After years of opposition from rural Republicans and urban Democrats, the Texas Legislature passed a school voucher bill April 17.
Texas now joins at least 15 other states with some form of taxpayer-funded vouchers for private education that critics say destabilize public education and favor evangelical Christian schools.
Passing such a bill in Texas has been a top priority of Gov. Greg Abbott and of a few billionaire donors who fund him and the Texas Republican Party. But in previous attempts, voucher legislation has been blocked by a coalition of big-city Democrats and small-town Republicans who see public schools as the lifeblood of their communities.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott speaks during the NRA ILA Leadership Forum May 18, 2024, in Dallas, Texas. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
After failing to get his wish in the last legislative session, Abbott and his allies put up opponents to otherwise conservative legislators in the Republican primaries, largely replacing voucher opponents with voucher advocates.
In the Texas House yesterday, Democrats offered an amendment that would have put school vouchers up for a statewide vote in November. Vouchers never have won support in a public election anywhere in the United States. However, only one Republican — former House Speaker Dade Phelan of Beaumont — voted with the Democrats and the amendment failed.
Early Thursday morning, April 17, the Texas House voted 85-63 to approve a $1 billion private school voucher program. The bill was opposed by every present Democrat and two Republicans.
The Senate already had approved a similar bill. Now, the two chambers must resolve the differences between their voucher plans.
That makes school vouchers the closest to reality they ever have been in Texas.
Charles Foster Johnson
“Today, the Texas House of Representatives betrayed the children of Texas,” said Charles Foster Johnson, executive director of Pastors for Texas Children, one of the most stalwart opponents of vouchers.
He called the bill a “reckless subsidy program that rips public dollars out of our neighborhood schools and hands them to unaccountable private institutions.”
“This vote was not about what’s best for Texas children,” he added. “It was about power and profit. A handful of billionaire donors have bought our Legislature, and Gov. Abbott has handed our public school system over to them in exchange for political favor. This scheme fails our poorest children, violates the Texas Constitution, and uses public tax dollars to fund the establishment of religion — all under the false flag of ‘parental choice.’”
Abbott, meanwhile, claimed victory.
“This is an extraordinary victory for the thousands of parents who have advocated for more choices when it comes to the education of their children,” he said in a statement.
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