Dom discusses four upcoming political races that have the potential to impact the advance…

Welcome to Old School, New School, Next School with Dom Giordano, a podcast devoted to preserving your parental rights, including the right to choose the best school for your child. This podcast is dedicated to gaining the option of school choice for every parent in America.

Here's your host, educator and noted talk media commentator, Dom Giordano.

Hey, everyone. Welcome into this week's edition of Old School, New School, Next School with Dom Giordano.

Episode 18 here. We are looking at, I'm calling this week's edition, a tale of four big elections, a tale of not four cities because they're in New York.

and Philadelphia mainly.

But I'm talking about the fact, and Jersey, I'm talking about the fact that school choice, well, first of all, before I get to that, this tale of four locales that are deeply involved in this debate over school choice and what it means, all of them with national reputation going on here.

I have been doing a round of media because there's such interest in school choice, all forms of school choice.

And I wanted to give you a sense. I've been on in a station in Denver. I've been on in one in West Virginia, one in Wisconsin, one on the West Coast. And all of them have been receptive to what I've told them about this. And all the hosts were not as knowledgeable as you might think in this area. I mean, it's a special area of expertise for me, Dom Giordano, your host each week. And again, you can always hit me with an email at

show at AOL.com. But what I have found is the response I get from their listeners, the follow-up, is heartening. That people get it, that we have the other side on the run. And why is there such antagonism that's built up toward the public schools? Well, I've talked about this a little bit before. It's the teachers' unions. You have Randy Weingarten out there and Becky Pringle Weingarten going down Broadway on show.

in which she talks about fascism. She was with the Reverend Al Sharpton last Sunday, and she said that Americans essentially are ignorant about what fascism is, and that's why that's got to be the driving force of AFT teachers across the country. Becky Pringle says much the same things. So there's a lot of groups that are forming now to not attack teachers, but to lessen.

the impact of the teachers unions, which are proposing these things that parents certainly don't want. And the people I've talked with in these interviews across the country are hearing that from their listeners. They're articulating that. They're telling me stories afterward. Here's just one case in point. I don't even have the date in front of me, but this is a notorious case in New Jersey of a young guy who was a state trooper killed by

and the Black Liberation Army. All right? It goes back many, many years. She was convicted of that, spent time in jail, and was broken out of jail and escaped to Cuba, and now adopted the name Asadi Shakur. She died the other day, just last week, in Cuba. And the Chicago Teachers Union lionized her in a tweet this week, talking about her mission,

was their mission, the Chicago Teachers Union. I mean, you talk about taking upsides on paper with something that is beyond objectionable. So around the country, people ask me about this aspect of the Teachers Union, and I tell them most teachers are not on board with this. It's been taken over by the activists. So now this is playing out, this whole issue that we talk about each week with great guests, my commentary, your input.

There are four big races happening right now in the country that are really slamming into this.

One, you have the two premier races. There's only really two premier races that have national impact usually in an off-year election. New Jersey and you have Virginia.

But due to the socialist background or more of the candidates or in Mondami, who looks like he'll win and be mayor of New York City, it is popped up there also. And then we have the governor's race that's emerging in Pennsylvania, where I'm from in Philadelphia, with Stacey Garrity, the treasurer against Governor Josh Shapiro, who is a national figure already.

Probably could have been the Democrat nominee for vice president in the last cycle if he had played his cards right.

So let's start with the two that will set the narrative moving into the midterms and have real impact nationwide and how school choice is playing out in those races.

Let's start in New Jersey. All right.

Last week with the races, Jack Cittarelli against Mikey Sherrill.

Jack is the Republican.

Cheryl is the Democrat.

Last week, we told you that in Jersey, the governor is the one that determines

the education people that make the choice about saying a charter school can go into operation.

Governor Murphy, the Democrat that runs New Jersey right now,

has not allowed one new charter school in seven and a half years of his term.

He only has a few months left.

Okay?

Mikey Sherrill is along the same line. She's not going to be putting charter schools in. Jack Cattarelli embraces charter schools, school choice, vouchers, the whole deal. And he embraces something else that I've been telling you about that schools are lacking. He embraces the idea that for kids that are behind grade level, usually pretty much behind, he embraces this intense tutoring in the basic subjects to bring them up to standard.

until they move on to other things. What a novel idea. That's exactly what should be done.

