After flipping the Sarasota County School Board to a liberal majority during this year’s primary election, voters reversed course Tuesday, electing conservative candidate Heidi Brandt to the last open seat on the board.

Brandt won 56.5% of the vote, beating opponent Jimmy Glover by more than 25,600 votes. Glover, a left-leaning candidate from Newtown, would have been the board’s first African American member had he won.

Liberal-leaning members will still hold a 4-1 majority, but Brandt will keep District 1 in conservative hands. The seat was recently vacated by Bridget Ziegler, a co-founder of Moms for Liberty, the conservative group that has pushed to reshape public education policies on school boards across the country.

“I think it’s important for every single person in our community to have a voice, and if it was all one way, that wouldn’t be a representation of Sarasota County,” Brandt told Suncoast Searchlight after results were announced Tuesday. “So, I’m really proud to have that conservative voice on the panel of our school board.”

Brandt, the mother of an elementary school student and president of the parent-teacher organization at Southside Elementary, campaigned on improving literacy, school safety and workforce training. She has advocated for expanding programs that pair young students with volunteer reading mentors and reforming Florida’s school voucher system to account for family income. 

Though endorsed by the Republican Party of Sarasota County in the nonpartisan race, Brandt positioned herself as a more moderate conservative than Ziegler, who was among the most outspoken members of the former conservative-majority school board. Ziegler had advocated against the Black Lives Matter movement, LGBTQ+ inclusion, and other high-profile culture war topics.

Brandt has openly disagreed with some of the board’s actions this year. She told Suncoast Searchlight in a previous interview that she opposed a resolution reaffirming the district’s willingness to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and a measure that sought to penalize student protesters who stage walkouts, which she worried could be enforced unfairly.

“I plan to get together and make sure that every single one of us is putting our children first, at the forefront of every single decision that we make,” Brandt said Tuesday night at The Ora, where Republicans held their election watch party. “I’m looking forward to it. I see this as an opportunity to do great things for our schools.” 

Brandt’s victory marked a reversal from the August primary, when Glover led the three-candidate field with nearly 44% of the vote, compared with 32% for Brandt. The third candidate, conservative Teresa DeWitt, received just under 25%, leaving Brandt and Glover to face off in Tuesday’s general election.

Glover said that despite losing in the general election, he was proud to be a part of the effort to flip the school board to a liberal majority.

“I just want to thank all the voters who supported me,” he told Suncoast Searchlight on Tuesday night. “We won in August.” 

District 1 covers northeastern Sarasota County, including the city of Sarasota and the town of Longboat Key, though district boundaries only determine where candidates can live, and school board elections are open to all voters in the county regardless of district. 

“I know Jimmy worked really hard, and he raised a lot of money. He did everything he knew what to do, but it was just too much of a challenge to overcome,” said Beth Mayberry, one of two progressive candidates who were elected to the school board in August. “People want to see some balance on the school board, and I think that’s appropriate.”

Regardless of Tuesday’s outcome, Mayberry said she expects the new school board will be able to work together to focus on day-to-day business.

“We’re going to see a whole lot less of the political nonsense that we’ve seen in the past,” Mayberry said. “All of us really want to concentrate on what’s going to help our student excel, what’s going to make our teachers better at teaching.”

Glover, and the other liberal candidates, ran on promises to make the school board more student-focused. Rather than focus on book removals, LGBTQ+ inclusion, immigration enforcement and other culture war topics that have long dominated board meetings, Glover promised to promote early literacy, career readiness, school safety and a supportive environment for teachers. 

The board’s liberal majority is new this year, after years of school board meetings being dominated by culture war topics and conservative policies.

Two progressive candidates — Megan Tennimon and Beth Mayberry — won seats on the school board during the primary elections, with the help of a number of young Sarasota County Democrats who spent hours canvassing streets and organizing voters to promote the liberal candidates’ campaigns.

“I would have loved for those students, maybe, to get to know me, and maybe not just what they think I represent,” Brandt said. “I think it’s just about being there and representing all students. No matter who you are, who you voted for or who you were behind. This is our time to get together and unite.”

Brandt’s win comes despite raising less than half as much as Glover. In total, Glover’s campaign raised $210,715, compared to Brandt’s $88,246.

“I think hard work and dedication is what got me across the finish line,” Brandt said. “Money’s great and it helps, but hard work is what got me there.”