The Makaila Keyes frivolous lawsuit against the 4 conservative school board members is a political stunt that will waste taxpayer money. Virginia Code 15.2-1405 states that elected officials have immunity. If immunity did not exist, then public officials would be subject to endless lawsuits, and nothing would get done.

Since elected officials have immunity, the lawsuit will ultimately be against the school board. Virginia Code 15.2-1520 states that “all costs and expenses of such proceedings so defended shall be charged against the treasury of the locality, or political subdivision and shall be paid out of funds provided therefor by the governing body thereof”.

In other words, the school board will have to use taxpayer money to defend itself against a frivolous lawsuit. Perhaps a portion of the carryover funds are repurposed to defending a lawsuit. Perhaps teacher’s pay is reduced. The educators that are cheering on this frivolous lawsuit are undermining their position.

The lawsuit will have a difficult time proving that individual penalties can occur if a “violation was willfully and knowingly made” as stated in Virginia Code 2.2.-3714. First, the clerk and deputy clerk, Dennis Martin and Patty Boller abdicated their responsibilities. There are moments in the January 10th meeting that they were asked for assistance and refused. They did not ensure parliamentary procedures were followed. They choose not to read the board into closed session. Furthermore, the behavior of Shelley, Cole, and Daniels created the chaos on January 10th.

Elected officials are held accountable on election day. The new board was barely in power for a few hours at the January 10th school board meeting. Yet, Keyes and her supporters are undermining the will of the voters that just elected a conservative majority on the school board.