Gloucester Roiled By School Halloween Party Featuring Trump Tombstone
By Evan Lips | October 23, 2017, 17:43 EDT
President Donald Trump isn’t dead, but a Gloucester PTO parent is apparently planning ahead.
A Halloween party Friday evening at West Parish Elementary School in the famous fishing city included a faux tombstone for “Don Trump.”
That didn’t sit well with some parents, who according to CBS Boston sent photos of the mock graveyard scene to Massachusetts Republican Party State Committeewoman Amanda Orlando Kesterson. She posted one to Facebook and proceeded to tag various news outlets in her post:
The city’s mayor, Sefatia Romeo Theken, who is up for reelection, posted a statement to her Twitter account denouncing the decision to inject politics into “political messaging within our schools.”
City Statement on West Parish School Halloween Party (full text in image). pic.twitter.com/errT4ZGfOP
— Sefatia Romeo Theken (@STheken) October 23, 2017
On Sunday the school’s principal, Telena S. Imel, released a statement:
“West Parish School and the Gloucester Public Schools neither condone nor participate in this kind of activity,” Imel wrote, noting that the individual responsible for the tombstone was a parent and not a school employee.
“What saddens me most is that some of our families were understandably uncomfortable while attending this event,” she added. “Our school, and this includes events sponsored by related groups, is not the place for politics.”
She wrote that organizers planning future events will be reminded “that school is not the place to engage in or to display political agendas or opinions.”
Imel vowed to be “particularly more diligent in ensuring that this is the case going forward.”