And you have a real force back to the union thing in New Jersey. The NJEA is a huge force. They have over 200,000 members in the state of New Jersey, and they will be backing the Democrat exclusively. So we have all that going on in the state of New Jersey.

We also have in the state of Virginia, in the governor's race, this is the place where Glenn Youngkin won the governor's race a few years back because Terry McAuliffe, the Democrat, essentially said, parents are not the arbiters of what should go on in school. We need to have the professionals, the teachers. He doubled and tripled down on that. There was a national outrage. And even in a state that was considered a blue state at that point, Youngkin won fair

comfortably to become governor and become a national figure.

So those are the two big races.

Now let's talk about Mondami.

In the Mondami race in New York, it looks as if the two key players will be Cuomo,

now that Mayor Adams has dropped out, versus Zordon Mondami, who's a self-described socialist, among other things.

Recently, in the last couple of weeks, and this is amazing, it's a testament to what's really happening in America and what this show is all about. 15,000 plus parents and students of the charter schools in New York who are worried that Mondami is an enemy of charter schools, will do everything that he can if he's elected mayor, inch by inch, piece by piece, to limit and take out and extinguish the mayor.

charter schools.

Now, why would he do that?

Well, because charter schools break away from the indoctrination of the public schools from a lot of things that parents don't want, even though they are public schools.

15,000 parents and kids protested, walking the streets of New York over the Brooklyn Bridge to a big rally.

And the person shockingly who was the principal speaker was Common. Common the rapper. Big time rapper. I've told you before on Old School, New School, Next School that people like Pitbull, Andre Agassi, Jalen Rose, and now Common run charter schools, have an interest in charter schools, are fans of charter schools. So Common, along with 15,000 parents on a Wednesday, on a weekday,

or rallying in protest of what they're afraid of, the new mayor might do to their charter schools. Meaning they really like the charter schools. They're really on board with it. And that's the last thing they would want done. Notice how that's becoming an issue there. Will it be enough to throw this race to Cuomo? I'm not necessarily that hopeful on it, but it's a big ticket. My point is, this is rising.

to the upper level of all these races. This is starting to become an issue where people deeply care about it. And the more that they do, the more that it rises to that level, then the more that we are going to see change and more, more and more, more. Right now, I have an article in front of me that makes the point that as many as one million kids will have school choice this year.

This article is a group that researches those that are engaging in school choice and makes the point when the school bells start ringing these days, and they had a record number of kids, especially children from low-income families, will be opting out of traditional public schools. This year, as many as 1 million kids will participate in public school alternatives, vouchers, tuition tax credits, scholarship programs, charter schools, home school, and beyond.

And by the way, in Jersey, the home scores is about 90,000 of them in the state are a big, big issue. And the bottom line is that is a big number. But the other side is not going to give up easily. I just told you that in New York, in this Mondami race, 15,000 people turn up, they go with common, et cetera. So what do the New York lawmakers do? They demand any number of New York lawmakers.

They demand an investigation.

New York state senators, John Lou of Queens, Shelley Mayer of Westchester,

the chairs of their chambers education committee who have historically opposed school choice expansion.

They have demanded an investigation into what happened with this rally.

They they allege coercion of the parents and kids.

And here's a quote.

They say canceling classes during the school day and forcing families and students to engage in a political rally is an egregious misuse of instructional time and state funds. Now think about this. The very people doing this, all the nonsense that goes on in many public schools, my years of teaching and seeing that, a wasting of time and results and not time on task. The charter schools are the ones that spend much more time, study after study, indicating how much more time they're going to be.

time on task and the results when it comes to reading and math. That's what they're about. And the parents know that. There's a lot of transparency, a lot of parental input. And if they don't succeed in drawing parents, what happens? They go out of business. So you can imagine the other side rather than going, wow, why did 15,000 parents walking across the bridge protesting in this whole thing? Maybe we should reexamine this? No. Some of them are now trying to cripple it by demanding,

investigations. That's where we are. That's how this works. It's an ongoing battle.

By the way, the New York Times, of all places, just in recent days, they have pointed out that things are getting so bad for some public schools that they've hired consultants in order to help them recruit students.

Yes, public school consultants to recruit students. Now, you and I know what is it that would attract more parents to those schools? High academic standards, clean buildings, and safety. Safety. That's one of the biggest things that parents want and one of the reasons they leave the public schools. But imagine having to hire high-priced consultants with taxpayer monies to continue to try to recruit students to the public schools.

