shelves, because representation absolutely saves lives.”