Jennifer Berkshire looks at the pressure on blue state governors to sign on to the federal voucher boondoggle. Let’s visit Massachusetts.
First, a quick recap. Buried in the 1000 page behemoth known as the One Big Beautiful Bill was the nation’s first-ever federal voucher program. Long a conservative pipe dream, notwithstanding those on the right who staunchly opposed the idea as federal overreach, the new voucher program gives tax-payers a tax credit of unprecedented generosity if they donate to a so-called scholarship granting organization. I’ll get into more on how this will and won’t work below, but the key detail for the purposes of this post is that governors must opt into the bill in order for their states to participate. So far 27 have signed up, leaders of red states all, save for one Jared Polis, the outgoing governor of Colorado. And while the pressure on Democratic governors so far has come from Republican-controlled legislators in states including Kansas and Kentucky, the voucher express is now rolling into blue states.
Which brings us to a recent event that convened, among others, former Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, edupreneur Kevin Chavous, and a who’s who of Massachusetts education reform and philanthropy leaders, all rallying around a message for Governor Maura Healey: “sign up for vouchers—for the kids.” For a full play-by-play of the gathering, read every word of this write up by veteran journalist (and longtime friend of yours truly) Yawu Miller. As Miller notes, while the messaging was both muddled and deeply misleading, the new Massachusetts Educational Opportunities Coalition reflects impressive organizing.
The National Parents Union is spearheading the local coalition which aims to pressure Gov. Maura Healey to adopt the tax credit program. So far, the group counts 124 organizations in support, including The Pioneer Institute, The Boston Foundation, the Lynch Foundation, 45 individual Catholic Schools, 18 Montessori Schools, 13 Jewish day schools, the umbrella organizations supporting those types of schools and dozens of YMCAs and Boys and Girls Clubs.
Bad timing
A key part of the sales pitch for bringing vouchers to Massachusetts is that the cause is bipartisan. Which made it all the more awkward that on the very day of the coalition’s debut, 32 Democratic senators, including both Massachusetts senators, dropped a bill to repeal the federal voucher program on the grounds that it will 1) decimate public schools and 2) explode the federal deficit. In a hard-hitting op-ed, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly warned that universal vouchers had “broken” his state. And while the Wall Street Journal was quick to paint Kelly as a toady of the teachers unions, the bill’s co-sponsors include among them some famously choice-y Democrats: Cory Booker and Michael Bennett. Bennett, by the way, is running to replace out-going Colorado Governor Jared Polis, to date the program’s lone blue backer. (Contrary to claims on the coalition’s website, North Carolina Governor Josh Stein has not opted his state into the program.)