05-28-25 Interview - Bernadette Guthrie - Derrick Wilburn's Accuser

Derek Wilburn on the show.

He is a member of the D twenty school board, but he has been dealing with what he says is a high level of harassment from a woman named Bernadette Guthrie. And Bernadette Guthrie is joining me now to get her side of the story out. Bernadette, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me, Mandy, I appreciate it.

So I want to let you set the table on this one, and then I will ask questions about the things Derek said yesterday and we can kind of let you, from your perspective explain what has happened in this ongoing situation with Derek.

Sure, and you might notice that I have someone with me.

So I also wanted to introduce Saffren Stevens. Saffren was one of the student moderators from the event in which all of this happened. So Saffron has a recent D twenty graduate. She just graduated a couple of weeks ago. She was nominated as one of the Gazette's best and brightest,

All Right, welcome Saffron.

So what we wanted to do was, like, we know.

That students can't vote, but I was in ap GOV the year before, and I've always been pretty involved in the school board, especially since I kind of more became aware of like my civic duties kind of almost, and so me and a group of other students at my school we decided during school board election season, even though we couldn't vote, we still wanted students to have a chance to sort of hear what was being talked about and have a chance to participate.

So the whole reason that.

We started this was sort of to be a four students by students event. So we held it out of school so it would be more easily accessible for students, and we opened it up for questions from the audience so that the students could actually ask questions. But yeah, so that's what it was like, a student forum ran by students, left by students.

Okay, so what went wrong, Bernadette?

So I think, you know, to begin with setting the stage of what the event was. I think it's just really important because there has been an attempt.

To rewrite history a little bit.

Right.

So, I've heard that it was a school board meeting. I've heard that it was just a political forum. It was never marketed that way, advertised that way. In fact, there are several emails that Saffron had from Derek's campaign basically verifying that it was only a student event, that only students were coming up with the questions and that would be moderating it before they would even commit to attend.

And so I wanted to make it very very clear this was a student event.

How Dida Middle School moderated by kids, All the questions were submitted by kids. It was heavily attended by children. So that was the you know, the the event that we attended. My daughter was a new sixth grader there. She was really excited to attend. A couple of her friend's older siblings were part of the moderation team. So, you know, I went brought her there because it was a you know, it was a student led form, it

We had bars in front of us, so there was no way to.

Quickly exit anything like that. And so there was a number of questions. Saffron and Piper, the other moderator, read the rules of norms and decorum.

They had said, you know, there will be.

No profanity there, you know, all of this stuff. So the candidates all agreed to those things. And so a question came up about books, and I think it was do you remember the exact question.

It was something along the lines of.

Like will you it kind of long lines like will you ban books? What is your opinion on banning books?

I think it's how will you ensure like diverse literature is available to students essentially something like that. And he was the last one to answer. The other three candidates answered the question in terms of their you know, viewpoints on you know, library access and that sort of thing.

And so when Derek.

Took the mic, he said, I don't curse, and I apologize what I'm about to say. I haven't said these words in years, and I mean I had no idea what, you know, what was what was going to be said. There was no warning of like these are not kid appropriate excerpts anything like that.

And so the.

First book that he read from was Push by Sapphire, and he read the most graphic passages out of that book about rape and incests. He read all of the words. He did not To be clear, there was nothing this.

This book is. It's pretty savage. I mean, it is a lot of really bad language. It is about child rape and incests, and it is definitely there's a lot in this book. I I have seen the excerpts and they're pretty horrible.

Yes, yeah, And it's all on video.

I mean, to this day, District twenty has the entire thing unedited on the website, full captioning everything. Right, So D twenty you google D twenty student Forum, it's all there. I think it's like forty three minutes. And so, as I said, I'm sitting there with my eleven year old and she immediately I can just she grabs my arm

To remove her from from the room, and.

So the moderators ended up like having to take an unscheduled break because they were shaken up. They didn't know what to do, you know, they like, there's it's just a couple of sixteen year old kids that are moderating it, and so they were shell shocked. Every one was in a state of shock, and so they quickly like took a quick break.

