A push for school choice was short-lived in Trump’s first term. They may now have a more willing Congress

WASHINGTON — The election of Donald Trump returns a school ally to the White House, this time with a Republican-controlled Senate — and possibly the House — that could be more supportive of proposals that failed during his first term.

Although private school expansion proposals suffered major defeats in several states, Trump’s victory brought new optimism to advocates of supporting school choice at the federal level. One of their top priorities: tax credits for donations to organizations that provide scholarships for private schools.

Jim Blew, who was assistant secretary in the U.S. Department of Education in the first Trump administration, said he hopes the new Congress will give the green light to ideas like tax credits for scholarships.

“The new members are all very clear in support of school choice, and I think that will change the dynamic,” said Blew, who founded the conservative Defense of Freedom Institute.

Private school choice encompasses several ways to use taxpayer dollars to support education outside of traditional public schools, including vouchers, education savings accounts, and tax credit scholarships. The idea of ​​offering that option to all families regardless of income — known as universal private school choice — has grown in popularity in recent years and is now enshrined in law in a dozen states. Nearly three dozen states have some form of private school choice.

However, the concept has been pushed back — and not just from groups like teachers unions that have long advocated for keeping public money in public schools. Some conservatives in states with large rural communities have questioned the merits of the programs, citing a lack of private schools in sparsely populated areas. In those areas, public school districts are often the largest employer.

In Tuesday’s election, Kentucky voters rejected a measure to allow public funding for private school attendance, and Nebraska voted to partially repeal a law that uses taxpayer money to subsidize private education. A proposed constitutional amendment in Colorado that would have established schoolchildren’s “right to school choice” was also defeated.

Concerns about the diversion of money from public education appeared to be gaining ground in Kentucky and Nebraska. Ferial Pearson, president of a Nebraska public education advocacy organization, said he will continue to work to give public schools “the support and resources they need to thrive.”

In Kentucky, Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday that voters sent a clear message that taxpayer dollars should go to public schools.

“This should end any debate. And this should end any attempts to take money from our public schools to send to private schools that are not accountable,” Beshear said at a news conference. He renewed his proposal for bigger pay raises for public school teachers and other school staff, along with his plan to establish universal pre-K in Kentucky.

To some observers, it was no surprise that even states that voted for Trump took a stand against school choice.

“Especially in the wake of the pandemic, with all the school closings and learning losses and chronic absenteeism, parents want something different, but they also like their public schools,” said Liz Cohen, director of policy at FutureEd, a nonpartisan think tank. at Georgetown University. “People want something new, but that doesn’t mean they want to get rid of everything.”

Cohen, who has studied the expansion of private school choice across the country, pointed out that decisions on a ballot measure “feel much more local and specific than who you’re voting for president.”

During his campaign, Trump promoted school choice as a form of greater parental rights meant to counter what conservative critics describe as left-wing indoctrination in classrooms and promote a free-market approach to education.

One of his platform pledges is to “serve as a champion for America’s homeschool families” and “to protect the God-given right of every parent to be stewards of their children’s education.” He proposes allowing homeschooling families to use 529 college savings plans to pay for their children’s education expenses, an option he advanced for private school families during his first term.

In that term, Trump appointed Betsy DeVos — a staunch supporter of school choice — as secretary of education. That administration, however, struggled to remove its school choice grounds. An effort to provide federal tax credits for scholarship donations failed, as did proposals to cut billions of dollars in federal public school programs.

With a more favorable Congress, those initiatives might have a better chance. U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, supported tax incentives for scholarship donations. And Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said he would focus the next Congress on “maximizing school choice for parents and holding woke university administrators accountable.”

Some conservatives argue that there would be advantages to leaving the issue to the states.

“I worry that we’re going to go back to the political dynamic of Trump’s first term, which was very damaging to the charter school sector in blue states,” said Michael Petrilli, president of the Fordham Institute, a right-wing think tank. tank. “Because Trump has strongly supported school choice, including charter schools, he has made these issues radioactive on the left, so reform-minded Democrats have been marginalized or silenced.”

In other races across the country, preliminary results show that victories for school board candidates in Los Angeles and Chicago were concentrated among candidates who promoted traditional public education over alternatives such as charters.

In Texas, various pro-voucher lawmakers backed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott won their races. Abbott sought to unseat GOP lawmakers who voted against a plan to subsidize the private school with public money. Newly elected candidates could give Abbott the votes needed to pass that voucher legislation.

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Associated Press writer Bruce Schreiner contributed to this report from Louisville, Ky.