SARASOTA, Fla. — The Sarasota School Board voted to call on board member and Moms For Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler to resign from her post.

The vote was 4-to-1 to ask Ziegler to resign from her post. She was the lone dissenting vote, making it clear she's not stepping down.

Ziegler has served on the board since 2014.

The resolution is non-binding, meaning Gov. Ron DeSantis would have to step in to remove Ziegler from the board. There's been no indication he will do that.

Board Chair Karen Rose called the vote following a sexual assault investigation into Ziegler's husband, Florida Republican Party Chairman Christian Ziegler.

He is facing allegations of rape.

“I personally care about Bridget and her family and deeply regret the necessity for this course of action, but given the intense media scrutiny locally and nationally, her continued presence on the Board would cause irreparably harmful distractions to our critical mission,” Rose wrote.

Ziegler spoke briefly about the resolution during the board meeting.

“You know, I am disappointed," said Ziegler. "As people may know, I serve on another public board, and this issue did not come up, and we were able to forge ahead with the business of the board.”

The alleged victim says she had previously been in a three-way sexual relationship with the Zieglers.

According to the affidavit, she canceled a meet-up with the couple when she found out Bridget would not be there. She told police Christian Ziegler allegedly still showed up at her apartment and that’s when she says the attack happened, stated the affidavit.

Christian Ziegler said he has been falsely accused and will not resign as GOP party chair. No criminal charges have been filed against him.

But the Republican Party of Florida is holding a special meeting this weekend to discuss his future.

Prior to the meeting, several dozen people marched outside carrying signs and chanting, “Hey hey, ho ho, Bridget Ziegler has got to go.” Among the signs’ slogans were “Ban Bridget, not books” and “Real women aren’t homophobes.”

“Bridget Ziegler must apologize and resign,” said Carol Lerner of Support Our Schools, a nonprofit group that supports public education. “The Zieglers are through and through grifters.”

Board member Tim Enos said it’s up to Bridget Ziegler to decide whether to quit. Only Florida’s governor can remove a school board member, and only under certain conditions, such as a criminal charge.

“If she continues and doesn’t resign and stays, we have an obligation that we all need to be focused on education,” Enos said. “The politics have to get outside the boardroom. It should be only about the kids.”

Bridget Ziegler has long been active in conservative politics. She was a champion of the DeSantis-backed law known by critics as “Don’t Say Gay,” which restricts teaching of sexual and gender material in early school grades. Moms for Liberty, which she co-founded in 2021, aims to inject more conservative viewpoints into schools, restrict transgender rights, battle pandemic mask mandates and remove books the group objects to from school classrooms and libraries.