There were some words exchanged with the other.

Candidates on stage. A couple of kids actually approached him after like older not old older kids, but like thirteen fourteen year old kids that went up to him after them and expressed, you know that they were very upset.

I left with my daughter right.

After that, and like immediately we got in the car, she burst into tears.

She had no idea what any of that stuff meant.

And you know, it was a it was a tough time for our family at that point. She was very emotional. My husband was going through chemotherapy at the time, he had cancer.

Well, and I'm not trying to down your story. I just want to make sure that we don't run out of time.

Yes, so she had a very she had a very emotional reaction to what happened essentially, and so fast forward, you know, a month later, he's elected to the school board.

And did you ever reach out to him and say this was inappropriate, this was wrong? Did you reach out to him and have a conversation with him about it?

I attempted to, and it was basically like, we support what we did, and there was no you know, like no acknowledgment of any wrongdoing. After the forum, then when he was elected, she saw him at another event at the EAC, which is like our administration center, and she immediately.

Had a painic attack. Ay, and my mom had to come get her.

It was all of the board and the administration witnessed it.

She had to be like she had to go home.

And so after that, I had set up meetings with Detoyan administration, the superintendent saying how can I make sure that he doesn't go to her school? Essentially, like I there's forty schools in the district. I just need to make sure that he does not go.

To her school.

So I had a I had a meeting with the superintendent and the and the administrative staff the january, like it was January second, right after he took office, and they told me that they could not restrict.

His access to her school, that he was an elected official, that if there was.

You know, the only thing I could do is like, you know, petitioned for a recall to have him removed.

And I just wanted to get this one thing. Security was there.

So they said the director of security was directed to create a safety plan for my child with the administrators at her school. So, along with District twenty security and the principle at her school, they created a safety plan which included if he went to her school, that they had that they brought her to like a safe room and would contact.

Me right away to come get her.

And so from the beginning, I said, like all I needed was him to acknowledge that what he did was wrong, because seeing that harm done to a child and not apologizing and not admitting that it was wrong, and then also not committing to staying away from her.

Yesterday yesterday on the show, that he just said, that's perfectly fine.

I will never go to her school. Has he gone to her school?

No? I I have never gotten a call.

No.

And I want to say he hasn't really gotten to any schools.

Right, he had a health issue after after being elected, and so he really has not even been able.

To serve in his capacity.

So I don't know that he's done any school visits or very many.

I don't.

I've never gotten a call that that he's gone there. But also you have to realize I only spoke about this like he's like it's been two years, Like that's false. This happened in January is when I started speaking out about it, and then.

By Devil's Advocate.

Let me just play Devil's advocate a little bit, because I can understand why this would be upsetting. I have a daughter. I get it, you want to protect your child. But you've been very vocal saying that he is uh sexually assaulted your daughter.

Is that accurate? Okay? Has have you said that.

He is like basically that he gets sexual gratification in any way from doing this stuff in front of children.

So he has referred to that book as pornography multiple times, whether it be on you know, other podcasts. An article he wrote for the Gazette before he referred to this book as pornography multiple times. And I have said the definition of pornography is pornography is for arousal. Right, So if you're saying in one breath that this book is pornography and then you're reading it to children.

To make a pure concerns about that in the library, there's something wrong with that, Okay, But you're assigning a motive here, and this is where it gets dodgy for me. You're a side because I've known Derek for years and I've known him to be an upstanding good person who really really cares about his community and really really cares and wants to do good, which is why in my view, and I'm not gonna I'm not gonna try and describe motives or make an excuse for him.

That's not my role here.

But I can understand why someone is trying to make a point that, you know, a book does not belong in a library when you have specific questions about book banning or things of that nature.

I just had this discussion with my sixteen.

Year old daughter, like, let's talk about what the words book banning mean, so I can understand what and I think it was a bad choice by him. I just want to say that if it's a kid's venue bad choice to read this, you you should have shows in different words, whatever, I am with you that this was

It's not that big a deal.

