Virginia legislators have passed three bills this year to dilute and politicize history and civics instruction in public schools, accelerating the undeniable trend of indoctrination in the state’s public schools.
by Stephanie Lundquist-Arora Published originally in IWFeatures
Last week, a Fairfax County mother said her twin 14-year-old sons were each encouraged by two public school civics teachers to urge their parents to vote in favor of the state’s partisan gerrymandering referendum. According to the mother, the teachers used similar talking points, including urging a “yes” vote to make Virginia’s maps “as fair as they can be” and to “stop [President] Donald Trump at all costs.”
My columns are rarely personal. This one is. Fairfax County Schools are indoctrinating, not educating our youth.
I was so disturbed, I had to write. It was approved by my boys.
Those teachers are likely satisfied with their efforts to disenfranchise Virginia’s conservative and independent voters. The measure ultimately passed by a 51.5% to 48.5% margin. In Fairfax County, 69.5% of voters voted “yes,” in favor of liberally colonizing their southern neighbors. For now, the matter is in court, where multiple lawsuits are challenging the referendum as unconstitutional and unlawful.
Some families might have been shocked to hear that their public school teachers were behaving in such a blatantly partisan manner. Those of us in Fairfax County, however, are used to it. And the problem of inappropriate politicization in classrooms is likely to get worse with the Democratic Party controlling both the General Assembly and the governor’s office.
In fact, state Democrats already have introduced three new laws to bolster activist teachers’ efforts to indoctrinate public school students in leftist ideology. Beginning in academic year 2026-2027, for example, HB182 will permit students to substitute African American History courses for the World History I course or the World Geography course to satisfy history and social studies graduation requirements.
Except when they’re coming to visit. Then we love them.
Celebrating America’s 250th birthday in Front Royal! 🇺🇸
It was a joy to join the town at their community block party – and to take part in the ‘potluck’. Their Majesties contribution was none other than… a Coronation Quiche! 🥧
Physicians are suing to block a ballot question they say conceals the true scope of the legislation.
by Victoria Manning
A group of physicians and other medical professionals along with a local voter have filed a lawsuit challenging an abortion-related constitutional amendment on Virginia’s ballot this November. The complaint alleges that the ballot question adopted by the General Assembly fails to inform voters about significant and potentially harmful provisions in the adopted legislation.
The amendment would overturn significant aspects of Virginia regulatory authority, including overturning parental consent requirements and abortion safety standards.
The Founding Freedoms Law Center (FFLC) filed the suit on behalf of the plaintiffs, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, the Virginia Medical Freedom Alliance, and Meagan Kade, against the Virginia Department of Elections and others. The complaint alleges the ballot language fails to notify the voters of key aspects of the legislation.
The actual ballot question says:
Should the Constitution of Virginia be amended to (i) protect the freedom to make personal decisions about prenatal care, childbirth, postpartum care, birth control, abortion, miscarriage management, and fertility care; (ii) protect doctors, nurses, and patients from being punished for these decisions; and (iii) allow for restrictions on access to abortion during the third trimester of pregnancy except when the patient’s health is at risk or the pregnancy cannot survive?
The legal challenge alleges the ballot language “profoundly misleads by omission and misrepresentation.”
Projects in the new PJM interconnection queue. From the PJM news release.
by Steve Haner
And the winner, again, is natural gas. The 13-state PJM Interconnection regional electricity market announced this week that it has reopened its process for adding new generation and most of the new electrons are proposed to come from natural gas.
The news release reports 811 applications for future connection to the regional grid, with a total faceplate energy value of 220 gigawatts. Almost half of the faceplate energy output, 106 gigawatts, would come from natural gas plants if all the applications are approved and –- the big if -– if all the plants get built.
Nuclear projects around the region are the source of the second largest amount of new energy on the list, with about 18 gigawatts proposed. Only 15 gigawatts of solar projects made the list, supplemented by another 9 megawatts of solar combined with co-located battery storage.
Between Friday March 6th and Tuesday April 21st, a narrow majority of Virginia voters went to the polls (or to their mailboxes) and voted in favor of the disenfranchisement of rural Virginia, as part of a national effort to make New York Representative Hakeem Jefferies the Speaker of the House next year.
Of course, without shamefully deceptive ballot language and tens of millions of dollars of outside money, the vote easily could have gone the other way. And while it’s over, it has yet to be certified, and when, or even if, that happens is an open question.
Legal
Monday April 27 saw the long-awaited oral arguments at the Supreme Court of Virginia (SCOVA) in Scott v. McDougle (named after the Democrat Speaker of the House and the Republican Senate Leader).
I corresponded with Zachary Werrell, an attorney and author who is an expert in both Virginia law and politics. Werrell noted that both sides received tough questions and cautioned against reading too deeply into courtroom dynamics or trying to parse the intensity of the justice’s questions to each side.
