Johnson's campaign 'sounding board' edited text blast to parents, teachers

Jonathan Felts described himself Wednesday as "a sounding board" for Johnson, both in Johnson's campaign for lieutenant governor and as state superintendent. He said he's not paid by the campaign or the state and that he and Johnson talk most mornings for about 15 minutes.

"I saw the text message and edited that," Felts said.

Felts has previously described himself as Johnson's spokesman/political consigliere, but he said Wednesday that's a volunteer arrangement, and Johnson's most recent campaign filings don't show payments to Felts.

The 540,000 text messages went out Tuesday to phone numbers collected by schools around the state. The superintendent's office also sent some 800,000 emails, all linking to an online survey on the Common Core standards, which Johnson has criticized as the March 3 primaries approach.

Johnson, a Republican, isn't seeking re-election but is running for lieutenant governor instead. Early voting for the primaries starts Thursday.

Wilson didn't respond to several phone calls seeking further comment Wednesday or to an emailed list of questions about what people opted into when they provided their phone numbers to local schools and what written policies DPI has on the use of personal contact information.

Contact information gets collected when parents enroll their children in school. It's uploaded to a messenger program so they can get calls when schools close for weather and other emergencies, Wake County Public School System spokeswoman Lisa Luten said.

The numbers are stored in a state database, called Powerschool, that DPI has access to, Luten said.

There's an online signup for the school messaging program, and it tells parents the program is used "to send important information to families through phone calls, email and text messages."

Johnson's office actually sent two text messages Tuesday. One said "NC Superintendent Johnson wants to remove Common Core from NC Schools. Do You?" and linked to the survey. The other came nearly two hours later, promising "more topics to follow" and inviting people to text back "STOP" to opt out of messages from DPI.

There was an opt-out option at the bottom of the emails as well.

State Board of Education members contacted Wednesday declined to comment on Johnson's text and email blasts. Member James Ford and Vice Chairman Alan Duncan both said they'd defer to Chairman Eric Davis, who declined comment.

"That's a question for the superintendent," Davis said.

The board on Wednesday called a closed session meeting for Friday. Davis said that meeting will focus on a personnel matter that's "not any big news or any controversial item."