Americans Are Turning Against School Vouchers…

By
Jennifer C. Berkshire

Hope for our precious children’s future: a Strong, Successful Public Education…

Americans across the partisan divide seem increasingly fed up with school voucher schemes, which funnel public funds to unaccountable private entities. Even Betsy DeVos’s lobbying group is getting nervous about the voucher backlash…

That’s how many Arizonans support that state’s Wild West voucher scheme. If the figure seems surprising given the ardency of the sales pitch for “education freedom,” its source should send your eyebrows skyward. This bleak view of Arizona public opinion about the state’s $1-billion-plus Education Savings Account (ESA) program comes not from voucher haters but from their superfans: the American Federation for Children (AFC), the deep-pocketed and highly influential school-choice lobbying firm started by “Betsy DeVos”…

To understand why AFC is decidedly downcast even as vouchers are on the move, we need to make a trip to the Grand Canyon State, where last month, the state Supreme Court deprived voters of the opportunity to weigh in on whether the famously fraud-ridden voucher program should be more tightly regulated. The backstory is complicated — riddled with backstabbing, late-night shenanigans, and dueling ballot questions — which is why we’re speeding ahead to the aftermath. While Arizona’s pro-voucher forces popped the champagne corks over the death of the ESA reform effort, DeVos’s crew sounded a far more cautionary note to the effect of: “This program is deeply unpopular, and unless we crack down on fraud and implement some standards to convince the public that it’s actually working, vouchers in Arizona are doomed.”