CV NEWS FEED // A handful of red states are looking to forge ahead with passing comprehensive school choice legislation in 2024.
“The short answer on school choice in 2024 is that it’s going to happen in states controlled by the parents’ party – the Republican Party,” school choice advocate Corey DeAngelis, PhD, told FOX News.
“We’ve already had nine or ten states go universal on school choice in the past two years alone,” he explained.
“We have 22 states in the country right now that have GOP trifectas, where the Republicans control both chambers of the legislature and the governor’s office,” DeAngelis continued. He said that he expects to “see momentum” in the “dozen or so” of the states that have not already passed universal school choice.
“Be on the lookout for a lot of … friendly competition among red states,” the American Federation for Children (AFC) Senior Fellow stated.
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DeAngelis named a couple of states in which he expects universal or near-universal school choice to materialize soon.
One of these states is Tennessee, where Republican Gov. Bill Lee formally presented the Education Freedom Scholarship Act last month.
According to The Tennessean, this program “would provide 20,000 students up to $7,075 each to attend private or home schools, with a plan to expand to universal eligibility in 2025.”
In addition, DeAngelis singled out Louisiana, whose incoming Republican Gov. Jeff Landry is taking office January 8.
DeAngelis called the state’s outgoing Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards a “barrier” to passing school choice there. During his eight-year tenure, the governor vetoed multiple school choice bills proposed by Louisiana’s Republican-dominated legislature.
However, the activist expressed optimism with Landry’s record on the issue. “When a universal school choice bill gets to his desk, he probably isn’t going to veto it. He’s going to sign it happily.”
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FOX News’ Joshua Q. Nelson indicated that Alabama and Mississippi are likely to consider universal school choice in the coming year as well, given recent remarks by their respective governors.
“My goal is for Alabama to be the most school choice-friendly state in the nation,” Republican Gov. Kay Ivey recently said:
I want us to have lots of school choices for our parents to choose from. We are working now, already, now, on a bill, an ESA bill, an education savings account bill, to present to the legislature in the next session and I’m very optimistic that will pass.
The recently re-elected Republican Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves has made similar comments.
“There’s been a huge push among Republicans around the country to give parents more options in their kids’ education,” he said:
We have seen tremendous progress when it comes to educational achievement levels in our state and the obvious next step is more school choice. And I hope the legislature acts on that and I believe there’s a lot of people in the legislature who want to do that.
Nelson also named Texas and North Dakota as states that could potentially pass universal school choice next year after suffering setbacks in 2023.
“DeAngelis noted that other states to look out for to make advancements in school choice are Missouri, Wyoming, Kentucky, Nebraska, and Idaho,” Nelson added.
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DeAngelis also stressed his belief that school choice is a winning issue at the ballot box.
“In the midterms there wasn’t really a red wave, there wasn’t a blue wave, but there was a school choice wave,” he told FOX. He noted that 76% of the 2022 candidates backed by AFC won their races.
“Forty of the 69 incumbents we targeted for opposing parental rights lost,” he said. “Parents are a political voting block and they’re also a political juggernaut that politicians are starting to listen to.”
