Texas And The Conservative Pushback On School Vouchers
From Forbes.com
Conservatives can be found on several sides of the school voucher debate, and Governor Greg Abbott’s dream of a Texas school voucher program is caught between them.
In states where pro-voucher lawmakers have held sway, the movement to install taxpayer-funded school vouchers has, so far, been marked by a hands off approach, with state laws that specifically forbid any sort of government oversight and offer private schools a combination of state funds and the freedom to spend them as they wish.
But conservatives are also fans of accountability and transparency. The parental rights movement has focused on accountability for public schools based on heightened transparency, right down to making daily lesson plans public, as in the Parents Bill of Rights passed by House of Representatives in 2023.
That desire for accountability has sometimes put Republicans among the opponents of taxpayer-funded school vouchers. South Dakota Republicans just killed two bills intended to create expanded school voucher systems. Rep. Melissa Heerman said one bill would use taxpayer money to fund alternatives to public schools with little accountability or oversight, as reported by Morgan Matzen at the Sious Falls Argus Leader.
SB 2, the most recent version of Texas’s recurring voucher bill, offers more accountability measures than many voucher laws in other states, but that has drawn the ire of some conservatives.
On X (Twitter), conversations rage branding “so -called ‘school choice’” as an attempt by the state to extend its grasp into private schools and homeschool. Abbott’s vouchers would grow government and shuffle money to “unelected bureaucrats and crony companies,” complain critics like Brian Roberts of the Grayson County Conservatives. SB 2 includes testing and data reporting requirements that many conservatives and home schoolers see as an extension of the hand of government.
Parent activist Tracy Hanes of the conservative Families Engaged for Effective Education tweeted a full-throated reply to Abbott’s call for vouchers:
Education Savings Accounts (ESAs) and vouchers are a Trojan horse for government control. By offering taxpayer-funded subsidies to private schools, virtual learning, and homeschool families, the government will ultimately dictate the terms of education in every sector. Once public funding enters, so do regulations, mandates, and oversight—eroding the very freedoms that make private and home education viable alternatives.
This isn’t “choice”—it’s a complete government takeover, turning students, teachers, and their data into commodities in a system that prioritizes profit and control over genuine learning and local autonomy. Public schools are already captive markets, and universal school choice would pull private and home educators into the same bureaucratic web, ensuring no child is truly free from government influence.