Virginia Education Board Member Denied Confirmation After Criticizing Socialism

A Virginia woman who advocated for “traditional American values” was kicked from the Virginia Board of Education after contending that socialism is “incompatible with freedom.”

Suparana Dutta, who Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin appointed to the Virginia Board of Education in July, was removed from her nomination just moments before she was set to be confirmed by the Senate of Virginia. 

Virginia State Sen. Ghazala Hashmi introduced an amendment that stripped Dutta of her nomination. The amendment passed on a party line vote. 

Youngkin explained that Senate Democrats “voted to remove Suparna Dutta, shockingly claiming that a public school parent isn’t qualified to serve on the Board of Education” before also adding “She is not only qualified, she epitomizes parental involvement in our schools and we need her voice on our Board of Education.”

The amendment to strip Dutta of her nomination comes after a tense discussion at last week’s board meeting, where she stated that socialism and communism are “incompatible with democracy and individual freedoms” and that the “Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are remarkable documents.”

Board member Anne Holton stated that she was “uncomfortable” with Dutta’s statements. “You cannot reference the Declaration of Independence and Constitution as remarkable documents without also acknowledging that they contain fundamental flaws of enshrining slavery and limiting the protections that they provided for only to white, propertied men,” she added.

While Holton agreed that communism is not compatible with democracy, she contended that “plenty of governments” call themselves social democratic governments. She went on to ask “So is socialism compatible with democracy?” before adding. “That would be a great debate to have in a 12th grade government civics class.”

Dutta, who stated that “I think socialism is just as bad as communism,” was branded a “far-right extremist” by the Virginia Grassroots Coalition, a leftist advocacy group that started a campaign to block her confirmation.

Spencer Lindquist is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @SpencerLndqst and reach out at slindquist@breitbart.com.