It's you know, so to to infer that he read the book because he enjoys reading those books to children is a huge leap and one that I don't.

Think is necessarily fair.

And that's you know that you're entitled the opinion. My opinion is mine.

I don't think that sexual thing own man to look out into an audience of young children, like there.

Was some there was elementary kids there.

And so how do you prove a point that a book is so this Like, don't get me wrong, this book is in one high school. Okay, So this book is in one high school. So you are trying to make a point that it is so damaging for high school kids that you're going to read it to elementary and middle school kids, Like that doesn't that defies all logical.

But you think he gets sexual gratification.

Out of that So it's funny because there was a discussion on like a Republican chat group where a former Senate candidate Eli Bremer was talking about a situation at a local city council meeting where there were some people that had come to that meeting and had read excerpts out of this book. So I had quoted. I had read Eli Bremer's quote about said something about like it's like, you know, sexual deviant behavior for a grown man to read this sort of thing in public.

I never said those things.

I was reading quotes that like other people had said about people that did that.

So there's the.

Whole thing is just a bunch of hyperbole and him misquoting me and sort of just you know, twisting words to make it seem like I have somehow gone around town and you know, defamed him in some way, shape or form. I mean, he won the election after he did it. So it's like, I don't know how one equals the other. But if it seems time, like I said, like, there's.

Delay, so I see your.

Mouth's okay, It's just I'm trying to get We're almost out of time, and I want to get this one question. Do you think he is that that people should be afraid of Derek Wilburn, that he's going to sexually assault or otherwise do something inappropriate to a child.

It is my opinion that his judgment around children is extremely concerning. I believe that if you look out into an audience of children and read pornography to them without any I mean, he said on your show yesterday that he knew he had the mic and there wasn't anything they could do about it, and it was and I mean.

The only other people who had a MIC was a sixteen year old and a seventeen year old, and I don't know what he could us to do.

I mean, I agree with you that that was an inappropriate thing to do. But what I'm having a hard time with is the is the sort of never ending drumbeat of assault of accusing him of doing really horrible things. Did he have a horrible moment of judgment? I agree with you that was bad judgment on his part. And he said yesterday, if I had to do it again, I would have done it a lot differently. He said it on the show yesterday.

Which that's the first time he has ever said anything like that. He has never even remotely come close to anything of an apology. He's never agreed to not go to my child's school or else. The administration would have not put a safety plan in place for her, so this could have all been avoided if from the very beginning he said that was a bad call.

I'm sorry.

I would never do anything to harm a child, and I would never go to her school. And I just I said, from the very beginning, like, I am going to keep talking about this because your lack of accountability shows me that you.

Don't think it's wrong.

And if you don't think it's wrong, you shouldn't be around kids. That is my opinion to this day. I don't waver from that at all. I don't think that it is normal behavior to read graphic sexual content about rape and incest to small children at a student event.

So you are you are not?

I just want to I have a lot of people on the text line saying, so do you want the books in the library or not?

Can I actually step in on this one?

So no?

Send stap on him almost out of time, and I just want to get.

I'll answer that that was another thing that he, you know, miss about advocated for these types of books in middle school libraries ever.

But it's this from a high school library.

Yeah, and my my opinion, I would never fight for this book to be in a high school library ever, and I never have so to pay me. I'm not I'm not the left, I'm not a leftist. I'm not any of these things. I'm not you know, a wacko like you. You know you described me like I'm just a mom and I'm and I'm not an activist either. I'm a dedicated district volunteer. I serve on our district accountability committee. I serve on both accountability committees for my children's schools.

Roots in this community. And your point.

I had an amicable relationship with Derek. The last conversation that I had with him was comparing notes. I sent him a bunch of information because our spouses were going through chemo at the same time.

That was the last conversation I had with him before there.

So to tap me as like some angry person that he won it couldn't be further from the truth.

Well, Bernie, did I appreciate you coming on? I'm completely out of time, so it will get say, it'll get sorted out. I appreciate you making time for us today, and uh, we'll just we'll let the courts decide. I appreciate you.

Yep, we sure will. Thank you so much for you