He did note, however, that both of the justices who did ask questions were “locked onto” two key issues:
On April 28, the State Supreme Court rejected an emergency appeal from Attorney General Jay Jones to certify the ballots from the April 21 yes/no gerrymandering election. This means, instead of the high court now greenlighting an acceptance of the results from the controversial election, they will continue to deliberate before issuing their opinion, thus keeping the final result unknown for now.
As reported here, on April 21, a preponderance of late-reporting “yes” votes from Fairfax County pushed the “yes” side to victory, with a margin somewhat over 80,000.
Results from April 21 Gerrymander Election. Blue is Yes, Red is No. Note how the areas poised to gain the most power, voted Yes: NoVa, Richmond, UVA area. (map/Del. Wren Williams’ Facebook page)
However, on April 22, Judge Jack Hurley in Tazewell County issued an injunction banning the state from certifying the ballots. In the case he heard, RNC v. Koski, Hurley objected to what he described as the “biased” wording of the ballot question as well as state laws the “yes” side broke to bring the issue to a vote. (In contrast to many other Roanoke-area media outlets that gave scant or zero coverage to Judge Hurley’s ruling, The Roanoke Star covered the important story here.)
Here are four words I never thought I’d utter: Abigail Spanberger was right.
During the campaign she urged Virginia to be fueled by rage. Well, after watching the patently illegal shenanigans by the “10 effing 1” Democrat crowd I’m feeling the rage and it’s fueling my desire to see Southern states go scorched earth on congressional redistricting.
Potential map of the south without the VRA restrictions Per NYT
Question: Has a Virginia newspaper, TV station or public radio station yet reported on the DOJ allegations against the Southern Poverty Law Center funding of racist groups?
Image credit: Copilot
Copilot: No Virginia-based newspaper, TV station, or public radio outlet has yet published coverage of the DOJ’s April 2026 indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
As of late April 2026, searches across The Richmond Times-Dispatch, Virginian-Pilot, Roanoke Times, WVTF Public Radio, VPM News, and WRIC 8News show no articles, broadcasts, or press releases referencing the DOJ’s allegations that the SPLC funded or paid informants within racist or extremist groups.
Counter-protesters near Emancipation Park during the Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally. Image courtesy of Anthony Crider / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY 2.0
by Scott Dreyer
On April 21, when many Virginians were focused on the gerrymander election, the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) made a bombshell announcement: The innocuously-named Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which for decades has posted a “Hate Map” where they targeted many right-wing individuals and groups, often including those holding pro-life, biblical, and/or conservative views, was charged with 11 counts of wire fraud, false statements to a federally insured bank, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
In sum, the accusation from a grand jury claims the SPLC ran a kind of massive shell game. The SPLC portrayed themselves to the public and their donors as a left-wing group fighting what they branded as “hate,” but in fact they were funneling more than $3 million of their donor’s cash to the very right-wing groups they claimed to fight, so that those right-wing groups would become more visible, which would further frighten and outrage SPLC donors to give more money, so that the SPLC could then give to more right-wing groups, in a never-ending cycle.
One of the most high-visibility cases involves $270,000, which the SPLC allegedly paid to a member of the online leadership chat group that planned the 2017 so-called “Unite the Right” hate rally in Charlottesville.
We can finally stop pretending cries of ‘racism’ are anything more than failed leftist political talking points.
by Beth Brelje
When the Department of Justice (DOJ) indicted the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) last week on 11 counts of wire fraud, false statements to a federally insured bank, and conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering, it revealed how urgently the Left has perpetuated the myth of American racism to stoke public unrest and steer politics. But the indictment doesn’t tell the entire story of how—under the guise of fighting racism—SPLC infiltrated the highest levels of government.
Imagine a fire department that sets lots of fires, then asks for donations to fight this “big fire problem.” That’s how Steve Cortes, founder of the League of American Workers and former advisor to Donald Trump, described the disgraced SPLC’s actions in a call with Restoration News.
Although the $339 million, tax-exempt nonprofit has gotten rich and powerful claiming otherwise, the United States is not inherently racist.
“The demand for racism from the Left far exceeds the actual supply,” Cortes told Restoration News. “So, what does the Left do in lieu of actual racism? It concocts it. It devises, and engineers, and gins up, and in some cases just completely lies about purported racism in American society.”
SPLC took donor funds collected to fight for “racial justice” and “dismantle white supremacy,” and gave huge payments to the very extremist groups it said it was fighting, the DOJ indictment alleges.
Extremist partners move politics
After the DOJ followed a trail of documents and bank records, it concluded that “between 2014 and 2023, the SPLC secretly funneled more than $3 million in donated funds to individuals who were associated with various violent extremist groups including: Ku Klux Klan, United Klans of America, Unite the Right, National Alliance, National Socialist Movement, Aryan Nations affiliated Sadistic Souls Motorcycle Club, National Socialist Party of America (American Nazi Party), and American Front,” according to a DOJ statement.