These others, charters and others, are doing it through their reputation, through what parents want, through parents moving toward them. 15,000 people in the middle of the week rallying around us. That, to me, is the story of this last week or so. And in these four big races, let's go back over one more time. In Virginia, it looks like the Democrat might be ahead, but the issue that is driving a lot of voters to take an

Another look at the Republican is exactly what we're talking about. What's going on in schools? The bathroom issue, transgender issues, who's in charge, parental rights, saying no, the parents are not in charge, the Republican saying yes, they are. In Jersey, I mentioned the charter schools, I mentioned the NJEA and the Democrat on that side of the NJEA, the Republican, Chattarelli, charter schools, high dosage tutoring if elected, more charter schools.

In New York, we have Mondami and people that like the charter schools are afraid, and he will, that this is going to be his drive to curtail these in the near future to do everything he can to stop them. Now, I left off one other race, saving that for the end. We have the budding of a big race where a lot of money is going to be spent here, and this issue of choice, school choice of one sort or another is huge in it, and that is the governor's race in Pennsylvania.

Now, it's important. It's a huge state, pivotal, swing state. But Josh Shapiro, the governor, is one of the Democrat top five favorites to be their presidential candidate in 2028. He was almost the vice presidential candidate in 2024. Seems as if he was seen as too ambitious. That's why Vice President Harris did not have him on the ticket.

The Republican challenger nominee, not yet, but on the way, is Stacey Garrity, the state treasurer, who is an avid supporter of school choice across the board, particularly for rural Pennsylvania. Josh Shapiro has not said that he is going to take the money from the big, beautiful bill that was passed, that huge bill that went through Congress, where there are millions and millions of dollars that can be done.

to offer scholarships of low-income students primarily to go to a private school, a Catholic school, something of that nature. This is free money. It will not take away from the public education monies. I don't think he'll sign it. She's on it with him. She's making this a big issue. It's in the top three or four issues in this race. The bottom line is this. If school choice of any sort, particularly the charter schools, ought to be,

How can you deny the ability to have charter schools? Based on what? If this becomes an issue in state after state nationally, in the top four or five issues, they're going to lose every time. The reason why we're getting traction, but it's not as quick, certainly, as I would like and you would like, is because it's often dwarfed by these other big issues, the legal immigration, the economy.

But when you take a look at what people are concerned about, they are concerned about the nation's schools. They know how appalling this is, and they want parental rights. And what does parental rights start with? Well, if you have a really bad school that you're sending their kid to, maybe dangerous, low-achieving, academically, indoctrinating, talking about fascism all the time rather than reading and writing, well, then you have limited parental control. You can do a lot on the home front, but you're still sending

your child into this cauldron of things that are undesirable.

But if we have more charters for your homeschooling, more cyber charters, and more vouchers like the big, beautiful bill, then you can do what many teachers are doing.

They send their kids to schools other than the public schools.

If you have a great one, you think it's great in your area, that's fine.

No problem.

But the reason why this movement exists is that appalling numbers of public schools and the public school teachers unions like the Chicago public school teachers, they are failures. And the Chicago teachers union is toxic. Lionizing someone who was involved in killing a cop and fleeing to Cuba is just the latest outrage. So let me know what you're thinking. We'll continue to monitor. These four races, though, are pivotal.

to put this on the map. And I would say the biggest one is in New York, where this exposes how people on the left, like Mondami, what they're going to do, even with charter schools. People want charter schools. They want more options. It helps to give kids a background in something they're interested in, in addition to just the raw academics. Send me an email. Let me know what you're thinking. Questions, comments, domshow, D-O-M-S-H-O-W, at AOL.com.

DOMshow at AOL.com. In our next episode, we're going to talk with a real activist in Pennsylvania who will lay out how all these things work with the public schools, particularly in inner city, suburban Philadelphia, in a way that I don't think you're going to hear it anywhere else and how that will play out in politics, I hope, into the midterms.

Because this is an obvious thing. It's about freedom. It's about choice. Dom Giordano, thanks for listening this week. Spread the word. Hear of Old School, New School, Next School. Old School, New School, Next School with Dom Giordano is a presentation of Giordano Productions, LLC. Copyright 2025. All rights reserved.