Ben Nguyen is in good company.  When Nancy Nix invites me to her house to meet people she thinks will be the future of politics, she has a pretty good track record.  And I felt bad; I was running late when she invited me over to listen to a speech from a bright young man by her pool, as I had in the past.  I was stuck on an overseas call, and the time zones didn’t match up to the schedule Nancy had given me.  But when I did arrive, it was just in time to hear a speech by Ben Nguyen, a former student at Lakota schools who had just graduated and was now running for the school board.  And as I watched him speak, he had picked a spot by her pool to talk to the crowd that was just like another young overachiever, J.D. Vance.  A few years ago I had listened to the future Vice President give a very similar speech as Ben did from that very spot, which was before he was even running for the senate seat, and of course Nancy was right about him.  Ben also reminded me of another bright young mind who she promised me had a great future in politics, which was Vivek Ramaswamy.  I think of these guys as young, even though they were in their late 30s when I first met them, because, to me, they are.  I’m not a young person, so everyone seems young to me.  But Nancy Nix has a knack for finding good people in the crowd and getting behind them with a bit of help.  I was not surprised to learn that Ben Nguyen was an intelligent young man, and I enjoyed listening to him speak about why he was running for the Lakota school board in the November 2025 elections. 

Essentially, Ben is against the upcoming Lakota levy, which is the most expensive school levy in the state of Ohio.  He is also against indoctrination in public schools, and he has fresh experience, having just left school to learn what is really going on.  And he wants to do good things in life with his obvious talents.  He has siblings still attending Lakota schools, so he is concerned about public education in general.  He plans to do many things in the future, as his life is currently an open book.  However, to run and win the school board seat would be historic; he would undoubtedly be one of the youngest ever to do so.  But as I listened to him speak, he possessed the wisdom of a much older person, and he was only going to improve with time.  I had just recently watched Bernie Moreno give a similar speech from almost the same spot in Nancy Nix’s backyard, and he’s close to my age.  And Ben sounded just as well-versed politically, and he was very articulate and well-spoken.  He’s already a better political figure than most people who have been doing this kind of thing for three or four decades.  As I thought about Ben, I was skeptical due to his age as I drove to Nancy’s home.  I am one of those people who think it’s better to be old and broken, looking like a wet towel discarded in the sun, than a beautiful young person with everything working, because of the essential ingredient of wisdom.  Wisdom is hard to get, and it’s worth the age it often takes to get there, and what you lose along the way.  So I’m not automatically impressed with young people.  However, it was clear that Ben Nguyen was something special because he possessed a remarkable amount of wisdom at a very young age, which was evident in his family background, as he discussed.

And he was right in his speech about why someone like him needed to be on the Lakota school board.  I have been intensely critical of the public education system.  My thought on it was to erase everything John Dewey ever did and to start the concept of education anew in American culture.  I don’t think people are nearly as educated as they should be, and I deal with a lot of people every day who hold advanced Master’s and PhDs.  People aren’t that smart in our culture, and it disgusts me.  I’m not excited to support more of the kind of education that leaves people so ill-prepared for the world.  However, to Ben’s point, the current school board does not represent the kind of people who live in Butler County, Ohio. If we are going to have a public school funded by taxpayer money, we should have representatives on the school board who represent us.  After speaking with Ben, I think he would be great, and I will certainly be voting for him.  Needless to say, I fully endorse him and would love to see him win a seat in this upcoming election.  It would be a step in the right direction.  I’ve been a part of a lot of campaigns to put members of the school board in place to represent conservatives, but the efforts have been discouraging, leaving me wanting to blow up the whole system with charter schools and the elimination of the Department of Education as a whole.  But Ben Nguyen reminds me of why I have worked for good school boards in the past, and his personality appears to be well-suited to withstand the intense scrutiny that comes with the job.

Isaac Adi was also there to show support.  Isaac is a current school board member for Lakota, and he consistently votes in favor of Republican positions.  But he’s currently the only one.  He and I have seen each other at a few events since the highly publicized fallout he had with Darby Boddy, a school board member I had supported a lot and still do.  The pressure of those positions, by the whispers that come into them, is hard to deal with, and I wanted those two to work better together instead of against each other.  And Isaac was one of the reasons I no longer thought school board races were worth dealing with.  But seeing him there to support Ben, I thought the beginnings of something good were forming.  Of course, to get a good school board, it would take a lot more than just Ben Nguyen.  However, this was a good start, because until there is a good school board, Lakota schools will continue to mismanage money and ask for tax increases, as they have more in mind than just this bond levy on the November ballot.  They are also considering an operations levy in the very near future, and we don’t want a liberal school board rubber-stamping more spending, as they have been doing.  We need smart people who are willing to engage in lively debate and continually ask essential questions. With Ben Nguyen in that school board role, I see a lot of opportunity for good things to happen.  However, people will have to show up and vote for him because the Democrats are counting on a low turnout to maintain the status quo on the school board.  So people are going to have to rally behind Ben.  And after hearing him speak and explaining what he wants to do and why, the Lakota school district would be in a much better position.  And Ben Nguyen is certainly somebody voters can get excited about.

Rich Hoffman

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