The deadly 2017 “Unite the Right” event in Charlottesville, Virginia was stoked by SPLC, the indictment shows. The rally is remembered for the images of men marching with flaming tiki lamps, and for killer James Alex Fields Jr. accelerating his car into a crowd of people, murdering Heather Heyer and injuring 30 other protesters. Fields got life in prison after pleading guilty.
Apologies for being away from the keyboard, but when dealing with and reading and writing about the City of Richmond, everyone deserves (and needs) a little R&R now and then. So while I am away, take a visit to Sharp’s Island in the middle of the James River just west of the Mayo Bridge and south of Mayo Island. It is a one-acre piece of sand and rock that was purchased by avid outdoorsman Andy Thompson and 10 other local families in 2019. Richmond BizSense had a great story about it that year in which Thompson said:
When recruiting friends to purchase the island, Thompson said reactions generally fell into one of two categories.“It’s almost like a personality test,” he said.
“Some people are like, ‘Case closed, I’m in.’ Then some people are like, ‘What’s wrong with you? Why would you buy an island?’ It’s hilarious the reactions you get.”
These are the parlor games court watchers are playing in Virginia as the commonwealth’s Supreme Court justices mull one of the most consequential decisions of their careers.
The seven justices will decide if the recent redistricting referendum, the one restoring gerrymandering to Virginia, will stand.
It shouldn’t. And the entire country is watching this travesty unfold.
Democrats, who control all three branches of government, have played cute with a number of Virginia’s laws in their breathless attempt to stage a special election in April and transform a 6-5 Democrat state to a solidly Dem state with a 10-1 congressional delegation.
Everything from the loaded language of the ballot question to the timing of votes was an exercise in shameless chicanery.
For example, Virginia law requires that constitutional questions be put to the voters only after the matter is approved by the General Assembly in two distinct sessions, separated by a General Assembly election. The hastily crafted return-to-gerrymandering question was voted on by legislators in October 2025, after early voting had begun. Certainly this violated the spirit if not the letter of Virginia law.
How ironic will it be if early voting – a device that Dems love to pad ballot totals – craters the referendum. Continue reading.
The allowance price (carbon tax) per ton charged within the RGGI compact to any electricity generator burning coal, oil or natural gas.
Virginia’s impending return to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) has driven up the price for carbon credits in the multistate cap-and-trade system’s secondary market. The futures price exceeded $41 per ton this morning, far above the roughly $25 per ton that utilities had to pay in the March 2026 auction.
It reflects the widespread expectation that Virginia electricity generators will be needing to buy far more allowances than Virginia will have available to sell, so they will be competing for allowances sold by the other ten states within the compact. High demand and short supply mean higher prices.
The next carbon allowance auction, and the first to include all the Virginia power plants as bidders, will be held in June, just weeks before the revised RGGI regulation takes effect in Virginia. As the General Assembly commanded, the final regulation was rushed through without any public input and has now been signed by Governor Abigail Spanberger (D).
The information page on the Virginia Regulatory Town Hall website includes a three-paragraph economic impact statement that says absolutely nothing about economics or ratepayer impact. It’s a whitewash. The Governor’s Review Memo, dated April 24, is just one word: Approved.
Virginia will have 11.5 million carbon allowances to sell in the final six months (two auctions) of 2026. At the price set in the March auction, that will reap the state treasury about $288 million by the end of the calendar year. But a $40 per ton auction outcome would yield $460 million in six months and points to almost $1 billion in potential annual tax receipts in future years.
Some key points:
First, the regulation just adopted will be obsolete after this year. The other states, while Virginia was away, adopted many changes for the three-year “control period” that begins in January 2027. Virginia will need a new regulation to reflect those.
The year: 2075. The American colonies on the Moon are getting restless under Washington’s tyrannical rule….
This second edition of “Dust Mites” has a snazzy new cover, includes helpful lunar maps, and is 5,000 words tighter than the original. The sequel, “Trogs,” is scheduled for publication this summer.
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
About
Bacon’s Rebellion is Virginia’s leading politically non-aligned portal for news, opinions and analysis about state, regional and local public policy. Read more about us here.
Fund the Rebellion
Shake up the status quo! Your contributions will be used to pay for faster download speeds and grow readership. Make a one-time donation by credit card or contribute a small sum monthly.
Can’t wait until tomorrow
For your Bacon’s Rebellion fix?
Enter your email address to receive immediate notifications of new posts by email.
SUBSCRIBE
Search Bacon’s Rebellion
Categories
Archives
The Jefferson Council
Protecting Thomas Jefferson’s Legacy at the University of Virginia
Forgot Your Password?
Shoot me an email and I’ll generate a new password for you.
