Writing for First Focus on Children, Lily Klam and Chris Becker earlier this year provided an in-depth look at the threat of school vouchers.
Over the past five years, private school voucher schemes have rapidly expanded. Many supporters particularly favor universal school vouchers. Universal voucher policies allow any student, regardless of their family income level or history of attending public schools, to be eligible to use public funding to attend private, often religious, schools or home schooling. From 2021 to 2025, the number of statewide universal voucher programs has gone from zero to thirteen.
These efforts have succeeded despite low public support for vouchers. When asked directly about vouchers, voters refuse them. Since 1970, voters have rejected the creation or expansion of private school vouchers every time they have been proposed. For instance, in the November elections, Kentucky and Nebraska resoundingly rejected a ballot initiative on school vouchers, but still voted for President Trump, who has made school privatization a pillar of his Agenda 47. Colorado also rejected a proposed voucher initiative.
Despite the consistent rejection of policies that divert public funds from private schools, billionaire donors have remained committed to privatization policies. Billionaires have backed the push for public school vouchers and have funded opposition campaigns against those who oppose them. For example, billionaires poured tens of millions of dollars into pro-voucher candidates in Arizona. This proposal ended up creating chaos in the state’s budget. In FY 2024, Arizona’s voucher program, which was originally estimated to cost $65 million, ended up costing over $300 million, contributing to the state’s $1.4 billion shortfall. The budget deficit caused serious cuts to a variety of critical programs, including water infrastructure and highway expansions.
The Trump Administration is pushing lawmakers to create a national, universal, voucher scheme and in late January the President issued a sweeping executive order to prioritize and expand school voucher programs nationwide. These programs could financially decimate public schools, increase discrimination, create a greater income divide, and ensure that the United States has two different education systems with vastly disparate resources.
Voucher programs may use terminology such as “school choice,” “education savings accounts,” “opportunity scholarships,” or “tax credit scholarships.” While policymakers use a range of terms to describe voucher programs, they all function similarly: by diverting public funding to private schools. Since many constituents associate the term “voucher” with negative perceptions, supporters often use alternative terminology as a strategy to pass unpopular policies.
Read here the full report to see who’s behind the push and why it is bad news.