Palm Beach County School Board member Edwin Ferguson ripped the recently killed conservative organizer Charlie Kirk as “a racist bigot” and urged teachers to be careful when making public comments about him so they don’t lose their teaching certificates.
Ferguson used his opening remarks during the school board’s Sept. 17 meeting to respond to a warning issued by the state’s education commissioner that commentary about Kirk could put their certification in peril. He questioned how a teacher could lose their certificate.
“Unless you as a parent or you as a teacher feel bad, because I as a teacher don’t miss a racist, a racist bigot at that, I don’t see how you’re going to be at risk of losing your teaching certificate,” Ferguson said. “When we talk about the Holocaust, I’ve yet to hear a person of the Jewish faith say that I miss Adolf Hitler.”
Ferguson’s comments came a week after Kirk, 31, was shot to death on a Utah college campus. His killing has anguished Republicans even as detractors said Kirk had a history of making racist, misogynistic, anti-Semitic, transphobic and homophobic comments and that they won’t mourn a bigot.
Republicans have reacted with vehemence to what they see as an inappropriate celebration of Kirk’s death on the left and have called for the firing of people whom they see as joining that celebration through public statements.
Ferguson’s comments have already drawn fierce pushback from a Palm Beach County Republican Party official, who said he has reached out to U.S. Sens. Rick Scott and Ashley Moody as well as to Gov. Ron DeSantis in an effort to have Ferguson removed from office.
“A racist bigot? That’s probably the worst thing you can call someone,” said Willy Guardiola, who chairs the party’s public relations committee. “It’s tasteless, and it’s baseless.”
Guardiola added: “He needs to be removed. Somebody needs to stand up and say, ‘This is not acceptable.’ “
Threats follow school board member’s Charlie Kirk remarks
The governor has the authority to suspend an elected official for a variety of reasons, including malfeasance, neglect of duty or incompetence. DeSantis has, on multiple occasions, angered Democrats by using that authority to remove elected officials, including here in Palm Beach County in 2019 when he suspended then-Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher for what he called incompetence and neglect of duty.
Bucher resigned before facing a hearing before the Florida Senate, which has the power to remove or reinstate an elected official suspended by the governor.
Ferguson has been inundated with vitriol in the aftermath of his comments during the school board meeting. He shared screen shots of a variety of incendiary, profane and threatening messages with The Palm Beach Post.
One voice message, which Ferguson also shared with The Post via email, called him a racial slur and threatened to “blow your Black head off.”
“Is this level of reprisal warranted?” Ferguson asked.
GOP calls for action against outspoken Charlie Kirk critics
Republicans have already made it clear they will react sternly to public comments they deem to be an inappropriate celebration of Kirk’s death.
A Florida Atlantic University professor was temporarily removed from her campus duties on Sept. 13 after reposting comments about Kirk on social media. FAU President Adam Hasner, who served as a Republican in the state Legislature before being appointed president by DeSantis, said the professor’s conduct was inconsistent with the university’s values.
The professor, Karen Leader, said she only reposted comments Kirk made and did not say he deserved to die.
Florida Education Commissioner Anastasios Kamoutsas wrote a letter to the state’s superintendents, directing them to share his warning that educators could be fired for public comments that cause either a student or a parent to feel unwelcome or unwilling to participate in the learning environment.
“It has been brought to my attention that some Florida educators have posted despicable comments on social media regarding the horrific assassination of Charlie Kirk,” Kamoutsas wrote on Sept. 11.
“These few are not a reflection of the great, high-quality teachers who make up the vast majority of Florida’s educators. Nevertheless, I will be conducting an investigation of every educator who engages in this vile, sanctionable behavior.”
Ferguson said he has “received a number of contacts in regard to concern about teachers who are fearful of losing their teaching certificates because of comments that they made” about Kirk.
The board member said Kirk “said a lot of toxic things that were very undermining to society at large, and we want to never forget that and we want to be better than that.”
He added: “The things that I’ve heard from this gentleman, Mr. Kirk, as it relates to the Black experience in the country, are definitely things that would make me say, ‘Hey, I’m sorry that he’s died, that he passed away. But he did not use his voice effectively.’ That’s my two cents on that.
“So, teachers, say what you need to say, but just be respectful and don’t say it in a discriminating way against him or anyone else who might be offended.”
Charlie Kirk’s take on Civil Rights Act, DEI and more
Kirk, an ally of President Donald Trump, traveled to college campuses across the country debating students in a bid to pull them into the GOP fold. He also hosted a podcast. On multiple occasions, he said or wrote things many deemed to be racist, sexist, anti-Semitic or hostile to members of the LGTBQ+ community.
For example, upon learning that multimillionaire singer Taylor Swift had become engaged to football star Travis Kelce, Kirk’s message to the singer was: “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.”
Kirk fiercely opposed diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, which he argued put unqualified minorities in positions of authority that should have been occupied by a white person.
Kirk questioned the intelligence and accomplishments of four Ivy League-educated Black women — former first lady Michelle Obama, former MSNBC host Joy Reid, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and the late Texas congresswoman, Sheila Jackson Lee.
“You do not have the brain-processing power to otherwise be taken really seriously,” Kirk said of the women, who had pointed to their accomplishments as examples of the benefits of DEI. “You had to go steal a white person’s slot to go be taken somewhat seriously.”
Kirk called the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which struck down racial segregation, “a huge mistake” whose passage “created a beast, and that beast has now turned into an anti-white weapon.”
Kirk said a Biblical scripture calling for gay men to be stoned to death affirmed “God’s perfect law when it comes to sexual matters.”
And Kirk offended many Jews when he said Jewish financiers were paying for anti-white, left-wing causes.
Guardiola downplayed some of Kirk’s comments.
“If you knew Charlie Kirk, you knew he had a sense of humor,” Guardiola said. “He was very, very bold, and he pushed the envelope a little too far.”
Guardiola said Kirk should have taken his message directly to historically Black colleges and universities to show them he was not a bigot.
“I’m not putting a microscope on all of the things that he said, things he said back to age 18,” Guardiola said. “I’m looking at things he did to make the country better.”
Wayne Washington is a journalist covering education for The Palm Beach Post. You can reach him at wwashington@pbpost.com. Help support our work; subscribe today.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: School Board member Edwin Ferguson rips Charlie Kirk, sparking Florida GOP ire
Reporting by Wayne Washington, Palm Beach Post / Palm Beach Post
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